It was one of my best adventure and cherished trip. Not only it was a well arranged/planned but was also my last trip as a bachelorette (before getting married) with friends. We were a group of 5 mad people (3 girls & 2 guys). We started our journey early morning at around 6am, in our own vehicle from Delhi, to avoid city traffic.

When I look back now, it is very easy to plan things when one is single, with family lot of factors have to be considered while traveling, and specially with kids. It was Apr 2009 when I went to this magnificent place called Rishikesh.

Rishikesh, the small town which lies in the foothills of Himalaya of Garhwal region. It is an ideal destination for pilgrimage, adventure, meditation, yoga, and aspects of Hinduism. The place is known as “Places of Sagas” and “World Capital of Yoga”. Rishikesh is a vegetarian and alcohol free city, one has to remember this when travelling to this place.

Although there are many things to do here but we went for “White Water Rafting”, as our only goal. We had made booking with one of the camp for a night stay. Earlier i was little skeptical about staying in a Tent, but trust me it was one of the amazing experience I had. The camp had all the basic necessary facilities. And one will miss out an experience if one decides to stay in a hotel (there are plenty of hotels available for stay at reasonable cost).

We started our journey on Saturday, and reached the camp area by afternoon. It took us 6-7 hours from Delhi with couple of halts for breakfast and lunch. Our rest of the afternoon was spent doing Trekking and Climbing. In the evening we had some snacks followed by dinner at the camp. We all slept after counting the stars and realizing that we would freeze if we do not go inside the tent. Yes it was pretty cold at night in the month of April.

The next morning when I woke up, I saw the best possible scenic view. Our Tent were located just in front of a flowing river and mountains. When the sun came up shining over the mountains followed by river and we standing on the rocks, wow, it is difficult to describe the beauty and the feeling in words.

Post breakfast, we went for our excursion Rafting. It was the second point and the top point from where a non-rafter/non-professional can do rafting. Swimming is not required for doing rafting although it is an added advantage.

We were a total of 10 pax in the raft 8 adventure seeker and 2 crew. There are 13 rapids which we experienced categorized into Grades 1-4 depending on their intensity. Sweet Sixteen, Three Blind Mice, Roller Coaster are the few rapids which I remember.

We all jumped into the river in the mid way where water intensity was not that high and we were flowing with the water, the water was taking us forward. That was the time, I realized how much powerful the water is and the destruction it can do when in full force. We again climbed on our raft after sometime when high intensity rapids were approaching.

We got down second time from our raft at cliff jumping point. When I was on the raft, I  thought it is an easy jump and the height is also not that high (super easy – a chu chu for me), but when I climbed up the cliff to jump, I got so scared, I just came down without jumping. But then I again climbed, thinking its once in lifetime types experience and one must do it. So finally I found some courage to jump from 20 feet height. I am not scared of heights but I do not know swimming, hence jumping in water without knowing how to swim was a great achievement for me. I was super excited.

Our rafting ended and we were back in our camp, picked up our stuff and went for lunch. We all ate like a monster as we were so hungry and all our body parts especially hands were paining by rowing our raft. Post our lunch at a hotel we started our journey back to Delhi.

It was the most amazing, unforgettable rafting experience I had, it is difficult for me to pen down with correct words.

The Things I missed during this trip and will do whenever I visit next time- Adventure – Giant Swing, Flying Fox, Bungee Jumping and may be ATV Ride and Air Flying Safari (if my pocket allows me to do).Sight Seeing – Triveni Ghat, Laxman Jhoola, Parmarth Niketan…etc

Best time to visit for Rafting – March – June. It is little hot during the day but cool water provides an unforgettable experience.

Tip – One should carry their camera with them to take lot of pictures only to cherish later