Here in Bantoli, Madmaheshwar Ganga flows southwards with a bass sound tumbling over rocks towards the river Mandakini. On the right bank, river Markandeya joins it forming a wedge-shaped slope between the two rivers. On the left bank of Madmaheshwar, thick jungles proceed as far as the eye travels right towards the sky. On the other side, steep grassy slopes merge into the coniferous forest at the top. The lodge overlooking the confluence of the two rivers is unbelievably soothing on the nerves. A small flat patch of crop surrounds it and then a gravel path proceeds towards Madmaheshwar, an important though not very popular site of Hindu pilgrimage in the Garhwal

Himalayas, where, according to legend, Lord Shiva's navel fell. A quick bath in the sunny patch and the prospect of a khichri sounds delicious after the morning trek from Rasi. I decide to stay put here for the day. By evening I had arrived at Rasi after a two-hour jeep ride from Ukhimath coupled with an hour-long walk. It takes about nine hours to reach Ukhimath from Rishikesh by bus.

Apparently there is a marriage at Madmaheshwar. The groom is a local priest whose family comes from a Karnataka Virashaiva sect. By some ancient arrangement put down to the travels of Shankaracharya, the Madmaheshwar temple is presided over by Karnataka priests unlike Badrinath which sees the Nambudiris from Kerala at the helm.

A couple of locals pass by. One of them, a schoolteacher, uses his stock of English consisting of flower power words like nature, beautiful and peace, before proceeding with his drunken companions towards Madmaheshwar. This drunken party is surely not going to like the 9 km. steep climb ahead. My host Sher Singh is busy with preparing strings of sheep wool. First, he takes out the damp wool from a wicker basket and then rubs it with two spiked boards. At the end of a minute-Long rubbing session, the wool becomes shiny and fluffy. Then he makes thick strands out of it by wounding it around the hand. Later this thick coil is dexterously fed into a hand-held rotating spindle and a uniform thin string of wool materialises. Upon my inquiring what he makes out of this wool, he jumps up and with a dervish like movement puts on a thick cut sleeve jubbah with an open front. Where does he get his wool? His flock of sheep goes up the slopes of the mountains to the north and east where the jungle called Badru ends and the bugyals or meadows begin. These are places from where one gets a rampart view of the Himalayas. Places like Kachni Khal, Pandusera, Nandikund - local pilgrimages associated with myriad myths about the Pandavas during their exile are not too far.

In fact, a week-long trek is possible with local guides around these truly awesome mountains. In the words of Ishwar Singh Bhatt in Rasi village - Come in the middle of September and I'll show you the real Himalayas. It will be a trip you'll never forget. He suggests going to Kedarnath from Rasi by crossing the water-dividing ridge between Madmaheshwar and Mandakini. The sky will be blue, the grass green and the only distraction will be the thousands of alpine flowers.

For his living, Bhatt runs a chait shop and lodge. The neat, spacious shop may look spare, but the food is on time. Behind the shop, a minute away, is the old temple dedicated to Rakeshwari Devi. A very tall swing, surely made in godly proportions, stands in front. A group of five sadhus are stopping by on their way back from Madmaheshwar. This motley group consists of people from various parts of the country who met on the way, liked each other's company and decided to complete one leg of their journey together. These are illiterate or barely literate men from Punjab, Rajasthan, Orissa and UP who chose to be with some akhara. Every year or so they try to go to some holy places to add up to their good karma. One of the mahatmas or great souls, as they are referred to by the local populace, shows his government approved permit for the forthcoming Amarnath Yatra in Kashmir to others. The Mahatmas are having regular glasses of black tea in the covered corridor of a building next to the temple. Whosoever drops by is offered a cuppa.

Meanwhile preparations for the evening meal are on and one of them is kneading the atta for the rotis. Some village boys and men along with an elderly villager are hanging about. In matters of intricate mythological issues and religious knick-knacks, the old man seems to be more knowledgeable and he knows it. From time to tome he asks questions like what is the twelve-syllable mantra or recites a Sanskrit ditty about the twelve jyotirlingas. At the same time he defers the invitation of the mahatmas to sit on the mat on the grounds that being a householder he is not worthy enough to sit on it. It is clear that the old man's world is more rooted in faith than some of the young sadhus who peppered their similes with technological metaphors from the modern world. His world was made of folktales, puranas and mantras. Folktales like how one daughter-in-law, when asked about the father-in-law's whereabouts, replied that he was in some unmentionable place; how the son was then asked to leave his wife; how the wife explained the misunderstanding by saying that it was actually the father-in-law's previous birth that she was referring to, etc. etc. and all this to prove some ethical or moral point. These peripatetic sadhus are surely closer to us mentally than the old man, an almost extinct phenomenon in this city-centric world. Later in the evening, the art inside the temple was a trance music of sorts with bells of all shapes and sizes making tingling sounds of various frequencies. Visually, the darkened ancient doors and the assortment of brass and stone idols softly reflecting the panchpradeep lights, created a mysterious setting. Meanwhile, the wind has picked up in the valley. The sadhus are still smoking their chillums. I make my way down to the lodge.

The evening shadow lengthens in Bantoli. It begins to rain and my plans of drifting in the moonlit valley vanish. The local forest guard stops by on his way up. He laments about the villagers' ignorance about forest protection and the practice of clearing off these steep slopes for cultivation which results in soil erosion and he predicts the disappearance of a nearby village in a few years time. A noisy party enters the lodge and I retire for the day after my evening meal of dal, chaul and subzi. Gradually I fall asleep to the sound of the river interspersed with snatches of Markendaya Puran that Sher Singh is listening to on his battered tape recorder.