Gypsies: KP 3: The evening!

“The sky turned pink, peach, copper and indigo as the sun left and twilight fell…!”

Watching the sunset from atop the Pushpagiri peak is spectacular, spell binding, magical and awe inspiring… I’m falling short of adjectives to describe it!

I had seen the sun disappear in the sea…

I had seen the sun disappear behind hills and mountains…

Here I saw the sun just disappear in what appeared to be a haze of clouds… But it was not at all cloudy that evening! I think I saw the farthest point of the earth visible to me from where I was standing…!

We were done with setting up our tents and filling water. We had reached the edge of the mountain just in time to watch the sun journeying westwards and into the horizon. We sat there at the cliff bathing in the glory of the moment. The valley looked threatening and deep enough to swallow anyone who would dare to go close to it.

The SeshaParvatha and the Siddha Parvatha appeared calm and majestic at a distance, against the sky filled with myriad hues. We spoke to the mountains and the mountains replied back to us… in our own voice, saying exactly what we had told them…!

The deep valleys and the beautiful view from the edge of the cliff were inspiring enough for anyone to dedicate poetry to the beauty of nature.

The sun was soon nowhere to be seen…

The sky was turning dimmer with each passing moment…

The moon peeped out above us in a perfect crescent…

The sky was soon covered in a navy blue blanket with shiny stars pinned to it…!

A nip in the air came along with the darkness and soon we were swaddled in whatever clothes we had (we did not have many!).It was time to light up the campfire. Firewood was piled up on top of one another; all the waste – dried leaves, papers, etc. went into it. Some big rocks to protect the fire from the winds surrounded the fireplace. A match strike, and the firewood crackled bringing comforting warmth to life.

We sat around the fire, chatting, each one updating everyone else with the recent happenings in his/her life!

We sat there staring at the clear night sky trying to identify the intricate patterns that were formed by the trillions of twinkling stars. I never knew that there were so many of them stuck up there!

We also sat there crying for some time because we had put tissues laden with Dettol(which were used to wipe hands that had got blackened by collecting firewood)in the fire, which made the fire smoke incessantly!

We had an early dinner around the fire…

All along blowing into the fire to keep it alive.

We hit the sacks early, a few of us in tents and few others outside in sleeping bags. Most of us had not slept properly since Friday night when we had departed from Mangalore. Saturday’s strenuous trek and the struggle for fire and water had also tired us out. We had two tents… one was occupied by all the girls… four of us including me, the other by two guys. The rest of the guys slept outside with a sleeping bag. The night was pitch dark. The sky was crystal clear - so clear that we could see stars shooting across the sky every few minutes.

That night I felt like I was in some kind of a fairy tale…curled up in my sleeping bag in the earth’s lap and the endless, beautiful, serene and mysterious night sky to give me company! The only sound around was that of insects, rustling leaves and crackling fire, which would soon die away. Everything around was so peaceful! It seemed as if nothing could have disturbed my deep sleep that night. But this was the calm before the storm…