The Green Ogre: himalayan monal

As we rattled along in the Mahindra jeep (driven by cab driver Naresh from Haridwar) along the winding roads that skirted the Shivaliks towards Madmaheshwar (also called Madhyamaheshwar), I asked Sahastra (the veteran of Himalayan treks amongst us): “Will we be able to see any snow-capped mountains once we are there?”

“Yes, you would be, if the weather is clear. The majestic Chaukhamba is right there near Madmaheshwar...”

The Chaukhamba is a seriously huge snow capped mountain with 4 peaks interconnected by ridges, the tallest of which stands 7138m.There are no mountains that stand taller than the Chaukhamba, anywhere outside the Himalayas. The Gangotri glacier, which is the origin of river Bhagirathi( which later joins with Alaknanda river to form the Ganges) starts from the western slopes of the Chaukhamba. It was conquered first in 1958 by Swiss mountaineers Lucien George and Victor Russenberger, after attempts to conquer the mountain failed in 1938 and 1939

(Source -Wikipedia and Peakware)

Overcast skies ensured that we didn’t get even a glimpse of the Chaukhamba anytime during our trek towards Madmaheshwar, which is situated at around 3497 meters (11473 feet), some halfway up a hill situated at the foot of the Chaukhamba. It rained cats and dogs the first couple of days that we were holed up in our accommodation (a shack with three beds), waiting for the skies to clear up.

On the second half of our second day at Madmaheshwar, we ignored the weather and climbed to the top, where the Buddha Madmaheshwar -- the old temple -- is located. We looked around for Himalayan Monals and hoped to glimpse the Chaukhamba. Almost nothing remained of the roads leading uphill, as the incessant rains had washed everything away.

As luck would have it, all we could see were the shadowy shapes of a pair of Monals fluttering away into the mist with shrill cries, and a mist covered hilltop. As if to deter us from staying back any longer, it started raining. Visibility was near zero. Disappointed, we climbed down, constantly slipping on the muck.

The Chaukhamba emerges from the mist

The next day dawned with a much better mood, as the skies cleared up by 8 am and we started our ascent up to Buddha Madmaheshwar once more to see the Chaukhamba. Visibility was excellent, the skies were blue and a vibrant sun created rainbows out of dewdrops.

As we climbed, I caught a glimpse of the Chaukhamba from behind a rocky peak that overlooked the Madmaheshwar temple. Boosted by adrenaline, my dragging ascent picked up pace as I climbed ahead of others much to my own amazement (considering I was last to reach the top the previous day). But once we were at the top, my excitement gave way to despair as clouds had completely covered the Chaukhamba, leaving no trace of the mighty mountain. We waited till noon, but with no luck…

Sahastra would later clarify: “The Chaukhamba is so huge and cold (thanks to the permanent layer of snow on it) that it influences the local weather around it, which explains the constant shroud of clouds around it.”

As we left Madmaheshwar for Gaundhar village the next day my heart was heavy, as neither the Monal nor the Chaukhamba had graced me with an appearance which was satisfying. The day was clear but beyond the green hills all we could see were wisps of white cloud. And then, unexpectedly, somewhere halfway to Gaundhar the Chaukhamba parted its veil of clouds and revealed itself to us in its full glory.

The massive Chaukhamba is so named for its four "pillars"

Our second peek at the peak came as we drove towards Rudraprayag from Paundhar village, having completed the trek. Someone shouted from the backseat – “Chaukhamba!”

We stopped the jeep and got down to see the huge mountain tower above the surroundings, as if it originated from the clouds.

Our final glimpse before the disappearing act

As we clicked away, black and white clouds started rolling slowly upwards, as if by magic. And within a couple of minutes Chaukhamba the magician played out a final disappearing act, vanishing without a trace in a puff of clouds.

By then we had had our hearts (and memory cards) filled…

Photos: Sandeep Somasekharan

Even a peacock must bow to this unchallenged monarch of Himalayan fowls

In May 2007, on my first visit to the Uttarakhand Himalaya, the Himalayan Monal (Lophophorus impejanus) proved utterly elusive. Fighting altitude sickness in the foggy heights of Bedni Bugyal, I was offered a tachistoscopic glimpse of a metallic blue streak with a white rump and an orange tail. That's about all. Out of reluctant pride, I ticked my checklist. But all along, I felt guilty that my sighting was of such low quality that it hardly merited an entry. Payback time arrived two years later.

In the third week of September 2009, my friend Sahastra and I trekked through the alpine forests and grasslands of Chopta and Tungnath. Tungnath, at 12,073 feet, is the third of the five Kedars (where Shiva's dismembered body is believed to have fallen on earth) and the highest Shiva shrine in India. It is believed to have been built a thousand years ago.

At 12,073 ft, Tungnath is the highest Shiva shrine in India, and possibly in the world

The grey stone temple blends well into its backdrop: plunging cliffs watered by a trickle of sweet springs and rock faces slathered with alpine vegetation -- grasses, daisies, primula, gentian, marsh marigolds, docks, and arrangements of ferns, lichens and mosses that would chasten even the most sylvan of landscape artists. A few hundred feet below, the grassland (or bugyal, as it is known locally) is broken by shrubs like juniper and a dense undergrowth of dwarf rhododendron. Here, rufous-bellied tits and orange-flanked bush robins dart inconspicuously along with Hume's warblers and grey bushchats. Lower down, the grassland meets the first trees of the forest -- stands of fern-girded oak and the relatively inviolate deodars.

Mist cloaked the forest, making birding impossible

But it was not here that we spotted our first Monal. On a misty afternoon in Chopta, 4 km downhill at the base of the Tungnath trail, we took a walk along the road hoping to spot something. Two days ago, we had been gifted with the lucky sighting of three (first, one for sorrow and then two for joy) Yellow-throated Martens, whom I dubbed Marten, Luther and King. But this afternoon's pursuit appeared to be fruitless. The dense fog made photography impossible and walking dangerous. We kept to the road to avoid toppling off a cliff. Halting abruptly at a bend, where a shepherd's trail branched off into the forest, Sahastra hissed: "Pheasant!"

Sadly, the human eye does not come equipped with fog-lamps. We could tell the shape of a large brown bird, not quite peahen-sized, with a mottled back and a prominent white ring where its folded wings met the base of its tail. We froze to avoid flushing it but it ambled into the thicket and into the cover that the fog offered. That evening, a look at the pages of Grimskipp told us that it was indeed a female Monal. Not quite the appetiser we craved, but enough for a tick on the checklist. But that first morning at Tungnath was where the Himalayan Monal revealed itself to us. We saw two males foraging unconcernedly on the verge of the forest. And then we flushed two hens, which whirred up in the air like partridges, arced and descended into the oblivion of the rhododendron shrubbery. Thus encouraged, we descended into the shrubbery and were rewarded with the sight of three more male birds. We heard them call -- a loud, not unmusical bugling -- and saw them flash their white rumps in flight. We were quite overwhelmed by the glut of good fortune.

We returned to Tungnath again two days later, riding mules at the crack of dawn to get to the summit of Chandrashila (13,386 feet above MSL) in time to catch a glimpse of the snow-capped peaks of Trishul and Chaukhamba before the rising mists blotched them out. At a tea stop, a beautiful red fox slunk past us, its coat rich russet and slightly grizzled with a creamy white tip to the tail. Further up, we glimpsed a magnificent male Monal, and then another with two hens. We flushed another bird off a cliff edge, and its brilliant metallic blue plumage glimmered as it caught the sun. We felt so accomplished that we wanted to take the rest of the day off and laze. But like diligent birders, we put indolence aside and got down to work. Through the day, more Monals showed themselves to us. This was indeed a happy hunting ground for the state bird of Uttarakhand (and the national bird of Nepal).

That evening, we heard the Monal call as dusk darkened the Himalayan sky. On our second descent of Chandrashila, we saw more than three or four birds foraging late into the twilight. Early next morning, as we left Tungnath for Chopta, we came upon a Monal cock foraging at eye-popping proximity near a cliff edge. It seemed unperturbed by our presence and took a few unhurried steps as we approached. The sun was not yet up and the dawn light was very tricky. Sahastra called out metering instructions to me as I battled vertigo in my attempt to photograph the bird. As I struggled with the exposure, a hen walked into the frame. And for the next five minutes we had the time of our life as the cliffside became dotted with Monals -- at least three males and four females. Finally, my encounter with the Monal had been fulfilling. It was hard to leave the hills without a pang gnawing at my heart.