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Days 14-13: We finally made it to the Sundardunga glacier; 3,800 meters in the Himalayas. Spent an hour there and behind us was a 14-day journey. On my way down from the glacier, I hallucinate. The tiredness had crept in, the glacier’s blinding white light played havoc in my head. As I came down alone, a movie played in my head; a goddess draped in jewelry leading me down. The morning of our final climb, our mountaineering leader, Bianca points out the summit. This would be my first experience of what the mountains demand. Two weeks earlier, we started from sunny Goa, heading to Sunderdunga Glacier in Uttarakhand, India. The night before the final climb, we gathered outside our tents, for Bianca’s tales of dread. Of mountain corpses hanging from trees remaining preserved in ice – a reminder to keep going and to keep sane. Then we hear furious jets taking off in that deathly quiet valley. That was an avalanche tearing down the mountain side. We would trek daily between 8 to 10 hours to reach our final camp. Coming out of a bend, there’s the biggest valley. With all rock, snow, ice, millennial lava spewed out; an awe-inspiring, jaw-dropping moment. Days12-10: We saw wild horses in a meadow that look like what Native Indians ride in Westerns. After pitching camp, we stare at the celestial theatre above. You could reach and pull that starry curtain. Day 8-6: A few days of trekking and we are forced to stop. The rain’s coming down heavy. A group of trekkers warn us to avoid Sundardunga. The paths are washed out, the weather’s threatening. We all look at Bianca, there’s just a moment, then she shakes her head and sees us waiting for her final word. What she says decides it for the rest; “We’ll make it, guys.” Chamu, our mountain guide nods his confirmation. He tells us the local guides cower under unconfirmed threats. We are now treading robot-like on sleet. One misstep and we would be in the cold river. Later we talk about how difficult the moraine trek had been. If we crossed this terrain, we had nothing to fear. Days 5-3: The mountain sun blazes by 8am. We had spent the night wedged in a narrow mountain side. A valley snaked through the horizon, eagles soared and in the far horizon, faint whites of snow-capped mountains. The phantom of the hills, Chamu is leading us. Our first five steps feel as if to the gallows. It’s endless trekking. You are aware of the changing topography, geography, geology, and your own psychology. The air goes cooler, the vision bluer, the trees taller and denser, your steps steadier. The trek starts getting miserable from all that walking, but this has nothing to do with any physical exhaustion. It’s just the single-mindedness of the walking. You are on the march to a forward post that you keep seeing and never reaching. It starts raining. I’ve pulled out the poncho and stuffed it back a million times. You don’t want to trample around in wet clothes in changing mountain weathers, where any medical help is an indulgent fairy tale. Days 4-2: We stop at Loharkhet (‘Field of Steel’). We spend the night here, bundled into a dimly lit room. Ink-black by 7pm. The hard trekking life is setting in. Servings of raw vegetables’ make for fine dining. Bianca reads out schedules. Shut down by 7:30pm, wake up at 5am. Hit the trail by 7:30am. Days 2-0: The drive uphill seems like snakes and ladders. Mountain villages like islands in the air. There are rivers gushing with mad ferocity below. We are pointed out the wipeouts from the cloud-bursts of last year. It’s as if an artist lost perspective and went wild with brushstrokes of frenzied creative on canvas. Metal bulking bridges wiped out. The mountain light is playing on the devastation. Our jeep is loaded with trekking gear and 10 trekkers for the 9-hour drive to Loharkhet - our first base camp - from Kathgodam railway station. I recall later that there was silence in the jeep right throughout the climb. Eight humans silent for over two hours.