For the Love of Mountains

Preview of my Coffee Table book

After a long gap I have begun rambling again on this blog. For quite sometime, my social media writing was restricted to facebook, which somehow constraints my writing. Then came along my book, For the Love of Mountains. I have more or less finished writing the book and the manuscript is with my editor. I discovered that writing a book is far more empowering and fun than social media posts. Blogging is something in between. As my fellow speaker Rajesh Srinivasan said recently, book writing is like test match cricket, blogging is like one dayers and social posts are like T20. So I decided to restart the one day format as well.

This post is an advanced introduction of my book. For long I wanted to publish my photos. However, I realized that while the photos look great, there are stories behind each of them that never get told. Many of them are very interesting local stories of the region that are unknown to most of us city dwellers. So I began writing a coffee table book, with photos and stories behind each of them. The effort is more or less complete now. From my 10000 plus photos taken on treks, I chose 100 of them to be included in the book based on the stories that I wanted to share. Notion press will be publishing the book and we hope to have it out in the next few months.

The publisher has come up with 2 cover designs and I would love to have your feedback on which one I should choose. But then in keeping with the concept of the book, I will share the stories behind the two scenes.

This picture was shot in Kashmir on the Great Lakes Trek. This trail is possibly the most beautiful trekking trail in the country. The trail takes you to some of the most beautiful high altitude lakes and across 3 scenic mountain passes that tower well over 4000m. The entire trek is above the tree line and you will be camping at altitudes above 3000m every day except day 1, making it a demanding trek. Srinagar is the base location to which you will have to fly and start the trek from Sonamarg, a 3 hour scenic drive.

Coming back to this picture, this alpine meadow and mountain lies between Gangabal and Satsar lakes, somewhere close to the LOC. We reached here on the 5th day of the trek, but you should be here on the 4th day normally; we were delayed a day due to very heavy rains on day 2. This particular section is the easiest part of the trek with gentle slopes that are a joy to travel. Whichever direction you look, we see blue skies, green slopes and snow covered peaks. In the middle of the valley, brave soldiers of the country man a camp from which they monitor the LOC for enemy activity. You will find soldiers speaking all languages and practicing different religion, who love the opportunity to meet their fellow countrymen. If they do meet people who speak their language they are super delighted. The encounter with the soldiers lifted us to a new high.

The second cover option captures Ganges (Bagirathi here) near Harsil. I have been here twice, and both times the scene looked similar, grey skies, dark forest and a serene river. The weather in the morning can be bright and sunny, but by afternoon, the skies become grey and rain is common. The route is treacherous and prone to lanslides, making driving a dangerous profession at some stretches. Ganges originates at Gaumukh, a place I have planned to visit twice and forced to shelve the plans both time due to weather. As they say locally, "Bulava abhi thak nahi aaya". At Gangotri, there is a temple for the river goddess as well as temple to Shiva and Bhageeratha. The river here runs for a short distance in a narrow valley, before rushing through the gorges of Bhairon Ghati.

What is captured here is the river after Bhairon Ghati, for many miles, the river runs peacefully through the valley near Harsil. Just before Harsil, you can capture the scene from the highway, you are forced to leave here only because you don't want to be stuck in the rain. As you near Harsil, the river is flanked by apple orchards, orchards that produce some of the most delicious apples. 

So which of these book covers do you like? Send me your comments and your choice of the book cover. By the way these photos are available for sale as canvas prints (18 by 24 inch or 20 by 30 inch color prints). For the rest of 2020, I hope to donate 10% of sale proceeds from such sales to Rotary health projects. So do let me know if you would like to order any of the photo prints for your homes, office or gifting.

Krishnan Naganathan

An ardent Himalayali, despite being a Tamil