varun singla

MY VACATIONS

“Vacations” the most beautiful part of an engineer’s college time. Vacations are the time to relax body and min. people use many different ways to spend their holidays. Many like to spend all their vacations sitting at home and playing video games , gossiping, wondering out with friends and in many other ways but some people like to visit new destinations during their holidays, so am I. I also like to spend my holidays at new destinations. So this time I and my parents decided to go Kashmir-heaven on earth and Amarnath Yatra. Our journey began from Indira Gandhi International Airport, New Delhi. Our journey began with little tension as we reached airport little bit late due to heavy traffic jam as a result our flight to Srinagar was missed, we got little tensed but with the help of airport  staff we were able to get another flight tickets and finally reached Srinagar. There we were welcomed by an awesome weather, bright sunshine with cold breeze and I felt an extreme freshness in the air. Outside of the airport our taxi was waiting for us. We loaded our luggage and buzzed off for Sonmarg. Next day we had to begun our Yatra to Holy Amarnath Cave so we had our dinner and slept early. Next day we woke up around 2:30 in the morning, got ready and went to Baltal, from where we had to board for helicopter to Panjhtarni. After completing all formalities and going rounds of checking we finally board the helicopter and reached Panjhtarni, from where the real Yatra begins. Me and my father decided to continue our journey on foot whereas my mother decided to go on palki. We begun our Yatra enchanting “OM NAMAH SHIVAY” and slowly-slowly reached the Holy Amarnath Cave, covering a distance of approx. 6kms. Inside the cave the feeling that I had was so different that I can’t explain that feeling in words. Finally we had darshan of “Ice Shiva Ling” and I was like “Yatra safal ho gai” with few minutes darshan of lord Shiva our journey back to Panjhtarni begun with the image of Ice Shiva Ling in our eyes and heart we reached Panjhtarni and finally boarded to Baltal and same day were transferred to our hotel in Sonmarg. I and my father were tired so we had some rest in our rooms and had dinner and went for asleep. Next morning we woke up late, had our breakfast and went to Srinagar. We were travelling in the lap of Mother Nature with river flowing on one side and high mountains on another side. We enjoyed river rafting on our way to Srinagar, following the twist & turns in the mountains we finally reached Srinagar and there we visited Nishard Garden and Mughal Garden after that we were transferred to our houseboat. Houseboats are only found in Kashmir and nowhere else in India. The same evening we visited Laal Chowk Market and did little bit shopping and later on visited mall road near Dal Lake, had our dinner and went to our houseboat to rest. Next day it was time to pack our bags back to home. That day we visited Shankaracharya temple and had a sip of water at Chashm-e-shahi later on we enjoyed shikara ride in Dal lake and visited lotus garden, floating garden, golden lake and meena bazaar. We bought world famous Kashmiri saffron and finally went to Srinagar airport for our flight to Delhi. I was not willing to return home back as I was amazed by the natural beauty of Kashmir. It is truly said that “KASHMIR IS HEAVEN ON EARTH”.