Auli to Gorson Bugyal Hike: A walk in Paradise

When we (Ritansh, Sonali, Poonam and I) planned Uttrakhand backpack trip, i have had no idea on how beautiful this trip was going to be. We have already covered Chopta and Tungnath and now our expectation were set to high. Auli did not fail us either.

7^th Feb 2017, Joshimath

Joshimath is originally a pilgrim town and is centre point for the valleys of Badrinath, Niti and Auli. Normally it’s a sleepy sloppy town in winter with not a single devotee in the town. But as Auli has started to attract tourist in winter, you find some buzz around.

So while on we planned Backpack Uttrakhand, Indeed Joshimath was on list. Now we (Ritansh, Sonali, poonam and I), were to decide where to go. We roamed around Joshimath on 7^th Feb. It’s a beautiful and small mountain town.

History of Joshimath

Joshimath, also known as Jyotirmath has a very interesting history and rich culture. It is home to one of the four cardinal pīthas established by Adi Shankara. Between 7th and 11th centuries C.E., Katyuri kings, who were originally from Joshimath, ruled the area of varying extent from their capital at "Katyur" (modern day Baijnath) valley in Kumaon. The Katyuri dynasty was founded by Vashudev Katyuri.

The ancient Basdeo temple at Joshimath is attributed to Vasu Dev. Vasu Dev was of Buddhist origin, but later followed Brahminical practices and the brahminical practices of Katyuri kings in general is sometimes attributed to a vigorous campaign of Adi Shankara (788-820 CE).

Katyuri kings were displaced by the Chand Kings in the 11th century AD. Joshimath is said to a winter home to chief priest to Badrinath. There were 4 water driven flour mills in the rows in ascending ways. The water was carried by engraved wood canals. Joshimath is surrounded by thick woods of pine and oaks.

After discussing with locals, we came to know that Auli is the best destination in winter to be. So next day we planned for Auli and hike to Gorson bugyal.

8^th Feb 2017, Auli from Joshimath: Auli Ropeway.

Auli is 16 kms from Joshimath by road. There is a serpentine road goes up in the valley from Joshimath. But we opted for ropeway.

The Auli ropeway is the highest ropeway in India. This 4 kms long ropeway takes you from Joshimath @ 1906.3 m and terminates at Auli at height of 3016.3 m.

Auli unfolded its unexplored glory as the slow-moving car gave us spectacular experience to observe at leisure the breathtaking scenery around them.

It was as fascinating as we went through thick pine woods of Nandadevi National park and slowly emerged snow capped plains of bugyal and snow capped mountains.

The ropeway take you to straight to Auli International Skiing centre.

8^th Feb 2017, Auli International Skiing Centre

To our surprise, we have such a big scale international skiing centre at Auli. W found so many international tourists flocking this skiing centre.

It provides a superb panoramic view of the huge mountain peaks like Nanda Devi, Kamet and Dronagiri.

From January to March, the Auli slopes are usually covered with a thick carpet of snow, about 3m deep. Skiing festivals are also conducted at Auli. These now include the national and international championships in the months of February and March, organised by the Winter Games Federation of India.

The international skiing centre also has the 500m ski-lift system, the longest cable car in Asia connecting Joshimath with Gorson, above Auli. A short distance beyond Gorson lays the hill of Gorson Top, which provides superb mountain scenes and international standard flawless snow slopes marks the 4km long ski runs. Once reaching the ski begin point they can ski down rapidly, while other can walk down the snow-paths at leisure.

There are two snow-beaters imported from Germany, for beating the snow for skiing. The slopes have been dressed and improved making them perfect for hosting skiing festivals and competitions of national and international standards.

8^th Feb 2017, Auli to Gorson Bugyal Top Hike

It is 4 kms long trek from Skiing centre to top of Bugyal top point. The top point of the Gorson Bugyal offers 270 degree view of surrounding Himalayan mountain ranges. Off course we decided to go for this hike. We were already so excited with the kind of snow the skiing centre have had. But we had no idea how beautiful this trek was going to be.

It initially got us into another super thick snow covered beautiful through Oak, Rhododendron and Birch wood forest. It reminded me of a divine forest straight out of a setting of Narnia.

We soon came across a beautiful Padiyar temple. The reds of the Padiyar temple stood brilliantly on the whites of snow. If you have an interest in bird photography, you will fall in love with this place where you can sight some rare Himalayan bird species.

We obviously took a break here to eat snow, yes Sonali ate snow. And we also had a small photo shoot.

Walking uphill, the first sight of Bugyal uncovered and left us speechless. The long long slopes of snow covered bugyal looked perfect picturesque.

Walking about 30 more mins took us to the top of Gorson bugyal, known to be a skier’s paradise; it has one of the longest skiing slopes in Asia.

They say, there wild bears and fox in the mountains. Not sure of the pumarks, but we saw some of these as well.

The glorious view of towering Himalayan peaks such as Nanda Devi 7817 metres, the Mana Parvat 7273 metres and Dronagiri 7066 metre made our day.

I took a 270 degree timelaspe from the top. You can view Nanda Devi, 7,817 m, Dronagiri 7066m, Barmal 5879 m, Hathi Parbat 6727 m, Ghori Parbat 6708 m, Nilgiri Parbat 6474 m, Nar Parbat 5855, Devban 6855 m, Mana 7272 m, Kamet 7756 m, Bhagnyu 5706 m, Narayan Parbat 5965 m, Nilkanth 6596 m.

After having enough fun, it was time to come back and Sonali already had her plans on how to go down. She caught hold of local guide who had the tire. It was fun ride on tyre slipping on snow slopes.