My Gallery
Gallery
Welcome to the gallery section, this would contain some of my pictures with friends, social events, some of my art work in photoshop among other things.
Ladakh - Wallpapers everywhere!
Posted on 22nd October, 2022Ladakh is without a doubt one of the most sought after destinations in India for adventure seekers. I had a pleasure to visit this marvellous place in June - July earlier this year. I was part of a group tour operated by a company called "Golden Eagle Expedition". It was an enduring bike trip for 12 days. We started from Srinagar and entered into Ladakh the same day by evening. Most of the time we were riding on bikes and had little time to spend in sight-seeing. Overall, it was a thrilling experience. We skipped Leh Palace, Leh Market and some passes
I enjoyed almost never ending scenic beauty throughout our journey. My favorite route was from Kargil to Leh, every single snapshot clicked on my phone appeared to be worthy of a desktop wallpaper. In our journey, we crossed multiple dangerous passes like Zoji la pass, Gata Loops and Khardungla Pass. We also left some prominent places from our itinerary owing to lack of time we had.
1. Pangong Tso : Often you would find this place at number one in many such Ladakh 'places to visit' lists. Most part of this lake lies in Tibet and is frozen in Winter. It changes color at least twice a day. In the morning it would be blueish and by evening it would be slightly green. I haven't been to many such comparable lakes, but this was for sure the purest form of water body I saw in my life. The different colored mountains surrounding this lake enhances the beauty of this place. This is where the last scene of famous Bollywood movie '3 Idiots' was shot.2. Tso Moriri Lake : Another pristine lake of Ladakh comes next in my list. Relatively less explored compared to Pangong, this lies completely in India. We experienced quite extended off-road drive on our way to this lake which makes it difficult to access compared to Pangong. In many ways it is similar to Pangong and provides a nice photoshoot location to decorate your Instagram.
3. Khardungla Pass : It is falsely advertised as the 'Highest Motorable Road' in the world. In reality it even struggles to make it to top 10. There is another pass called 'Umling La Pass', located in eastern Ladakh at an altitude of 19,300 feet above sea level, which in reality has the world's highest motorable road. Khardunga however is easily accessible from 'Leh'. It was a unique experience for me, at almost half the elevation a commercial flight often operates it was the highest altitude I've ever been to.
4. Shanti Stupa : It is one of the main attractions of the city of 'Leh'. It's hilltop location allows to have a panoramic view of Leh city. You can also enjoy the scenic beauty of snow covered Himalayas. Statue of Buddha is also installed inside the Stupa.
5. Nubra Valley : Around 160 KM from Leh, this cold desert of India has a lot to offer for tourists. 'Sand Dunes' is located in Nubra valley where you can enjoy camel riding. These camels have two humps which differentiates them from camels elsewhere found in India. There are other activities you can enjoy in Sand Dunes like archery and few others which I can't recall at the time of writing this post XD. We visited this place in the evening and experienced mesmerizing sunset view in the valley.
6. Hanley Village : This places supposedly has one of the clearest night sky views from anywhere in India. I took several shots of the night sky here, one of them you can find in the gallery of this post per say. It houses Indian Astronomical Observatory which has one of the highest operating telescopes in the World at the altitude of 4500 meters. People come here to gaze the night sky and we did the same for 3-4 hours, tried our photography skills and captured some stunning night visuals.7. Indus Zanskar Sangam : Ladakh is full of rivers and their confluence points. Perhaps the most famous out of these is the confluence point of river Zanskar and the mighty Indus. This spot is located almost 30 KMs from Leh. We were not able to descend down to the actual spot, we only had a top view which kind of sucked. This was one of those places which we were not able to cover in detail due to lack of time. There is an army base just near the spot, there are activities like river rafting which we missed. Indus approaches from the left and Zanskar from the right. I regret I did not get to touch pristine Indus, though at a lot of places in our journey we could see Indus flowing by our side in the valley. It is the longest river in India, despite the absence of major populated settlements near this river in India. It is the life line of Pakistan with 95% of the river flowing through it.
Stuttgart - More than just a city of luxury cars
Posted on 21st December, 2022This was my first visit to Europe. I visited a city called - Stuttgart, located in Baden-Württemberg state in Germany. The visit was due to official work related reasons with few of my colleagues. I had a lot of fun while exploring the city. We used to stay in outskirts of the main city in a place called Esslingen, some 12 KMs from the center of Stuttgart city. We used to work in the office from 7 AM - 4 PM which is typical German working hours. We used to explore places in the time we used to have after work was done.
I started with Public Library Stuttgart. It was the best library I've ever been not, not that I have been to many libraries to be honest with you. You can find the interior view in one of the attached images I've with this post. It was very easy to access the library, we did not have to go through many security checks. As you'd expect, it was full of German books, but there were few English ones as well stacked in between the German books. The architecture is mesmerizing, it's bright white from Inside. The way they have put in book shelves and the stairs from the top is a view to capture. The place is so clean and serene, makes you feel lost in silence.
I had the first time experience of watching a top tier Football division game in Europe. We watched a game of Bundesliga in the Mercedes Benz Arena in Stuttgart. I've been an avid Football follower for years now, experiencing a match in live inside the stadium was something totally different. We felt ourselves connected to a team we never heard of (Stuttgart Vfb), we used to stand at our seats whenever ball approached the goal in anticipation. I watched people waving flags, forming a Mexican wave, singing song for their team. All these things, so far I only experienced on TV. It was cherry on top of the cake when the team we supported won in extra time 2-1.
Next, on a random holiday I visited Porsche Museum. It had a huge collection of luxury cars through out the history of Porsche. They charge you 10 Euro as entry fees to the Museum. You're provided a multi-lingual earphone with a phone which tells you about the history of Porsche, various cars and milestone events in the timeline of the company. The museum premises is spread over 3 floors which I covered in around 3 hours.
Now I'd be covering the most talked about tourist destination in Stuttgart - Mercedes Benz Museum. The museum is located in vicinity to our Untertürkheim office. They charge 6 Euro for normal customers, but for me it was free of cost. I visited this place thrice in a week since it is humongous comprising of 9 levels. It has huge display of Mercedes collection throughout the 100+ years of company history. It has an art Gallery which displays various events that happened which led to what Mercedes is today. If you try to read these, it could easily take you an entire day. I was more interested in capturing cars in my camera so I skipped a lot of these writings.
I also visited Stuttgart State Museum of Natural History. My first experience was, man this is totally different from the ones I visit in India. I saw rocks and fossils dating back to 200 Million years ago, there were dinosaurs skeletons and the models created from those parts on display. I wonder why we don't have that many fossils in display in our Museums in India ? There were also some demonstrations on our we humans evolved as a species. I couldn't read most of them since they were in German. I spent around 4 hours in the museum which was totally worth it.
On one random day after office hours, I took some time and headed towards Konigstrasse - one of the favorite shopping destinations of Stuttgart. At the end of the street you have a castle and a giant wheel. One of the most beautiful Christmas market in Europe is setup here for around 3 months.
Visiting the cleanest city of India
Posted on 21st December, 2022Indore, this city, has always been in the media for neatness. I had the opportunity to visit this place recently to attend a wedding function. These days, I occasionally go on a work-from-anywhere spree. So I decided to come here before the wedding date which I had to attend in order to explore the city in some depth.
In total, I explored 10+ places within Indore. Unfortunately, when I made the visit, the iconic Rajwada palace was undergoing some maintenance work. As a result, entry was prohibited for visitors. I went to this other palace called 'Lal Bagh Palace'. I liked some of the sections inside the palace which emitted a royal aura. Some of the belongings from the royal family were well preserved and put on display. I went to Zoo which was pretty much like every other Zoo in India. It was compact but still had a huge collection of animals in the artificial habitat.
Indore is known for it's night street food. There are two places for foodies who want to experience late night street food - 1. Sarafa and 2. 56 Market. Sarafa is congested, messy but provides more options to eat plus they're economical. It is a narrow street near the old part of the city. 56 (known as Chappan) is a series of 56 shops located in sequence on both sides. It is well maintained and neat. Both of these markets are supposed to be opened till 2 AM.
I also covered few temples in Indore which were Bada Ganpati, Glass temple, Khajrana ganesh temple and Annapurna temple. I saw there were posters, audio announcements everywhere emphasizing the pride of Indore's first position in neatness within the country. There are dustbins everywhere like it is in some western countries. I guess, that is why it is the cleanest city in India. Even the mentality of people is wired in such a way they would think multiple times before littering in public. I wish this mentally to be installed in residents of other cities as well. The city looks crowded like most Indian cities but, it's not a mess.
The city boasts a robust network of city buses running throughout the city. In some parts of the city, there is I-Bus which has it's own path in the road with stations. It is just like a metro but for bus. Streets are narrow in some parts of the city and might invite traffic jams in peak hours. Overall, visiting Indore was a pleasant experience which I would like to visit again.
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