First sight of Sleeping Buddha

The Sandakphu trek, is one trek where we have an essence of everything - Beautiful Mountain view, faraway Snow-capped peaks , Beautiful Meadows and the serene forest.

One of the initial question which out trek leader asked us was -

""What is the underlying reason why each one of us are doing the Sandakphu trek?""

My answer was "The View of Sleeping Buddha". Its true indeed that Sleeping Buddha was the very reason why I got attracted in choosing this trek. This trek has made me more knowledgeable about the tall peaks which we have in the Himalayas. Kangchenjunga being the first in the list. I must confess that I had very limited knowledge of mountain and its importance.

Its day-3 for us and we were at Tumling. I was awake by 4AM and ready to witness our first sunrise of "The Sleeping Buddha".

More than the sunrise my mind was completely on the first rays falling on the snow-capped peaks. This had been my thought for most of the mornings in this trek (except Sabargram - My eyes were dangling between  - the sunrise or the sleeping Buddha).

We indeed got a spectacular view of the mountains  that day morning.
The flow of light down from the summit towards the bottom was a mesmerizing view.

Sleeping Bhudda "."

The above picture is taken after I captured my video (Youtube link at the end has the complete visuals).

 After the morning view of Sleeping Buddha, I don't think any other photographic compositions on that day would be justified. Still I could not resist taking few nice shots which is copied below

This tree stood very distinct from others. I shot this after sunrise view while going back to the room. I have processed to give the glow effect  ( one of the simplest processing techniques which I use for some images )

View of entire Tumling - Stupa to Stupa ..

This picture is going to be my wallpaper for sometime now. I just loved ....

The one other important thing to start off the day is to taste the "Noon tea". We got one cup made for us and few of us shared ....Yuk...taste...that was the first reaction..but that changed a-bit when I tasted the second sip....It was different...

We started the days trek by ~8:30AM and soon we entered the Sangarilla National Park. The most important and another first time sight for us came soon ....We were blessed to sight "THE EVEREST" . It was such a clear day that we have been told that Everest sighting on second day of the trek is a rarity.

We reached Kalipokri by late afternoon . Kalipokri was a small town and there is not much views from there. So we were mostly indoor .... But the real reason was it was very very cold. The wind was making us shiver even inside the dining area. It was at Khalipokri we had really good ice-breaking session - The Adjective activity. With that the group had known each other well ..at least by name :)

Sleep took over the cold night with the dream of Sandakphu "summit" the next day......
Leaving now with my vlog on beautiful sunrise and the days events.....

Initial steps of the Sandakphu trek

It was late afternoon when we reached Jaubhari which is the base camp for the Sandakphu trek. The drive was pretty smooth and comfortable with 2 breaks. Its here all the co-trekkers met for the first time. I could see the excitement in everyone before starting the new journey , just like me....The day went well and relaxed. We saw the beautiful moon rise thought the clouds far and beyond the Darjeeling city.

Moon above Darjeeling City

The next morning all of us woke up with even more excitement . I got ready early with the intention of taking  nice pictures of sunrise and the pines far away.

Dawn colors

We started out trek with an introduction to our local guides. Our trek leader, Pavanji introduced them, GD ji and Syam bhai....With that we started our trail into the pine forest.....

The steep slopes , the beautiful & tall pine tree were complimenting itself with our heart beating louder and faster as we ascend....It was today we first crossed the Nepal border. We criss-corssed the border multiple times between India and Nepal while walking slowly at our own pace.

A special note needs to be mentioned about the place were we had the lunch.
I could say that the best lunch during the entire trek was on that day. It was a lovely family, very much caring and the wonderful food. 

Conquering the route on the way via the  pine forest , into the off road trails and the concrete road , we reached Tumling by evening. We had ascended about 3000ft by then.

After the nice and refreshing warmup ....I took my camera to see if there are any good compositions of the mountains during the evening. The Sun had set and it was getting dark and cold. Light was very less, may be i thought ...i would have got best composititon of my photohraphy trek .....The last light leaving the Buddha on that day.

Clouds and the mist far away blending with the peak to beautiful feel for the image.

At the end of the trek and reviewing my compositions, i consider this specific image to be one of the best in this trip. Its tough to pick the best shot of the trip. This will remain a special image for me. There are not many evening images in the entire trek....The day ended with chit-chat and nice story telling session by Pavanji. We went to bed....Planning to wakeup at 4:30 to summit the viewpoint for sunrise...

 

I leave here with this view on the day events below....till we wakup for sunrise ....

 

Buddha's grace - The view of Kangchenjunga from Pelling

The anxiety in me started from the time we left Bangalore and it kept on increasing till we landed at Bagdogra airport. We had a long trek ahead of us to Sandakphu, but before that we had planned to go to Pelling, Sikkim. Twice we tried booking taxi online and both the times it was cancelled due to non-availability. We landed at the airport thinking that we will have to hire one from the airport itself. We were lucky that with initial search we got a cab within our budget- Toyota etios liva - Just sufficient for 4 of us and we started our drive towards Pelling.


Pelling is a small town and existing just because of the closeup view of the great Kangchenjunga. I had never been a mountain person nor put my thought on going to a trip just to see these mountains. From the time we had planned this trip , the thought of seeing these peaks came again and again. My eagerness, interest and the willingness to see the mighty mountains increases as days passed by.

It turned to be a really torturous journey  to reach Pelling. We had hoped to reach before evening , but as we drove along we just hoped that we reach there before sunset. By the time we reached the hotel at pelling, we were already late and it was getting dark after sunset. The entire area was cloudy. Still with slight hope we pulled out or cameras and triopod hoping that we might get a clear shot just incase.Sadly that never happened.

I took a few compositions of clouds and also took a shot in the direction of where the peak is assumed to be. Never thought it would be a really worth a shot but after processing i felt the photo turned out to be nice. There was small patches where i could see some snow capped mountains....

Closer look will reveal the mountains behind the clouds

Composition of clouds after sunset

 Disappointed though and at the same time the hope of clear view of sunrise did not let us down. We packed the cameras and tripod for the day and did not expect anything dramatic for the night.

The evening started getting cold and we orderd soup. Waiting for the soup and chatting at the balcony of the dining area, we glanced and hoped for good stars at night. We started seeing the moon which let us down for a brief period as the stars would start to vanish.

It was about dinner time when our enegry levels changed drastically....We spotted something white color in the direction of the mountains....
" Is it cloud...No its the mountain....No is it ???? " This kept on going for few minutes till we finally realized and got really exicited to see the peak glowing in the moon light.

The Moon lit kangchenjunga - That was the treat for us and a great present by the Buddha himeself for the disappointing day till then. 
It was around dinner time and soon cameras and tripod also came out.
After the dinner i had a very good photo shoot of the peak.

We initially searched which was the summit but it was resonally clear. The Ridge line of Kangchenjunga was supposed to be famous which leads to the summit.

Moon lit Kangchenjunga

The Mountain Glows while the towns started to sleep

Later we found out that the actual summit is just behind the peak which is seen from Pelling, if we notice we can see a small point just to the left of the peak.


With this out hopes of an early morning sunrise view increased and we were excited to wakeup by 4:30AM.
The Moon lit peak was still shining.

Lord Buddha did bless us with clear views.Tripods and camera out, I did not have to search much for the real composition. I just wanted to see the peak glowing gold during sunrise and my eyes were fixed on just that spot. We came back to the discusson few times on which exactly is the summit and all the time we ended in pointing the ridge line leading to the peak.....

The Glow before the sunrise

First light on the summit. 

The actual summut is just to the left of the peak as seen in the pucture

The Buddha transformed from moon lit white to golden

The view was just a amazing, it just transforms us into a different level of consciousness and forgeting everything else for that moment.

 My Video on this visit below. 

With this, it was time for us to leave pelling thinking about the ride back and the long trek ahead for next one week.

Beautiful dusk at kollam harbour

Kollam is my native town and will be the most remembered for all my childhood days of joy and enjoyment. There are so much memories which can never be explained or passed on with words. The Beach and the backwater are one of them.

As a small boy, we used to go to the main beach in kollam and sit at the shore. Getting into the rough sea waves was fun....I dont remember doing a complete dip during childhood as this was never allowed and the sea used to be quite rough.
After I started photography as a passion, i had gone many time in different places to shoot the nature , but never attempted the sunset at Kollam....When i went home last month that was in mind.

Initially I went to the beach to make a small video and a nice sunset photo, but it started to rain and I could not do much. I took couple of shots of the sunset in mild rain. Never expected anything dramatic except the nice orange colors of the sky..I was sure the shots were really good as it was raining heavily deep inside the sea.....

To my surprise   - one of the shots captured a small lightning...seems to be striking deep inside the sea and probably it was raining there.....i am thrilled with this achievement.

Sunset with lightning deep inside the sea

Another shot of sunset. I love the sand at the foreground in this picture.

To continue on the video and to get few more compositions of the beach, i came back. Thirumullavaram beach used to be an isolated place earlier and one of the beach which i loved . There were rocks on the shore and photographically i had a composition in mind with Sand in the foreground, Rocks in the middle and the beautiful dusk sky at the backdrop. But this did not workout.
But as time passed, people have started to come more and more to this beach. This time when I went it was really crowded. Though I started talking about my view, I felt very uncomfortable to continue with that video....I cancelled the idea and tried to search for a better place.

I drove thru the shores inside thangasherry area to find a good place and came till lighthouse. I had to realize that population of kollam has increased a lot and all of the spots were really crowded, including the lighthouse.
Finally I found a space near the harbour to mount my tripod and wait till sunset.


The kollam harbour was a project which was started during my childhood. I used to see loads and loads of trucks with huge stones passing by to be dropped into the sea. Stones used to be so big that sometime one truck can carry only a single stone. I was never able to visualize what was the purpose of these stones and that too being dropped into the rough ocean. I see those results now with as the weaves have reduced within the harbour area and fishing boats can easily come and go doing business. There are few large ships also dock at the kollam harbour.

I waited at the spot see the fishing boats and the beautiful birds on the water bank. As the time passes , the dusk colors started to appear ...it changed from blue sky with white clouds to orange and violet streak in the sky illuminating with this wonderful color combination. The reflections on the calm sea water  added to the beauty. It feels like once the Sun has set, it is pulling away all the magic from this place for the dark night to set-in.

Mesmerizing colors

The magical colors starts to fade as i watch the sky and then pure darkness remain......

My Vlog this

Every time I see the sunset, my belief get stronger and stronger that the sunset colors and its combination never repeats. I am sure I will watch out for many many more composition of the sky and each of those are going to be unique.


Signing-off with this though ......