Vaishno Devi trip

Although the tickets for Jammu were booked one month in advance, as Deepti HAD to come to office on saturday, the original tickets were cancelled at the nth moment & we booked fresh tickets thru Tatkal on Thursday for Saturday. We were lucky to get those tickets, though not thru the same onward train. I hurriedly booked tickets for the 22:35 AII JAT express from Delhi to Jammu for Saturday, and 19:45 Jammu Rajdhani to Delhi for Monday, and after assurance that Monday wouldn't be considered as a leave. We knew this trip would be slightly hectic, considering the schedules, but we had the spirit to make it happen.

On Saturday, we - myself, Deepti, Geeta & Pavan set out for Old Delhi station at 9:30 PM from our guest house to catch the 10:35 PM train. The train came 10 mins late from its scheduled arrival and left at 11 PM from Delhi. On boarding the train, we had already decided to take maximum rest here only before we began our yatra. We reached Jammu Tavi station at 9 AM on sunday, which was 1 hour behind the actual reaching time. Immediately after getting down from the train, we went out of the station and very close to the main entrance of the station, we found a private bus stop where tickets were being sold to Katra. I bought the tickets paying Rs. 200 for all and got into the bus. The bus got full within no time & it started for Katra at 9:20 AM. We had been told that the busses wont start unless it was full, by our colleagues here. The bus journey was little tiring, as he drove very rapidly even on the mountain ranges.

We reached Katra at 11:30 AM and went first to Vaishno Devi Yatra Counter to get our tickets for the yatra. There was a long queue already, but it moved fast. This Yatra ticket is mandatory to have, without which one wouldn't get entry to yatra. This ticket was free ofcourse, and it mentioned that we need to present this ticket within 6 Hrs at Banganga check post when the yatra began.

We then went to Niharika Guest house, as had been instructed by Abhishek, as he had told that this was a Govt guest house and one can easily find accomodation here. We hadn't booked any accomodation prior to our arrival at Katra, as many had assured us that accomodation - either guest houses or dormitories or hotels would be easily available on reaching Katra. But, this Niharika guest house was already full, and so we went again in search of a hotel. Some broker came to me and told that he had rooms available in his hotel near busstand, so we thought we go check out his hotel. He took us to Hotel Damini, where rooms were good enuf & we took only 1 2-bed room for a day as we thought that 2 would be a waste as we wouldn't be in the room for most of the time, and paid him Rs. 600. After refreshing, we had our lunch at a nearby restaurant, went to the market and bought raisins, figs & other energising stuffs.

We finally started our 12 km Yatra to Vaishno Devi at 2:30 PM. It seemed to be raining atop the hill. We wasted our energy waking 1.5 kms from Katra to the starting point of the Yatra without knowing that there were autos available from Katra to the starting base. This is the starting point of Yatra.

The path of the Yatra was neatly tiled, with shops on both sides, but it was damn slippery due to movement of horses - you know what I mean ;) The inital 30 mins of the Yatra took off all the energy present in us and compelled us to take immediate breaks. In between, rains also started and made our Yatra even more difficult, but we held umbrellas and jackets and continued. Oh boy, from the starting only, the paths were steep. We were chanting 'Jai Mata Di' along with whoever passed by. At one point, we thought we were walking on the clouds, as it began to get dark.

Midway, we got a signboard which mentioned that distance to Bhavan (Bhavan is the main place where the holy cave of Vaishno Devi is located) thru Adhkuwari was 6.5 kms and another way was 5.5 kms. We decided to go to Adhkuwari first and took the long route. Our legs were already screaming.

Finally, we reached Adhkuwari at around 6 PM and went first to Cafe Coffee Day and had some refreshments. We then went to Adhkuwari temple, which is a cave below.

Importance of Adhkuwari (as is written on the information board): At this spot, according to the legend, Mata Vaishno Devi Ji had observed spiritual discipline (tapasya) for exactly 9 months in a small cave and have concluded the same after attaining enlightenment to become one with her creators - Mata Saraswati, Mata Lakshmi & Mata Kali. Hence this sacred cave has become popular by the name "Gharbhjoon".

From Adhkuwari, there were again 2 routes to go to the Bhavan, both of which were exactly 6 kms to Bhavan. Without knowing which one to take, we simply took the straight route, where we met some guy and he told us not to take this route as it was steep & curvy and told us to take the new route on the left. We did so as he told and found that this route was much better, as horses weren't allowed & the steepness increased incrementally. We kept taking breaks at very frequent intervals and finally reached the top at 9 PM. We took exactly 5.5 hrs! Fully exhausted! This is the Bhavan (got from net):

On reaching the top, there was already a long queue for the Darshan. I went to the Yatra counter and showed the yatra slip got at Katra, and he issued me a group number. We had to wait in the queue for nearly 2 hrs. In the meanwhile, I went to Prasad shop & got Prasad for offering. The queue started to move and there was heavy pushing all over. After a very tight security check, we finally entered the sanctum of the holy cave which was fully covered with marble and had a very small entrance at 11:15 PM and had Darshan of the 3 'Pindies' of Mata Vaishno Devi for just a fraction of a second. It was mentioned all over the queue on boards that there is no statue or anything, and that the Godess has manifested here in the form of 3 'Pindies', and we have to concentrate on those 3 only in the cave.

After the Darshan, we came out of the main temple and found out that there was one more Shiv temple nearby in a cave.

After seeing these 2 temples we came and took some rest nearby open area, where many people had already fallen asleep. We then went to a restaurant and had our dinner at 12 AM. We then continued our Yatra to Bhairon temple, as it is considered that the Yatra would not be complete without visiting this temple after having Darshan of Mata Vaishno Devi. The path to this even more steeper than to Vaishno Devi. Although the distance was only 2 kms, it took us 1 Hr to reach Bhairon temple and reached there at 1:30 AM. We had Darshan of Bhairon Baba and came back and took some rest before proceeding with our return journey. With this our Vaishno Devi Yatra completed.

Importance of Bhairon Baba temple (as is written on the information board): Bhairon Nath, in pursuit of Mata from Banganga, Charan Paduka, Gharbhjoon reached the holy cave. When he tried to enter the holy cave, he was engaged in a battle with Lord Hanuman. Thereafter, Mata herselff came out of the cave and beheaded Bhairon with such might that his head fell atop a hill 2 kms away where Bhairon Ghati temple is constructed. However, Mata forgave Bhairon Nath when he repented for his sins. She declared that her piligrimage would be deemed complete only when piligrims would also have Bhairon's Darshans on their return journey after performing Darshans of Mata.

We started our return Yatra at 2 AM, and we were already exhausted by then. On our return, we took stairs wherever possible to save time, but my legs started trembling. We reached Adhkuwari at 4:15 AM and took an hours break as we had no further capability of walking down. Later, we continued our descending journey and got split up, as Deepti & Geeta took stairs in between and myself & Pavan took the path. And at one point, I split up with other 3 and was wandering here and there searching for them for 1.5 hrs. I also made announcements at the disaster control room, but in vain. I just walked down and took snap of Geeta Mandir, but didn't go inside it.

Finally, I came out of the main entrance at 9 AM and found Pavan waiting for me. He told that the girls had already left for the hotel at 8 AM and he too announced my name at the main entrance, but it wasn't heard inside. Anyways, finally I found him! We took an auto back to the bus stand and went to the hotel & crashed.

After refreshment, we checked out of the hotel at 12:30 PM and had our dinner at Annapoorna self service hotel. The food was better than the one we had the previous day. We then thought of what to do next, and went to dry fruits stalls and enquired rates of Kesar, but to my disappointment, all quoted exhorbitant rates for a gram of Kesar - Rs. 250, Rs. 300 etc. I didn't buy anything and then later we thought of going to Jammu station and having rest at the AC waiting room there. We caught a bus from Katra to Jammu at 2:30 PM and slept all thru the journey. We reached Jammu at 4:30 PM and went to the station, where the girls retired at the ladies waiting room, as the AC waiting rooms were already booked. Myself & Pavan went around nearby area of the station and bought some fruits & other stuffs. Finally, after lots of timepassing at the station, we got into our train and it left promptly at 7:45 PM. It was my first experience in Rajdhani express & I thoroughly enjoyed it, as they served soup, dinner & ice cream, with music running in the background. As we were completely stressed, we slept as early as 10 PM. I was woken up by the voice of the lady when she mentioned that we were nearing New Delhi at 5 AM on tuesday. Oh, what a sleep that was!

We reached New Delhi at 5:10 AM and went out of the station and took an auto to our guest house. We reached guest house at 6:15 AM and simply crashed again. I then left for office by 11:30 cab, and inbetween got to know that Delhi had received heavy rains on monday and there were jams all accross Delhi. Also got to know that Vaishno Devi Yatra had been closed from monday/tuesday due to heavy rains in that area. How lucky were we!

Jai Mata Di!

For more information on the legend of Vaishno Devi, accomodation, and all other stuffs, click here and here.

With this, my last weekend trip in Delhi ended. The last 5 trips on all 5 weekends were all super exciting & I have lot of memories to carry back home when I travel back to Bangalore on 1st August!