My first solo hike goes wrong

My interest in Hiking, Trekking and adventure grew with a school friend of mine, and our mutual fascination about shows like 'Man Vs Wild' and 'Survivorman'. In the year 2022, when I got some stability in life, I got several opportunities to go 'into the wild' with friends and alone.

My first solo hike, which became something of a small disaster, was in a wildlife sanctuary near Manali.

I was on a 10 day trip in Himachal Pradesh with 3 friends. The rest of my friends were not so interested in the hikking, and were more interested in sight-seeing. So, my day was mostly divided into 2 parts. getting up at 5 AM and exploring the local space, wherever we happened to be staying that day, and returning by 9 or 10 AM when my other friends were ready for the itinerary of that day.

I had never done solo hiking, or much hiking for that matter. There were warnings about leopards and bears in the jungle, although leopards were not supposed to be a threat during the daytime and bears were thought to be less likely near human settlement.

I had planned ahead for this hike. I had chosen a hike called 'Kanyal Circuit', described by the following youtube video by Creedaz. The youtubers had provided a GPX file for the trail they had taken in the hike. A GPX file can be opened through several android apps. It basically gives you a google map like view along with the trail marked for the given hike, as well your GPS location on the map. Best of all is, as I would find out later, gps on phones work even when there is no network. So, one can use this GPX file to avoid getting lost in a jungle. Great help.

Our stay in Manali was only for two days. Also, I had a time restriction from 5 AM to about 9-10 AM. In this time, I had to find the trail, learn how to navigate using the GPX file and complete the 'Kanyal Circuit'.

We were there in Manali at the end of march. The mornings were chilly, but as the day progressed, it would get sunny and sweaty for a person hiking.

On day 1, the alarm woke me up at 5 AM when it was still dark and I got ready while trying to avoid disturbing the sleep of my roommate. By the time I was out, it was already bright, and I could see the red sunlight reflecting from the heavenly white mountains. It was cold, and I was wearing a jacket, woolen cap and maybe gloves. I had a bag with one liter of water. This information will become relevant later.

I had shared my live location with my friends, so that they could find me if I was late, lost or something else.

Initially, I had some difficulty trying to find the trail and I ended up wasting a lot of time. Eventually, I got to the wildlife sanctuary, and from there, it was a one dimensional clearly visible trail along the mountain, with a bright sun beginning to rise up, and the Manali city visible below in the valley.

I was greatly concerned about the leopards and bears that might be in the jungle, so I asked a person, who was on an early morning walk, about them and got reassurance that it was unlikely to come across either of the species. Another of my concerns was of getting robbed in the isolated place, especially because I was alone. But I braved my fears and went on.

I came across a shepherd with his sheeps, and some other early risers. But as I got deeper into the forest, it became totally isolated, with only some wild dogs being occasional companions. I came across several water streams with clear sparkling cold water, descending from the mountains. This information will also become relevant at a later stage.

I had already wasted a lot of time and I knew I would not be able to complete the Kanyal circuit that day. So my aim was to get a feel of the trail and maybe return the next day with the more ambitious aim.

I was still within the network area and I started getting calls from my friends, asking me to come back for the day's plans. I wrapped up my day's hike, returning from a beautiful dolphin nose-like spot. I made a complete video of my 30 minutes return walk from that spot.

My plan for the next day was made. I would try to reach the highest spot of the hike and return. The entire hike would be about 16-18 KMs, which I would have to complete in 3-4 hours.

The early morning routine for the next day was a replay of the last one. I did not know at that moment, but I made a couple of mistakes. I did not have breakfast, as it was too early for the breakfast to be available. I did not carry anything to eat with me. I kept only one liter of water with me with no plans to refill. And most risky of all mistakes, I was going alone.

I reached the spot of my last day in no time and confidently walked past the dolphin nose spot, keeping to my well defined trail. I kept a close watch on the GPX app, just to make sure that I was on the right track.

Then I became careless. Why look at the GPX app when I can see the trail in front of me?

When I next looked at the app, to my surprise, I found that I had diverged from the trail in the app. The easy trail was over. I was supposed to deviate from it and climb uphill.

Now, I was unsure. Should I walk back and find the point from where I deviated from my trail? Or should I climb uphill and try to find my trail back?

I decide on the latter. The uphill walk was not easy as there was no trail visible. I got closer and closer to the spot where the app said I needed to be, but there was still no trail visible. There were some faint trails, but it was difficult to spot where they continued. I was struggling to proceed.

In the meantime, the sun was up, and it was getting hot. I removed my jacket to find my shirt completely drenched in sweat. I also realized that I had already drunk up all my water supply. I did not realize how much of an issue this fact was soon going to become.

In absence of a well defined trail, I somehow struggled to proceed in the general direction that the app was telling me to. Finally, I was relieved to get out of the forest to get a glimpse of the valley again, and with it a village (different from Manali) and the sun.

The bright view, especially coming out of the dark forest, was breathtaking. It was also reassuring that maybe I was finally out of my ordeal. Maybe the way will be easier ahead.

I also noticed that I was out of the network zone. I was now on my own. I would not get out of here if my feet cannot carry me. And I was getting the first signs of fatigue setting in.

I could see an isolated hut, fenced by barbed wires, although no one was visible.

Taking a break from the amazing view, I decided to proceed to the Kanyal peak. By then, I had realized that I just had to walk uphill and I will get there.

There was still no clear trail visible, but I made the best of what the app was trying to tell me.

I took something that looked like a trail, and started climbing uphill. I got caught in a strange plant whose thorns simply took hold of me, sticking against my clothes. I freed myself from that plant, and climbed uphill, when I slowly realized that it was simply impossible to climb uphill through the thick forest there. I was on the wrong trail again!

I had to retrace my path to where I thought I had made a mistake. On the return journey, the same plant again clinged to my cloth and I had to again free myself from the thorns!

All this trial and error was taking a toll on me. Dehydration was setting in, I was hungry and out of energy. I started realizing the mistakes I had made that day. At this point, I was hoping that all of this would get over.

But I had to reach the Kanyal peak.

Thankfully, I now figured out what the correct path to the peak was. It was a steep climb uphill, with the risk of slipping quite significant. With each few meters that I walked, my strength was depleting further. Now I was wondering how far I could still go. I knew that I was about 7-9 Kms from safety, that with each step taken into the trail, this distance was increasing and also that in my return journey, there was a phase with no visible trails in which I had to find a safe path to descend before I could get the part where the trail back to safety was clearly visible.

At several points, I decided to give up the hope of getting to the Kanyal peak. I was running out of time as getting lost in the jungle had already cost me a lot of time. I was calculating, using the app, how much I still had to walk before I reached the peak. I started negotiating with myself about how much I still had to walk. I started taking a few minutes of rest on my path, trying to catch my breath and collect my strength. If only I could have some water, it would be alright. I wondered that if I reached the Kanyal peak, I may find some tourists who could share some water with me.

I had done some research that human beings are not Leopard's natural prey as they are too big, but when in the sitting position their apparent size gets smaller and the probability of leopard attacking increases. All these thoughts were going through my head in my rest period.

There came a point when I decided that I could not proceed any further. I sat down on the point which would be the furthest I would go on the hike. The Kanyal peak was visible from there, but I knew that, dehydrated, I would neither be able to relax or enjoy the view that the peak would provide. And then, there was the looming thought that I had to return back the whole way I had come.

I do not drink cold drinks, as a rule. But at that moment, I started hallucinating that I was back into civilization and drinking a cold drink.

I am atheist. But at that moment of weakness, I started praying to any god out there for my safe return to the city.

After some rest, I began the daunting task. I was so out of strength that I had to take a rest after every 2 minutes of walking down the hill.

The risk of falling was even greater during descent, so I had to be careful.

Somehow I managed to reach back to the isolated hut I had mentioned before. I decided to reach out for help from the inhabitants.

Water, food, anything.

I made my way through the barbed wires. I was trespassing.

I called for someone.

I alerted a dog, which started barking. The dog was getting aggressive and was jumping around me and I used my bag to try and create a barrier between me and the dog.

I saw an old woman emerge from the hut. She called to calm down the dog.

"Paani hai aapke paas? Pyaas lagi hai mujhe.", I asked the old woman for water.

"Sookha hai yaha. Jao yaha se." She replied.

"Kuch khane ke liye hai aapke paas." I tried again, asking for some food instead.

"Jao yaha se. Ye kutta khata hai."

This dog will eat you. Go away from here.

This was absolutely disappointing. The dog was still barking, but was maintaining distance. I moved away from the hut, resuming my hike back.

I knew that if I can descend carefully from the mountain, I should get to the clear trail from where the return would be much easier. But choosing a path to descent was tricky, as the risk of falling was significant. Also, I was totally out of strength.

At some point, I devised a method to descend by sliding. I would sit down and rest my body weight on one foot, keeping the other foot downhill and slide. The sliding would become uncontrolled, and I scratched the skin in my palm and also tore my pants a little. But it worked, and slowly, I descended safely to the familear trail.

This greatly increased my enthusiasm. I knew that now I only had a simple walk through a trail in a forest. And I knew that there were some streams of water on the trail.

I filled my bottle in the first stream of water I found and drank half a liter of the fresh cold water. This was risky and badass. My 'man vs wild' moment!

Now I knew that I could complete the remaining couple of Kms of journey without any problem.

I was also back in the network area and was getting several calls from my friends that it was late and the car had arrived to take us for the day's plan. I told them to order some breakfast for me and that I would be arriving in half an hour or so.

When I was back in the city and saw a shop, the first thing I did was purchase and drink a packaged Guava fruit juice. In my hotel, I drank another packaged mango fruit juice. I had a quick breakfast while my angry friends were waiting downstairs with the cab.

When I sat in the cab, I was feeling like I was dead. We reached a market, and I again drank mixed fruit juice. It was after this, and an hour of walking like a dead person, that I finally regained my strength.

Then we went to see the Jogini waterfalls.