Government nod for use of satellite phones in Himalayas

To boost adventure tourism, the government is going to give the much-awaited permission for use of satellite phones by adventurers in the Himalayas on September 27, World Tourism Day.

Kedar-kantha-Trek

“We have got in-principle approval from the Home Ministry for allowing satellite phones in the Himalayas, where there is no phone connectivity. A policy is being finalised and it is likely to be announced on World Tourism Day,” a senior Tourism Ministry official said.

With the government nod, satellite phones-equipped tourists will be able to contact their relatives in case of emergency while trekking in the remote areas of Ladakh, hiking in Sikkim, or exploring the wilderness of the Himalayas spanning across in Arunachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir and Darjeeling.

There is a long-standing demand from the industry for allowing satellite phones in the Himalayas. However, the official said there are certain conditions being laid down by the Ministry of Home Affairs for allowing satellite phones like monitoring of the calls made from these areas and the type of phones to be allowed.

Adventure Tour Operators Association founder member India Ajeet Bajaj said, “It will be a game changer for Indian adventure tourism industry as it will take the adventure related activities in the Himalayas to a new height”. About the proposed call monitoring provision, Bajaj said “we have no problem at all with it.”

According to the policy to be announced shortly, the adventure tour operators will be provided satellite phones by the government authorities for use and they would be responsible for its correct use as per the established norms. According to industry sources, the Himalayas attract about 2 million domestic and foreign adventure tourists in a year who go for skiing, hiking, camping and trekking. The number will go up with the satellite permission as the Himalayan ranges are missing many global tourists due to poor communication facilities. At present, the ministry is pushing adventure tourism in the country and announced several schemes like bearing the cost of 50 per cent fee of climbers trekking the Himalayas as part of the campaign,” 777 Days of the Indian Himalayas”, launched last year.

Source: Economic Times

 

Everest in Numbers

Everest 2012: 229 Summits 9 Deaths 

A long line of climbers follow each other up Mt. Everest. Image: Ralf Dujmovits.

8,850 meters (29,029 feet): Height at the peak.

60 million years: Approximate age of Mount Everest.

$25,000: Cost of a climbing permit per person.

8,000: Height in meters (approximately 26,000 feet) at Mount Everest’s “death zone,” the low-oxygen area above the last camp and before the summit where conditions become increasingly harsh.

1953: The year Sir Edmund Hillary and Sherpa Tenzing Norgay became the first recorded climbers to reach Everest’s summit.

3: Number of countries visible from the summit (Tibet,India, andNepal).

11: Number of people who have died on the mountain in 2012. (till 23 May 2012)

19: Number of people who died in one year—1996, the deadliest ever on Mount Everest—during a trek chronicled by writer Jon Krakauer in Into Thin Air.

30: Number of minutes before a climber dies after contracting hypothermia on Mount Everest, depending on how fast his or her body temperature drops

40: Record number of people to successfully reach Everest’s summit in one day(May 10, 1993).

200: Approximate number of total climbers who have died on the peak’s treacherous slopes.

4,000: Approximate number of people who have climbedMount Everestsince Sir Edmund Hillary and Sherpa Tenzing Norgay in 1953.

13: Age of Jordan Romero, the youngest climber to reach the summit, in May 2010.

76: Age of the oldest climber to reach the summit, Min Bahadur Sherchan, in May 2008.

73: Oldest Women climber to reach the summit, Tamae Watanabe on 19th May, she broke her own record set a decade ago at the age of 63.

21: Record number of successful climbs to the summit by Apa Sherpa.

 

Epic Day for Indian Mountaineering – Everest 2012

 First time in History of India Civil expeditions from India announced the success. A dozen civilian mountaineers from Pune today reached the summit of Mount Everest, the world’s highest mountain at 8,848-metres. Sagarmatha Giryarohan Sanstha and Giripremi – the two Pune groups – announced success of their respective expeditions on their Facebook pages.  However Ramesh Gulave succumb to death from Sagarmatha Giryarohan Sanstha due to AMS.

Mr. Ramesh Gulave

Eight climbers from Giripremi, including Tekraj Adhikari and Krishna Dhokale, and four from Sagarmatha Giryarohan – Shrihari Tapkir, Sagar Palkar, Balaji Mane and Anand Bansode – reached the summit from the ‘South Col’ route, from Nepal.

This is the first time that civilian mountaineering expeditions have scaled the peak.

 

Social-travel sites to try when planning your next trip

This week, travel review giant TripAdvisor announced a new feature which highlights reviews from people in your social networks, in the hope that it can make finding the best travel advice easier and more fun.

It may boast 50 million users, but it’s by no means the first company to pursue the holy grail of using the internet to help us tap our virtual friends in a bid to travel better. Here, a look at some of the best sites out there for social travel inspiration:

Wanderfly
The latest version of Wanderfly launched last month with a new emphasis on ‘visual travel discovery’, as well as its clever mix of suggestions from tastemakers and friends from Facebook or Google contact lists.
http://www.wanderfly.com/

Trippy
Trippy has unashamedly taken a leaf out of Pinterest’s book, breaking down travel ideas into a pinboard and allowing users to repin their own favorite places.
http://www.trippy.com/

Triptrotting
With the tagline ‘not just another clueless tourist’, Triptrotting helps users scour their social networks in search of people they know to get advice, recommendations and even a bed for the night.
http://www.triptrotting.com/

Gogobot
Gogobot makes it easy to instantly see where friends have traveled to, displaying destinations, ratings and questions on a simple, Facebook-style feed for users.
http://www.gogobot.com/

Twigmore
Twigmore helps travelers to form a ‘friend-map’, connecting them to potential friends at destinations to ensure that they know people on the ground. It’s powered by Facebook.
http://www.twigmore.com/

TripAdvisor
The travel review giant’s new ‘Friends of Friends’ service automatically elevates reviews on its site which come from direct friends or people who know your friends, before allowing users to send messages to get further information if necessary.
http://www.tripadvisor.com/

Tripalong
Makemytrip forayed in social travel lets you find your friends on the flight you are on.

Source: http://www.nydailynews.com, Google.com,Corporate Websites

 

Trekking in Indian Himalayas – Valley of Flowers

Valley of Flowers – The Paradise on Earth

Himalayas are the youngest and tallest mountains on earth. Indian Himalayas spread from northern most part of  India i.e. Jammu and Kashmir to Eastern most part Assam. The design or spread of Indian Himalayas makes them home to variety of flora and fauna. Northern most part is barren land and known as cold desert while eastern Himalayas receives highest rainfall and are kind of humid subtropical. The lower Himalayas called Shivaliks fall in the category of subtropical climatic zone.

Valley of Flowers trek is located in Chamoli Garhwal in the state of Uttarakhand, in NDBR region (Nanda Devi Bioshpere reserve). About 595 kilometres from Delhi, the altitude of valley of flowers Uttaranchal varies from 3,200 m to 6,600 m.

The stunning landscape of The Valley of Flowers National Park in northern India’s state of Uttarakhand, bordered by Nepal and Tibet, comes alive with the monsoon rain. This high-altitude Himalayan valley has around 300 different varieties of alpine flowers, which appear as a bright carpet of color against a mountainous snow capped background.

Here are the pictures from my last visit.

White Flowers

Golden Drops

Flower in Valley of Flowers

Yellow FlowersOur GroupRoute MapMaple Leaf

 

Cobra Lily

Amazing red flowers

Valley and Flowers

 

Photographing Colors of Pushkar Fair – Rajasthan

There is a saying that there is always dark below the lamp. Till now I have traveled through out India but how come I missed Pushkar Fair and I live in Jaipur. So, I decided to not to miss this time.

Pushkar Fair  is the annual five-day camel and livestock fair. It is celebrated for five days from the Kartik ekadashi to Kartik Poornima, the full moon day (the 15th) of Kartik (November–December) inHindu calendar. The full moon day is the main day and the day, according to legend, when the Hindu god Brahma sprung up the Pushkar Lake, thus numerous people swim in its sacred waters.

I planned a 1 day trip, I left Jaipur at 5.00 AM and reached Ajmer at around 7 and another 45 Minutes to the holy town of Pushkar. It was the second last day of the fair and a day just before the main bath of Kartik ekadashi. So all the buses were leading to Pushkar.