Auli Tourism

Auli is entire skiing area is about 5-7 km, but since this pasture is located way up between 9,500 and 10,500 ft in eastern Garhwal, it commands excellent views of surrounding peaks, which soar well over 23,000ft. The air is cold, fresh and scented with pine the skies are a stunning azure blue and only occasionally marked by a few tattered clouds.

This may not be Aspen or St Moritz, but hey it is India of 50 degrees in the shade fame and it’s pretty miraculous that we have slopes with wonderful soft powdery snow at all. And the Uttaranchalis are trying a spanking new cable car system modestly called the ropeway, traverses 4 km up the hill from joshimath, transporting you over the tops of aok and fir trees to Auli. And when you swoop down the slopes, you don’t have to worry about the trudge back up the baby slopes have a 1,640 ft skilift and the advanced slopes have a 2,620 ft chair lift to haul you to the top. Two imported snow-packing machines keep the slopes in order, preventing the formation of ice or crust.

So forget another winter at the beach and head north instead. After a week on the slopes you will be confident enough to whiz down a mountain and excute a fancy parallel turn to a halt. Skiing is wonderful exercise but be warned it is dangerous your tummy disappears; your muscles tone up your skin glows with good health. It could become addictive.

Auli is not for the meek hearted or the lazy. But apart from the exhilaration of the successful downhill run there are also other magical moments. Watching the dawn break behind Nanda Devi, struggle to describe to oneself the exact shade of the indescribable, pale blue in the hole in the snow left behind by your boot, watching the sky open up its bounty at night, and the snowflakes floating gently, soundlessly to earth all is peace, all is beauty. Yes Auli can be balm to a city-wearied heart.

Joshimath

The great sage Adi Shankarachary is supposed to have wandered into Joshimath and gained enlightenment here. Alas, its; hard to imagine this treeless town on the highway to the holier sites of Hanuman Chatti and Badrinath as a spiritual seat of any importance. Still check out the Narsingh and Garuda temples the Shankaracharya Math and the amar kalp tree, believed to be over 2,500 years old. Drive down to the hot springs of Tapovan just 14 km away.

What’s in it for Kids

Take the kids along and bung a pair of skis on their little feet and watch them fly after the initial hesitation. If they tire of the concentrated activity, then leave them to their own devices after making sure they’re warmly clad. After all it’s not every day that one can make snowmen and snow castles in the tropics.

Around Auli

Rudraprayag 162 km

Jim Corbett may have put Rudraprayag’s name on the world map for man-eating leopards, but it’s difficult to imagine anything wilder than a tabby cat prowling around in the thin a tabby cat prowling around in the thing scrub covering the surrounding hills. What is of breathtaking magnificence though is the swirling confluence of the Alaknanda and Mandakini rivers, around which the town has grown.

A must-visit is the Koteshwar Mahadev Temple on the banks of the Alaknanda. Less temple than cave and adorned by ferns and moss, the devout can observe hundreds of spontaneously generated Shivlings carved out of rock by the patient dripping of water. It is a charming spot even for non-believers. Equally charming are the Rudranathji and Chanmunda Devi mandires, overlooking the confluence of the two rivers just across the bridge at Rudraprayag. Shri Rudranathji is famed to be the meditation place of the great mediator and troublemaker Narad Muni. Just below, the goddess watches over the union of the rivers form her modest temple.