GREEN WORLD
THE VALLEY OF
FLOWERS
According to
legend, when the Pandavas were on their way to Swargarohan where they were to
take samadhi, Draupadi an requisite flower floating in a river. She asked Bhima to find out where it had
come from. So Bhima set off
upstream. As he walked between
rhododendrons, oaks, firs, pines, deodars and silver birches, he could hear
birds chirping, insects buzzing and occasional cries of animals. Then all of a sudden, everything grew silent
and Bhima saw in front of him a saucer-shaped valley where millions of flowers
of different shapes, sizes and colours grew in wild abandon. The beauty and serenity of the place
overwhelmed him. Then plucking a flower
that grew on a nearby ledge, Bhima returned to tell about the wondrous sight he
had beheld.
For a long
long time very few people knew of the valley, which lay in the Himalayas,
between Rishikesh and Badrinath. The
locals called it Bhyundar or the playground of fairies and nymphs. In 1931, English mountaineer Frank Smythe,
who led the first successful expedition to Mt. Kamet, accidentally stumbled
upon the place, on his downward descent.
The sight of hundreds of thousands of sprays in a riot of colour against
the backdrop of the massive Rataban peak and the river Pushpawati flowing
nearby, captivated him.
He and his
team camped in the valley for two days, taking back with them a priceless
collection of seeds, bulbs, tubers and plants.
“It’s a valley of peace and perfect beauty where the human spirit may
find repose,” wrote Symthe in his book the Valley of Flowers. The book made the place so popular that
tourists from all over the world began to visit it and soon the valley came to
be called the Valley of Flowers.
During the
flowering season, the bed of the valley is like a gigantic greenhouse and the
emission of carbon dioxide and other gases in the rarefied mountain air can
make breathing difficult. People have
been known to faint on entering the valley.
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Courtesy
‘Hindu’ - 14-1-01