An important part of mountaineering - An Expedition. On February 22, 2020, one message popped up on our mobile phone “ we are going to organize a beginner-level mountaineering Expedition that is Mt.Friendship Expedition which is situated in the Himalayas Dhuladhar mountain range, and altitude is 17350ft. "Those who want to be a part of an expedition should begin physical training and preparation for that."
In February 2020, we decided to do the Mt.Friendship Expedition. As a passionate mountaineer, it was a dream to be a part of any Expedition. We started physical training like 5 km of toe running, squats, pistol squats, situps, pushups, yoga, pranayama, etc. These are the basic requirements to be a part of any mountaineering Expedition and it is necessary otherwise you have to face many physical health and mental health issues.
Because of the Novel Corona Virus's unstoppable behavior, the Indian government declared a complete lockdown of the entire country on March 22, 2020.
We didn’t stop our daily exercise because we think it will end soon. But months come and go, and the situation has not changed. We got technical knowledge on online platforms and analyzed everyone’s physical training with the help of technology for the Mt. Friendship Expedition. Physical training is not the only requirement to be a part of an expedition, in addition to maintaining physical fitness, we have to face many financial expenses to organize an expedition. That was a big challenge for us because, due to the pandemic and lockdown, no one has any income sources. Obtaining sponsorship for the expedition was thus a significant challenge at the time. We started to approach corporate companies, self-finance businesses, sports academies, some brands, etc. But we didn’t get any positive response from anyone. Some people told us why we are sponsoring you for your traveling, and trekking. Some people told us why you want to put yourself in a dangerous and uncomfortable zone. Hearing these types of comments, we didn’t lose hope. With the help of social media, I connected with some enthusiastic people and was able to get sponsorship through crowdfunding.
After several months of lockdown, perhaps six months, the government of India began running trains to North India, but everyone was required to take a COVID test.
After so many discussions and searches for loopholes, the date was finally announced that 27, September 2020. We are all excited about mt. Friendship Expedition. We completed all the legal formalities, like obtaining permission for the expedition from the IMF (Indian Mountaineering Foundation) and registration. We packed our backpacks according to our needs, with the main item being woolen clothing because our expedition leader thoroughly explained the temperature of the location.
All set! Bag packed! We were ready.
We reached Ahmedabad railway station at 6:00 PM on 27, September with all the equipment and bags. We met lots of new people. We started our journey with 37 unknown mountaineers. Some people age is 15 years old or 41 years old. That kind of person also encourages us and teaches us that “Age doesn’t matter if you are passionate”
We caught the train and hold our seats. And the phone's notification ring rang, and it was a message from the expedition leader that, due to the PM of India's inauguration of the Atal Tunnel, the government of India had blocked all mountaineering routes through the Dhuladhar Mountain range. So we won't be able to summit Mt. Friendship this year, but we will be able to summit an alternate of Mt. Friendship. We arranged some technically difficult expeditions for all of you, and that is Mt. Jagatsukh Peak, whose height is 5050 m. We all are shocked and talking about the message and searching about the Jagatsukh peak. We discovered that no Gujarati mountaineering team or mountaineer had ever summited Jagatsukh Peak, so we are all set to climb Mt. Jagatsukh on behalf of Friendship Peak. The next day, at 10:00 AM, we reached the Old Delhi railway station. After that our journey from Delhi to Manali was continued by car.
We took 17 hours to reach our campsite in Jagatsukh village. The first day was free for acclimatization, practical knowledge, and training about how to use technical equipment. For acclimatization, we trek to Sajla waterfall. It is an amazing and beautiful place.
We back to the campsite and started packing for Expedition. Next-day Morning After the healthy sleep we all were ready with our rucksacks.
After trekking straight 3 hours we reached our very first basecamp “Chika” at 12:30pm. We pitched our tents near flowing river,took our lunch and hike nearby for acclimatization. There was a hidden temple of Nagraj Takshak. After listening that Me and my friend can’t control our eagerness and we went to find that temple. We climbed waterfall, hiked more and more up but we didn’t found that temple and we came back with some amazing memories and experience.
After sometimes our cook served us a hot vegetable soup. Cold temperature and hot soup it is not a bad combination. After that we took our dinner near by 7:00pm. After that we went back to our tents for rest and healthy sleep. May be I remember I was sleeping at 1:00am or 2:00am at home but there I was slept at 9:00pm.
Next day our eyes was opened at 5:30–6:00AM we did some stretching exercises to feel free body. On that day we have no more time to do other activities so we took our breakfast earlier and packed our tents and sleeping bags.
We continue our trek for our next base camp is a “Seri”. We walked more and more, crossed small waterfalls. We climbed more nd more and beautiful places comes nd go. we thought we took 2 hours more than yesterday’s trek but it was a record break trek in timing we took 7 to 8 hours to reached our basecamp Seri. But the view was the insane mountains looked like mountains are garnished with snow and waterfalls are making their way between that mountains and lake side camping was a best part of that seri campsite. We can clearly see our goal from our tents.
On that day I understood the fact that “when you climb incline you took less time than crossing passes and valley or straight climbing". On that day We took our lunch at 4:00pm. After lunch we put matress and sleeping bag out and start “Dayro". Once dayro start it’s not easy to stop.
When we started dayro our cook came with one surprise that was Maggie. On that day we walked 18 to 20km in a single day. Nearby 9:00pm we came back to our tents to take a nap. Next day early morning we found that the lake was little bit frozen in corner. Day’s starting was a beautiful and testy because we got chocolate pancakes in our breakfast at the 15000ft. That day our goal was occupy advance basecamp “Tenta" before afternoon. That day we have to crossed many rivers. And the first one was that lake. That days we crossed 7 rivers to reached advance basecamp. That day all the peoples are very tired so we decided to entertain everyone. We started our dayro under open sky. We started antakshari but that game turned into musical jamming after that we went for small acclimatization trek nearby chota Chandratal (Deo tibba route) and that time temperature was approximately 3°c to 5°c. Next day morning we saw that shoe laces are frozen in air. That day we took out our technical equipments for technical training of snow climbing.
After returning from training we packed our backpack for summit attempt. We have to start attempt at night so we took rest in evening but at that place how we can do rest, me and my friend we both wondered near our camps to capture some beautiful views. After dinner we took a short nap. We woke up at 1:30AM packed our lunch box with healthy food and ready with our backpack(Backpack’s weight is around 15 to 20kg. ) and started our trek at 2:00AM.
On that day we passed from river phase, jungle phase, rock phase at the night. We passed from many dangerous routes where you have to put your leg with accuracy if your leg will slip your body moved towards the valley. So you have to be careful when you are crossing such kind of lose rocks ways.
After crossing some dangerous routes we reached there where snow phase is started. We wear our koflach boots, crampons and gaiters.
We took tricolor with us and moved forward towards last phase for summit attempt. When we saw last snow phase we thought it will took maximum one hour but when we started climbing we climbed more up and up but there was not end soon!
At the end after 2 hours continue climbing we reached at the summit point of Jagatsukh mountain at 11:00AM on 3rd October,2020. We are the number one team from Gujarat who successfully summited Jagatsukh mountain. That was a proud moment for us.
After viewing avalanche on Mt. Deo tibba we started descending. Because of successful summit attempt all the team members are very excited and in good mood. In max 30 minutes whole team descended and cleared snow phase. We have no extra time so we started descending towards our campsite. we reached at tenta campsite nearby 7:30–8:00pm in the evening. We waited for everyone for dinner. We all took dinner together. Next day we decided to cover 3days distance in one day. We woke up with fresh energy we took our breakfast and ready with packed lunch. That was our last day in mountains so we spent some quality time and capture some beautiful moments. On that day we got Redbull energy drink from our energy drink partner. We packed our backpacks, technical equipments, tents, and aslo plastics and garbage because we have leave our footprints on mountain not garbage. We started descending from Tenta to Jagatsukh village. Now That 37 strangers is become a family. We all are connected with eachother. May be it was a magic of mountains. We heard one proverb “ Pahado pe banni Dosti, pahado jitni mazboot hoti hai!” Now we can say that is true because we feel that. We all are moving fast with weather. That day weather condition was critical like sometimes you feel hit, sometimes coldness. That day Rain was also happened. We didn’t stop anywhere in whole route. We celebrate and expressed our joy by dancing between the large mountains. At afternoon we crossed seri and early night we crossed chika but after that because of darkness we didn’t find the route and we Lost the way. We struggle a lot to keep team all together in that darkness and finding right way to reach Jagatsukh village. We found one bear’s house on that way. We used a lot of time to find proper way. After so much struggle we found a right way to reach our basecamp. At 10:00PM we all 37 people reached safely at our basecamp in Jagatsukh village. Next day was our last day in Himachal Pradesh so we went to visit Jagatsukh village. We all were busy to explore places. When we came back to campsite we saw our expedition organizer hosted a party to us. They arranged DJ night also. And everyone knows when garba playing no one gujrati can stop their legs to dance. We forgot about dinner and expedition’s Fatigue at that time and started Garba. After sometimes we leaved from Himachal Pradesh.
This Expedition taught me so many things. Mountains always realise us how small we are infront of them. It taught me you have to live happy in every situation. You are not only one you have to take everyone together when you are in mountains.
