Wrapped in silent solitude

Burbling rivers, faint rustling of leaves, the humming of a water mill and whistling wind in Uttarakhand’s Darma Valley sing a song of nature.
Darma Valley
Darma Valley

In the remote Himalayan village of Naagling in northeastern Uttarakhand, the arrival of darkness fuels frantic activity among villagers, who prepare for the ritual of spirit worship or devta naach. In the courtyard of a traditional stone house decorated with colourful carved wooden frames, beedis do the rounds as villagers filter in and sit around a sweltering fire.

Traditional drums, known as dhol and damua, are heated over a shimmering blaze. Conversations are drowned in spine-tingling thuds interspersed with crashing of cymbals as the drums come alive, shattering the eerie silence of a chilly night. The roar of distant river is lost in the music as the silent Darma Valley shakes itself from its slumber and sways in this song of the Himalayas.

Naagling shares its border with Nepal and Tibet, and has historically been a centre of trade, leading to a healthy inflow of cultures and ideas.

The neighbouring valleys of Vyas, Chaudas and Darma abound with legends of daredevil traders navigating snowy high altitude passes with caravans carrying pulses, spices, jaggery and tobacco and returning with salt, Tibetan wool and borax.

The passage of time has brought mixed fortune to Darma Valley. A serpentine unmetalled road to Naagling means precious days saved trekking through punishing terrain. Efforts are underway to provide solar-produced electricity to far off villages.

Beyond Naagling, the trail parts ways with an under-construction dusty road and darts into a jungle of deodar, oak and birch, offering cursory views of radiant peaks in the distance and threaded by gurgling streams bounding over huge boulders.

The shaky wooden bridge over the howling Galchini River is crowded with flock of sheep and goats herded by rugged men and women returning from the bugyals (high altitude meadows). As one approaches Baaling village, the imposing presence of Panchachuli Group of peaks is felt instantly, their silken slopes rising behind heavily wooded ridges.

Perched on a bluff looking out on the Dhauli Ganga River, Baaling is a quintessential Himalayan village with cramped stone houses amid terraced fields. In autumn, courtyards are stacked with firewood for winter, and pulses such as rajma and black soya beans soak in the glaring afternoon sunshine.

Uninterested yaks and mules graze nearby on the last remnants of grass. Further on the path, majestic mountains rise on both sides of this valley, white summits with glaciers running down their slopes and vertical crags adorned with brown parched grass. The villages of Bon and Philam shelter in the shadow of these giants with terraced fields running from their boundaries to strips of deodar trees lining crumbling cliffs overlooking the Dhauli Ganga.

This simple but thoroughly entertaining walk culminates in the twin villages of Duktu and Daatu straddling the Meola River, a tributary of Dhauli Ganga.

Very few human settlements in the Himalayas offer such excellent views as relished from the heights of Daatu. The five white pillars of Panchachuli rise starkly, dwarfing the landscape of the River Meola. A comfortable stillness pervades the scenery complemented by the burbling river, faint rustling of leaves, the humming of a water mill and a whistling wind.

The base camp of Panchachuli Peaks is accessible by a 4 km trek that takes one above the tree line and past a moving glacier of ice, rocks and gravel, peppered with menacing crevasses and glacial caves.

For someone who has trudged into this sanctuary, battling cold and fatigue, the ultimate reward is to witness a golden glow hop on the mountaintops as summits are lit like diyas dispelling the blackness of a freezing dawn. And with this hope one succumbs to a deep slumber aided by an unearthly silence broken occasionally by tinkling of bells as restless mules wander in the peaceful valley.

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The New Indian Express
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