Trip to Vaishnodevi and back

For a long long time I had been postponing the trip to Vaishnodevi, not because I didn't want to go there but because I had this genuinely sincere belief that I will truly have the call from Ma "chalo bulawa aaya hai" :-) Well, finally no such message came and I had to agree to the trip planned from 2nd to 4th Oct. The original idea was to land in Jammu on morning of 2nd and then straight away go to Katra, check in a hotel and then avail the helicopter service to the shrine. We managed to meet the original plan till the hotel check in part (train reached Jammu at 5 AM on 2nd), but then found out that helicopter service is over booked. Rather than risking life and limb on ponies, we all agreed to leg it up. For Kush, I decided to carry him on my back.
After all the bathing and breakfasting and security procedures, we started climbing up at 1 PM. Straight away I realized that the uphill climb was very very arduous, more so with Kush in my arms. I had to take a break every 75 steps or so and by the time it was 2:30 PM, I hadn't even reached the 1st stop Charan Paduka situated at a distance of only 2 kms. After some discussions, Meetu prevailed on me to hire a pithoo, a coolie to carry Kush up. And then we started the real climb. After we reached Adhkwari ( a distance of 6.5 km), we took the newly laid path straight to Bhawan, a distance of 5.5 kms. This part was easier as the climb was not as steep as compared to earlier path. To cut a long story short, we all reached Bhawan by 6:30. And then found that the darshan has been stopped till 9 PM. We all waited and waited, and the hunger and tiredness made us snappy and angry. I couldn't figure out why we were being made to suffer like this, but wait was all we could do. Finally at 9 PM, the line started moving, but by then we had run into a problem. There was no space in the locker and we had many items to store. So another long wait for locker space. At 10:30 PM, we joined the line. The line moved slowly and finally at 12 PM, we finally had the darshan, a quick 2-3 seconds look up of the pinds. Then we dragged our weary bodies to claim our things from locker and had some food. We decided to take ponies for the downhill journey. We had to find 4 but we could find only 3. I couldn't get a horse for the downhill journey and so with a heavy heart and still heavier legs, I started on the downhill journey, alone, disappointed, angry with everyone. After 9 Kms of constant walking, with some 30 seconds break thrown in, I realized that I could walk no more. My knees trembled, my legs didn't want to move. It was when I couldn't bring my body to move an inch that I heard a comment from a little girl behind me. She was happy that the trick her mother had taught her was holding her beautifully on her trek downhill. The trick was simple. Instead of going down in a straight line, start jogging left and right so that the body is moving constantly at an angle to the road unfurling below one. I followed it and was able to drag myself to 1 km of my destination, the auto stop. But for the last 1 km, I would never have understood the meaning of pain. Every step, every movement was a very very painful jab, every breath reminding me that I needed rest. Somehow I dragged myself to the auto stand, took an auto and reached hotel room at 4:30 AM (all done and dusted in 23 hours flat !!!). I had made the downhill trek in 2 hours 20 minutes or so. But I was really really tired. When I entered my bed, I had tears in my eyes, tears of relief. It was an incredible feeling. The remainder of night flew away and I woke with pain all over my body. And then I realized the import of all this meaningless trek taxing my body, causing so much pain and discomfort. It is after suffering pain that one can really feel the bliss and the blessings. That's the idea behind that arduous trek up and down.