I was lying on my bed, a slow smile
curving over my face, as I painted a picture of myself wandering through the
park along the beautiful turquoise lakes and umpteen waterfalls – the thought
of being in this stunning place in less than 12 hours had led to an inexplicable
excitement that was net letting me sleep; I was getting impatient – why was the
time moving so slow? I had first read about this place a few months back while
browsing through the internet – it featured in this list of “100 places to
visit before you die”. I showed it to Prateek and told him that would
definitely visit this place someday - little did I know that this “someday”
would come so soon!
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| Of lakes and waterfalls.. |
Finally, it was morning, and time
for us to start our journey towards the park. I was brimming with excitement. We
reached the Park around 10 - 10:30, and bought our tickets. There are a bunch
of different trails to choose from depending on the amount of time one would
want to spend in the park. We had the entire day and hence chose a trail that
would let us explore the upper as well as the lower lakes, taking about 5-6
hours to complete.
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| All set for the trek.. |
As we were about to start our
trek through the park, it started raining – Though we were prepared for it with
our umbrellas and raincoats, we were not able to take many pictures; Also, as
the rain intensified, we got soaked and were almost shivering – not allowing us
to enjoy the beauty that surrounded us as much as we would have wanted to!
Thankfully, a couple of hours later, the sky started clearing out; the turquoise lakes glistened as the sunrays
fell on it – changing its colour from turquoise to emerald to dark blue
depending on the intensity of sunlight. The walk through meandering wooden
pathways over the streams, the umpteen waterfalls, the crystal clear lakes, the
different shades of yellow and green on the trees that surrounded us - all
seemed straight out of a fairy tale – Nothing we read or saw on the internet
could prepare us for the ethereal beauty that we were confronted with.
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| Shades of Green and Yellow.. |
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| Walking through the rains.. |
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| One of the many waterfalls.. |
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| Pretty pretty! |
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| Over the streams.. |
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| Crystal clear water.. |
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| Oh so beautiful! |
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| Shades of emerald.. |
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| The "Big" waterfall |
As we made our way back, covering
the last stretch of this amazing journey, we were greeted by some spectacular
views of lakes cascading into each other; And before we knew, it was time for
us to leave this place – a place that could be best described as “nature’s
masterpiece”.
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| Nature's masterpiece! |
