In the worst of times

My Pilgrimage

Kangra Devi - Gautam Buddha - Anandpur Sahib Darbar

 This blog is more of a photographic essay . Some words do come to me but I am not sure about the quality as per me.

I am going through one of my worst phases of my life, with problems galore more or less after shifting from Khan Market flat. All my hopes of a good quality life have been shattered.


I have never been an atheist but also not a fanatic. I have been very moderate in my beliefs and I believe in philosophies of all religions. There was a beautiful book by Dr. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan our second President of India. He was a great scholar philosopher writer, a statesman and a man of knowledge. In his book he mentions that we all are trying to reach the same peak but have taken different routes to reach it. Each religion preaches brotherhood and peace. He wrote about the various religions and their practices. 

Our Kul Devi - Kangra Devi or Vajreshwari Devi 

Surely in times of distress we all move closely to our faith, seek divine intervention by visiting places of worship, hope and miracles. I too went out in seeking positive influences to Himachal Pradesh where their are so many ancient temples. One of my cousins was told that we have a Kul Devi (family deity) - Vajreshwari Devi or Devi of Kangra and he should seek her divine blessings by visiting the temple. So many from our large family visited the temple in Kangra and I also thought that I should make a trip along with my wife. So on this last Sunday, the 15th. we started in the morning at 6:24 am from Noida. Fortunately we had a nice Sikh driver Amarjeet who drove very safely and was nice to talk as well. He owned the car and I believe the difference in attitude.

Taken on my last trip

I had gone to Dharamshala 9 to 10 years back with a group of NIFT students in a bus. Buses travel late evenings and so I really do not remember the hours it took reach Upper Dharamshala. Road widening and fly overs to miss the congestions have been built in recent past. Quite a comfort of traveling by road.


We had planned to visit all popular temples en-route. We reached Chintpurni Devi temple around 4 or 5 PM. The place was full of pilgrims seeing a long queue with our turn coming around late evening, we moved on to reach Kangra Devi temple another 50 odd kilometers from there. 

Dal Lake McLeod Ganj
 taken during my last visit

We had our reservation through the net so were not sure about the location of the hotel - Dal Lake Resort. During the day I did remember having visited the Dal Lake in my last visit with the students. There was no trace of any water, some redevelopment taking place, hopefully they make it a tourist attraction with new landscaping with refilled water.


We were in the main Kangra Devi temple by 7 PM and did have our dharsan but we wanted to come back again the next day. 

The family boy taking care of his elders and helping
them in fulfillment of a pilgrimage 

The route we took to reach the temple was very steep down hill with car, thought there might be a way out but it was a dead end. With difficulty the car could be reversed. We had stayed back for the temple. With so many monkeys we had to be very careful as they can be ferocious. We all know how they can be dangerous as they snatch things from the hands. It was a tough climb with every step we had to watch our selves from the monkeys with not people around except a few residents. 

The shops on both side did help in reducing
the stress of a steep climb

The next day evening we came back for the revisit took the correct route from inside the town and surely this was the right entry. The car could be easily parked and our climb to the temple was very comfortable, though the climb was steep but with low steps it did make all the difference. There were shops lined on both sides, I am sure it also makes all the difference. 

I did love to capture a few more frames
but keeping the comforts of the other pilgrims
grabbed a few shots

We had very nice dharsan and Pundit ji conducted the special Puja beautifully, gave a lot of satisfaction to our disturbed mind. All these temples of faith have lots of positive energy. It was so very nice that the Pundit ji permitted me take a few photographs of the deity, so I had to be quick not to disturb the other devotees.

Gautam Buddha

During the day on Monday we visited the McLeod Ganj Monastery. The open areas have modern covers, looks good. 

This receives a lots of faithfuls from many religions from around the world. The town is full of many foreigners who come meditation. It will not be a surprise if many connected to the Hollywood are found to be having a peaceful quality time in McLeod Ganj.

The prayers by the disciples in the prayer hall. There are drum beats in between the hymns are very reassuring and soothing. 

One of the faithfuls

One of the disciples doing the ritual prayer exercise in the hall. It was very soothing to have spent some time sitting on the floor taking some pictures of people wal\
king in.

The prayer exercise to keep the body fit

They have outside the hall platforms where the believers perform the ritual exercises. Watching it, one can understand these are kind of exercises to keep fit. In extreme cold conditions they are used to living some exercise is too required to keep the body in shape. Each religion has its way of keeping their faithfuls in good health.

In the hall of the monastery

On our way out we stopped for Lemon-Ginger-Honey drink. I did drink lots of it on my last visit. It is very freshing as a matter of fact. Perhaps it as more Lemon-Honey drink than with Ginger. This brew had lots of long thin strips of Ginger. (how silly not to have taken a photo of the served beverage) Ginger juice may have made it very strong in taste. I did like it any way. After this we had gone to the Kangra Devi Temple.

The McLeod Ganj Chowk

On our way back from the temple we really did not find any decent appealing place to stop for late Lunch. So I opted for a Tibetan lunch in McLeod Ganj as it has more visitors and so the food is always good and fresh. We sat to have our meals in Tibet Kitchen at the Chowk. The town is small with lots of footfall. 


There is so much of car movement, so they have tried to regulate through one way st]\\reet, but at the Chowk there is always a waiting as one road leads to Bahgsu Temple / water fall. 

I wanted to go to the fall but my memory played truant and  took the wrong road. Perhaps our tea was written at this small shop that catered to the area with a variety of products of regular needs of the people living there. The guy works with Foreign Affairs ministry with his posting in his village and has a side business to keep himself busy.

This was Tuesday and there was rain and storm brewing up. We reached back to the Chowk. First we took shelter in the small bus stop under the McOllo restaurant. I did want to shoot some photos of the activity at the Chowk; decided to walk up the stairs of the restaurant, but the wind was too strong blowing in rain where we stood. 

We had to take shelter in the restaurant. This restaurant is one of the busiest outlets. It was full of crowd who had come to see the IPL match in Dharamshala. The RCB team was staying in McLeod Ganj.

Destination Ladhak

Hi all,
At last I made my Ladhak trip though not by road but by air. Took a direct Kingfisher Flight both ways. In air it was for one hour, that is not bad at all.

I landed in Leh on 24th August, 2011 and landed back in Delhi on 6th September 2011. The return flight was one hour late.

I had been trying to get some company of photographers, finding none I opted to travel alone. The group only helps in savings as the costs get divided and shared. In hind sight I feel it was good that I was alone as I could decide on spur of the moment my plans of travel, stay or stopping for meals. Besides there are greater chances of ending up with quite similar images like when I went with Babul Bhatt to Agra when his daughter commented that her father too had similar photos. There are merits and demerits of having a company or being alone.

Nazir the taxi owner cum driver was very good. I felt very safe in his Xylo by his driving. I had told him that I was in Ladhak specially for photography and was unlike any other tourist who try to make it destinations and back. So he was always alert to my requesting him to stop, that he did with out any complaints. He would also stop finding some thing interesting. He took me to shepherd areas. He also talked a guest house owner to accompany me to Turtuk village, as he knew the area and the people. He was in the Intelligence Corp, Pune during the 1971 war with Pakistan. This helped him in interaction with the people there. Later he joined the Forest Department that too helped him in developing contacts and also gave him an in depth knowledge about Ladhak's forest cover. I appreciate his presence in Turtuk village with me as I never felt I was intruding in to the privacy of the village people. This village being Muslim dominated, there were quite a few who did not want to be photographed, but still had many who had themselves photographed.

There were many children in the village. I had stopped on the way to buy some sweets (toffees). I bought a jar of coconut sweets that came in very handy. He and Nazir took the task of distributing the sweets in advance making many agreeable to get photographed. This also helped me to be free and shoot as no one realised my presence giving me ample opportunity to shoot.

The children had balloons that they were trying to blow air into them. I never realised these were given by some people already in the village. As we entered the village, I noticed there were 3 more photographers, one of them was a foreigner.

 We did say a hello but never got to know each other as they too were busy distributing balloons and shooting. They were mostly crowded by the children who wanted more balloons all the time. I think they carried some other gifts as well.

The armed forces have established many schools within commutable distances between villages to bring education to all the sections of Ladhak. We all know Ladhak is very sparsely populated, where population is spread out in small clusters.

The tough terrains, very loose bonding of mountain soil, low Oxygen levels, very strong sun, extreme UV exposure for skin and with sparse vegetation in many regions of Ladhak our armed forces, various agencies developing and maintaining the roads for good travel, I like to say a special thanks to them

All these forces have people from various parts of the country who are roughing out there by giving their today for our present comforts, a secured today and for a better tomorrow. I have taken more pictures, which I shall be adding in the later posting. This is a small dedication to all of them.

I will be adding more impressions and images as I build up my Ladhak trip blog.