Group Members / Colleagues:
- Salman Saeed (Me)
- Engr. Rao Ehtisham
- Engr. Muhammad Usman
- Naseer Ahmed (Driver)
Travelling Dates:
Sunday 20[SUP]th[/SUP] January 2013 ? Friday 25[SUP]th[/SUP] January 2013
Vehicle Used:
Toyota Corolla XLI
Distance Covered:
Home (Lahore) to Home (Lahore) = 1299.6 Km
Total Expenses:
Fuel Cost = 11000/-
Accommodation, Food & all other Expenses = 24000/-
Total Trip Cost = 35000/-
Travel Detail:
Day 1
On Sunday 20 January 2013 around 01 am at night I left from home (Allama Iqbal Town) and pick 2 of my colleagues from Gulberg and in last pick my driver from his home Shahdra and we exit from Lahore Via G.T Road around 02:15 am, I stopped at Muridkay for refueling and necessary checking of car tire, air pressure, battery etc? there I gave the pilot seat to my driver, and took some rest, around 05:30 am at barakahu Islamabad we filled again our car?s fuel tank and take some tea (we have hot water in flask, teabags and everyday milk arrangements with us).
Around 06:30 am near Murree I take control of driving seat (and drive myself all 5 days till Jehlum, because I love to drive, after Jehlum our driver was able to drive till LahoreJ ),We crossed Kohala Bridge around 08:30am, Right after crossing the Kohala Bridge there is a office of AJK Tourisum Department, I stopped there to get some information about snow conditions, and road conditions for 4X4 jeeps after sharda to Kel, as expected there is no one to help us at this time :),
I took couple of pictures and move on, we reach Muzaffarabad around 09:00 am, I stopped at Sangam Hotel to get some information about the breakfast, as they have buffet every morning, I was told that today they don?t have Buffet but they can make breakfast for us on order and we will have to wait for this, they offered me a menu to choose from, the very first item I saw in the list was the boiled egg, which was Rs 95/- J I gave them the menu back and move forward to another hotel for breakfast, after a few yards there was a hotel, we took our breakfast very economically, and reached to AJK Hydro Board Office in Upper Chattar Housing Scheme for getting some information about all of our sites which we are going to visit and some of our technical queries, at there we were informed that there is a heavy snow after Sharda and we cannot go to Kel even by Jeeps, they suggested us, its better not to go there (H).
After an hour or so we left from the office and as we reached at Quaid-eAzam Bridge just before Sangam Hotel, the road was blocked due to some kind of political procession and we moved very slowly slowly, it took us 1 hour to cross the whole city.
But there we observed one thing very special, that the local Police, People & Drivers they are very polite, calm & cooperative and they obey the laws very well as compare to the other parts of the country, everyone stays in his driving line no one tries to cross others even if they have the clear way and chance to cross, specially we were very amazed to see the Rikshaw Drivers, they were very calm and not in a hurry like the rikshaw drives of Lahore (as Lahori drivers are always in hurry and they use every means & limits to reach their destination).
Around 12:30 Pm we reached Patika, it is a small town 19 KM from Muzaffarabad, it has a dependable commercial center and a modest bazaar with day-to-day activity, all essential items are available in the bazaar which feeds a fairly large number of villages behind it. On its back runs the forth-emitting river Neelum. The village and bazaar are connected by a suspension bridge crossable by jeep alone. This old bridge is also replaced with an RCC one enabling it to afford heavy traffic. The running streams, water channels and water falls across the Patika village present another heart winning scene.
We had our first site in Patika 2 KM away from main Patika town, so we crossed the bazar and the river neelum through an RCC bridge after 20 minutes we reached at the top of our site,
our site was 200 meters down from the road, we went down visit the existing small 100 kW hydro power plant, new plant was proposed at the side of the existing plant, so we took site & surrounding pictures gathered some necessary information and set off for our next destination Jagran Resorts ? Kutton Velly.
A small floor mill operated by hydro power in Patika, you will find few more same kind of small mills in Patika.
30 minutes after leaving Paktika we reached in front of a Dhani Water Fall (anyone correct me if I am wrong about the name), due to shortage of time we did not able to take pictures of that water fall, so i am attaching this picture from my last year trip when I came here in March with my friends, but this location is little bit changed now as compare to last year.
If you look at the left side of the water fall I looks like a human skeleton J, from this place to onward there is no coverage of any cellular network of Pakistan, so if you are going beyond this point inform your family behind that there is no network coverage and they cannot contact you until you come back, but you can contact others by landline numbers or PCO?s or by S Com cellular network operated by Pakistan Army ahead of this area.
