Sunday had been a day of some rest, and we had needed that break, so we were much up and about on Monday for our trip to Gulmarg. We woke up in time, had a relaxed breakfast and picked up our camera and other stuff, all set to head out. Then we made a call to Sohail, our travel agent, to check on the whereabouts of our taxi. We were in for a rude shock – he told us there were rumors floating around that Gulmarg was closed even today. Because of that he had not sent the taxi so far. So we were quite upset, arrey are we going to spend another day twiddling our thumbs? What else can we do today with Srinagar also being closed? He said OK, he would send the taxi, but once it was allocated to us we were going to be charged for the full day, irrespective of where we went or whether we used it or not. We couldn’t really believe that Gulmarg was closed, we had not read or heard about it anywhere,so we said please send it anyway. The taxi arrived soon afterwards. The driver was a young jovial guy called Khan. We asked him what news about Gulmarg, he said what he is hearing is that it is closed, they are not allowing visitors. How can that be, we asked. Can’t be true, let’s go. He said, sure, I have no problem, I’m with you for the whole day. Let’s go. If we get through, its good, if not, it’ll be a drive and we’ll figure out something. He suggested that out of abundant caution we should request our travel agent to send us a reservation voucher for an overnight stay at Gulmarg just in case somebody insisted on that. Also make sure you have your Aadhar cards available readily. They may be needed.
So off we left and we called our travel agent on the on the way to tell him to send us the dummy reservation voucher. We were only 10 kilometers out of Srinagar when we met our first checkpoint. A fairly long queue off tourist vehicles ahead of us and we could see the security personnel stopping each vehicle quizzing them, turning some of them back but allowing some of them to go through. Our driver spoke to those who are returning and the news was that they were turning back all those people who are on a day visit, but allowing those who are going to stay overnight in Gulmarg. Fortunately, our dummy reservation voucher had arrived on WhatsApp by then. Finally, when we reached the barrier post the soldier asked us where we are headed and we said Gulmarg. Are ypu staying there overnight ?, Yes we said. So he simply waved us through. We were overjoyed and immediately sent a thank you message to our travel agent saying without his voucher we wouldn’t have made it through. Mr. Khan our driver told us don’t start celebrating too early there are still many barriers ahead and you could be turned back at any of them, but we were feeling up-beat and thrilled and we felt that if we can cross one will cross them all.
And so we continued another 20 odd kilometres uneventfully till we reached Tangmarg. Tangmarg is just 15 kilometres short of Gulmarg and it is from here that the ascent to Gulmarg begins. There was not much traffic and we presumed that the ineligible had been turned back, but we would be okay what with our reservation slip and all that.
Were we in for a rude shock. There was a barrier right at the entrance of Tangmarg swarming with security personnel, not very pleasant, who insisted that we turn right and park onto one of the side roads or go back. The driver opened his mouth to ask something but they were not ready to listen and they just banged on his car and yelled at him. We got out of the car and told him to find a good place to park while we try to figure find out what was going on. It was hardly 10:00 am, we were still among the early birds to arrive at Tangmarg and parking was relatively easier.
So we walked up to the soldiers and asked them what is going on. Gulmarg is closed, they told us you can’t proceed further. Closed? Why?, we asked. The president is coming, that is why. What rubbish, we told them. The president is in Kargill on the occasion of Kargil Day, and Kargil is a very long distance from here, so how is his being in Kargil affecting traffic to Gulmarg ? They had no answer to that, and even as we kept talking about how ridiculous this security over-reaction on his visit was, Tiny checked on Google, and that’s when we learnt, OMG the President’s aircraft was not able to take off from Leh for Kargil due to bad weather, and so they reverted to Plan B which was that he would be visiting a girls school in Gulmarg. In fact he was expected there anytime from now.
So that explained all the hyperactivity of the security personnel. We also understood there was not going to be any laxity. in fact it was Tiny who updated the soldiers on these facts, poor fellows most of them were young recruits who were completely clueless about what was happening and did not even know the full facts. All they knew was that it had something to do with the President and their orders were to stop all traffic and keep the road clear which is what they were doing.
Then began our wait. Our long wait. Every few minutes we would ask one of the soldiers any update when do you think they’re going to open open the roads? Not before noon they would say then it became not before 1 o’clock, then it became perhaps by around 4. What it meant was nobody really had any idea what was it. By then plenty of other cars had also reached Tangmarg and everyone tried their luck to get past the barriers some showing their reservations (dummy or not) and doing what we had done before them. But this was no ordinary visit and security was absolutely tight so there was no way they were going to let anybody through. For those like us who kept insisting we have an overnight reservation they told us not to worry we will definitely let you in through before end of day. From here we cannot let anybody through without orders. If at all we do, there are several barriers further on manned by senior officers. You will never get past them and we also will be pulled up for having been irresponsible and having let you through.
We had already decided that many of the things that we might have wanted to do in Gulmarg were ruled out. Once we cleared from here it was just another 15 minutes to Gulmarg. So we had given ourselves a deadline of 4:00 PM. Even if they let us go by 4:00 PM will go ahead do the little that we can while in Gulmarg and try to head back thereafter.
Even the net was no longer keeping us updated on what was really happening. Nobody seemed to know what is really going on. Some news snippet said that the president was going to Srinagar for lunch, another said he was now having lunch at Gulmarg and was still there. We too sat at one of the restaurants and had a leisurely lunch. Then suddenly there was a flurry of activity. Convoy upon convoy of pilot vehicles, flag vehicles with stars and flags sped past us heading down towards Srinagar. We figured with these top officers now leaving Gulmarg, the events would probably be getting over. We called Khan and told him to keep the vehicle ready and come to the next barrier. Sure enough, few minutes later they started dismantling the obstacles that they had placed and soon traffic was permitted. There was some chaos initially, everybody rushing, but it soon settled down. Along the last leg we met two more checkpoints who insisted on seeing our reservation and our ID before letting us go through. Good thing we had them ready. And then we finally made it and reached Gulmarg shortly after 4:00 PM
We gave ourselves a maximum of two hours to see the sights of Gulmarg. We walked through the bazaar, climbed up to the Shiva temple took another walk towards the Saint Marys church, admiring the greenery and the serenity, and we must have walked at least six to eight kilometres in that short spell including the steep climb to the temple. We were totally exhausted and had no energy to even walk back to the parking lot. Fortunately they were ponies available and we opted to ride on onei to get back to the parking lot
Of course, as usual, we managed a fair number of memorable photographs and they are in the photo gallery below.
