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Ladakh Trip Day 1: Mumbai-Srinagar-Pahalgam – Art Pixel Photography

This is the 1st blog post of my most incredible journey till date! It was my journey to Leh-Ladakh that spanned over almost 25 days and this blog post and the coming blog posts will shed highlights of all the fun, frolic, adventure & challenges I faced during this one long amazing trip! I had a few photographer friends with me for company & I promise you…we had a blast!

Day 1: 17th August – Mumbai – Srinagar – Pehalgam:

We had an early morning flight to catch at 6.40am on the 17th of August and I reached the airport at 5.30am. I had only 10 minutes to do all the check-in formalities including getting the boarding pass and all this made the start of the trip a very unforgettable & anxiety driven experience. As usual, thanks to my airport anxiety… I was told to check in from a different place as opposed to my other friends who checked in from the regular check in counter. To add to this…I faced a huge problem checking in courtesy – mistake of the air authorities!

They had forgotten to stamp my Professional Camera Gear Bag and this made matters even worse. A few minutes just before boarding the air bus, the ground staff of our airline checked us for the last time & they sent me back to get the Gear Bag screened again as it was not stamped. Duh!!!

I was already short of time and this only worsened the situation. Finally all went well and I along with my friends boarded the plane to Srinagar with a Capital Halt. I managed to even click a few nice aerial pics from my Samsung Galaxy S2.

We got the luggage fairly quickly & once we came out of the airport, we were greeted by our Driver cum Tour Guide Mr.Javed with his Kashmiri warmth. We headed straight for Pahalgam. The car had some absolutely loud and infamous music. Most songs were about doom & gloom, lost in love, separation & death. I just looked at my friends and gave them the “We’re so damn F#$%^d” look!!! But very soon came the first icing on the cake… Kahwah Tea. Guess, Mr.Javed, the Driver understood that we really needed something to refresh ourselves.

We halted at lethpora for some Kahwah. I had no idea how it was going to be. All we were told was that, it had saffron & its a special kashmiri hot drink. It turned out to be the best hot drink I had ever had! It was absolutely refreshing and was made of saffron strands, green tea leaves, cinnamon bark & cardamon pods served with honey & crushed almonds. It was truly magical!!!

We then proceeded further…on our way, we saw a lot of godowns & store houses filled with Kashmir willows used for manufacturing cricket bats. We crossed the Jhelum River across a small bridge and reached Bij Behara Market place. We were dog hungry and after reaching Pahalgam, we had lunch at Nathu’s Rasoi.

After having lunch, we checked into Hotel Iceland. The best thing about Iceland was that it was mostly made of Wood! It was certainly one of the best places we stayed. The charm of the hotel was it’s location. It was set on the edge of a river stream and was surrounded by huge rocks, lush greens & beautiful mountains. We checked into our room after having a look at the place and decided to take a nap as the journey had been long and tiresome. The room was nice & cozy, more like a cottage.

It was quite cool even at afternoon time here in Pahalgam. We woke up at around 5.30pm and then decided to come down and click a few pictures of the beautiful locales surrounding the hotel itself. The weather was heaven, the place was heaven and to top it, we got to have nice Veg Pakodas with Hot Tea! We then sat by the river stream & clicked a few pictures… Could you ask for more?

Here are a few of my favourite snaps clicked on Day 1:

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Here is a Slideshow version of the above pics.

Captures from Art Pixel Photography (Amit Desai).

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“Photography is a medium through which I experience my affinity towards the divine. When I’m close to nature, when I am all by myself, lone (but not lonely), I experience this deep connection with a force that cannot be merely described in words where photography serves as a thread that ties my bond with The Eternal, The Almighty, The All, The Everything & also The Nothing! Lets meet, THERE!”