The Nanda Devi AffairThere is a kind of brotherhood between man and mountains.... The inescapable logic of desire leaves the mountain traveller no choice but to plan his next expedition to the very peak that may have just rejected vociferously the most singleminded of advances.' In his thirty-year sojourn in India, Bill Aitken has had two serious affairs"one, essentially spiritual in nature, with the country's rivers, the other more earthy and passionate, with her mountains. In this sequel to his first book for Penguin, Seven Sacred Rivers, he talks of his second great obsession"Nanda Devi, patron Goddess of Kumaon and Garhwal. Spanning more than a decade, from the Seventies to the Eighties, Aitken's attempts to explore the sanctuary of this most beautiful of Himalayan peaks were not, he admits, those of a professional mountaineer, but of a romantic. Accordingly, what he gives us is, in his own words, -neither a book about Himalayan climbing nor a treatise on hill theology but a diary of mountain relish.' Aitken's deep-seated study of the cult of the Goddess and the folklore and customs of the Kumaon Himalayas is chequered with deliciously acerbic asides on bumptious bureaucrats, the bane of Indian mountaineering, while the true nature lover's concern for the environment is manifest in his anger over the destruction wrought by political motivations and the ambitions of so-called professional mountaineers. |
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Page 134
... rain . Luckily we hadn't taken down the tent and could hastily stuff our clothes back inside . Now as the weather grew nastier the plan was to ferry a load up to the lake ( as far as we could go in the mist ) so that tomorrow we could ...
... rain . Luckily we hadn't taken down the tent and could hastily stuff our clothes back inside . Now as the weather grew nastier the plan was to ferry a load up to the lake ( as far as we could go in the mist ) so that tomorrow we could ...
Page 162
... rain coursed down to make us so wet that we seemed to be part of the monsoon drench . By some perverse logic our misery made us laugh and as the cane lashed back to whip our bodies we began to make a joke of it . When the person in ...
... rain coursed down to make us so wet that we seemed to be part of the monsoon drench . By some perverse logic our misery made us laugh and as the cane lashed back to whip our bodies we began to make a joke of it . When the person in ...
Page 185
... rain started we all adjourned to a shepherd's hut where Govind prepared more rice and jholi . It would have been too much of a coincidence for the couple to have come from Lyme Regis and their accents confirmed that they were from ...
... rain started we all adjourned to a shepherd's hut where Govind prepared more rice and jholi . It would have been too much of a coincidence for the couple to have come from Lyme Regis and their accents confirmed that they were from ...
Contents
The Moving Mountain | 1 |
Vital Statistics | 11 |
Beru Pakho | 20 |
Copyright | |
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Almora altitude animal ascent Badri Badrinath Bal Singh base camp beauty Bedni Bhagawati bharal Bhotia birch British buggials bungalow cave Changabang chowkidar climb climbers clouds cold crossing deity Delhi descent Devi's devotees Dharansi Dibrugheta Dumyat Everest expedition forest Ganga Garhwal glacier goats Goddess Gopal gorge Govind hill Himalayas Hindu Hom Kund honour Indian inner sanctuary Joshimath jungle Kalanka Karnaprayag Kausani Krur Kuari Kumaon Kundan lake Lata Kharak Latu load main peak meadows mist monsoon mood morning motor road mountain Mussoorie Nanda Devi Nanda Ghunti Nanda Kot Nandakini Nathu Nauti never night one's party passed path pilgrim pilgrimage porters Pratap rain Raj Jat Rhamani ridge Rishi river rock route Rup Kund sacred season seemed sheep shepherd Shipton Shiva shrine slope snow leopard Sriyantra steep stumbled summit Sutol Tapovan temple tent trail Trisul turned Uttarakhand valley village weather women worship Yashu