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Trekking Summer Camp | Level 2

Trek For Age Group 12-15: Deoriatal-Chandrashila Trek

Special Summer Camp in June for Dayara Bugyal trek!

Due to popular request, we are opening one MIXED GROUP in June for children aged 10 to 16 on the Dayara Bugyal trek. Click here to read more

Trek For Age Group 12-15: Deoriatal-Chandrashila Trek

Deoriatal-Chandrashila is our go-to trek for slightly older children. It’s a trek set in the heart of Uttarakhand, taking children through a few of the densest jungles of the Kedarnath Musk Deer Sanctuary, a picture-perfect lake (Deoriatal), which serves as a birding hotspot, the world’s highest Shiva temple, and finally, a high summit climb to Chandrashila. The 360 degree views that children witness from the summit leave a lasting impression on them. 

On the trekking summer camp, children go on a trekking adventure and climb a high summit in the Himalayas. Over the period of 10 days, they trek from camp to camp — backpacks on their shoulders, trekking poles in their hands — and explore the outdoors at close quarters.

Not only do they go on a trek, but the program is also designed to impart rare life skills. We bring these learnings through methods of experiential learning. These life skills are otherwise difficult to imbibe in regular school life. 

Deoriatal-Chandrashila is our go-to trek for slightly older children. It’s a trek set in the heart of Uttarakhand, taking children through a few of the densest jungles of the Kedarnath Musk Deer Sanctuary, a picture-perfect lake (Deoriatal), which serves as a birding hotspot, the world’s highest Shiva temple, and finally, a high summit climb to Chandrashila. The 360 degree views that children witness from the summit leave a lasting impression on them. 

On the trekking summer camp, children go on a trekking adventure and climb a high summit in the Himalayas. Over the period of 10 days, they trek from camp to camp — backpacks on their shoulders, trekking poles in their hands — and explore the outdoors at close quarters.

Top Skills Children Learn from the Trekking Summer Camp

Our summer camps are a mix of fun, adventure and learning. Through the course of the trek and the program design, children learn the basics of trekking, camping and wilderness survival. 

  • Building a shelter out of bare minimum resources
  • First aid skills through mock drills
  • Navigation skills using maps and GPS tools
  • Skills to identify and set up campsites in the outdoors
  • Cooking in the wild
  • Learning to cross streams 
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Given that children are in the heart of some of the richest biodiversity in our country, they learn first-hand about forests, plants, birdlife, animals and all natural elements around them. 

  • See and feel the rich biodiversity of Himalayan forests  
  • Learn about birdlife and animals endemic to the region
  • Learn about the stars and the Milky Way by experiencing it in real-life
  • Nature journaling 
  • Experiencing the forest  
  • Witness big Himalayan ranges at close quarters and learn the stories associated with them
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At Indiahikes, we are very conscious about how we trek and how we treat the outdoors. There’s a certain spirit of trekking we believe in — a minimal and sustainable way of trekking. These are imparted by our Green Trails initiative, which inevitably has a big impact on children.

  • Learn a minimal way of living by exploring lifestyles in remote villages in the foothills
  • Clean trekking trails and leave mountains better
  • Understand the importance of saving natural resources
  • Learn the basics of waste management — segregating and composting waste
  • Understand how to make composting toilets in the outdoors
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Finally, the program design imparts priceless personal behaviours and skills among children. Within a week of our trekking summer camp we see remarkable changes in children. Children start displaying life skills that usually take years to develop. 

  • Gain life-long confidence after climbing to a high mountain summit 
  • Get accustomed to hardships
  • Build resilience through overcoming difficulties
  • Learn how to work collaboratively with a team 
  • Learn to own and share responsibilities 
  • Understand how to deal with healthy conflicts and resolve them 
  • Learn interpersonal communication skills
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Deoriatal Chandrashila Videos
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Deoriatal, pronounced as 'Dev'riyatal has multiple legendary stories connected to our epics.

Picture by: Rupendra Yadav

Deoriatal Lake with Mythological Stories

Why Deoriatal Chandrashila Is A Great Summer Camp Trek

At Indiahikes, we have always been on the lookout for a good trek which are children friendly. Very few Himalayan treks are suitable for this, given the long distances, altitudes and tough terrains. But Deoriatal Chandrashila creates the perfect atmosphere for slightly elder children. Here is a small photostory

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Trekking inside the dense forests of Kedarnath Wildlife Sanctuary provides perfect atmosphere for children to connect with nature. Picture by Jothiranjan

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The campsites on the trek are so beautifully placed. They help the children to safely step outside and bond with others. Picture by Jothiranjan

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Unlike most of our other treks, on Deoriatal Chandrashila, you get the mountain views from the Day 1 of your trek. Here's a child stunned by view of the Chaukhamba Massif on the first day of the trek. Picture by Jothiranjan

Know Your Trek

We have always wanted trekkers to be well-informed before they go on a Himalayan trek. Knowledge is the difference between a safe trek and a dangerous one. It’s also the difference between a wholesome experience and a superficial experience.

Use this section to learn about the Deoriatal Chandrashila trek. It has in-depth information about each day of the trek, what to expect, and how you need to prepare for it. Many years of expertise have gone into this content. Trekkers find that extremely useful.

How We Keep Children Safe

Indiahikes Safety Mechanism

Indiahikes stands for safety.  Indiahikes is the largest and the safest trekking organization in India.  Over the past few years, we have had over 8000 students from schools across the country with us on treks.

We have had no untoward incident on these programs. This is because of our robust Risk Assessment and Management System that rests on the 3 pillars of our three pillars - people, processes and equipment.  And we constantly work on them.

Our Trek Leaders are certified mountaineers with a Basic Mountaineering Course or Advanced Mountaineering Course. Trek Leaders assigned to lead student treks are Wilderness First Responders (WFR) and NOLS certified.  We have constant refresher courses and specialized training for them year-round - towards building capacity to handle any risks. 

Apart from the Trek Leaders we have technical guides, trek guides, program facilitators and assistants who accompany all team members of the Outdoor Leadership Program. All of them are trained to handle emergency mountain situations.

Read more about how we keep your students safe here .

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Ultimately, even an expert team such as ours cannot keep all students safe unless they follow stringent safety processes. 

There is a process for preparing team members, a process to monitor their health 3 times a day, a process for management of accidents, a process for managing altitude sickness, and a process for evacuation. There are processes for even trekking and a separate process for difficult sections. Any potential risk is nipped in the bud.

Our extensive trek experience matters here. The trekking trails are not new to us. These trekking trails have been nurtured and developed by us for many years. We have our own base camps on these trails. 

From the time the program starts till it ends, safety of all team members is our responsibility.

Indiahikes is extremely meticulous in the safety processes we follow for risk assessment and management. We draw up a Risk Assessment and Management plan before every trek - especially so if it involves children. We prepare a risk assessment and management plan for each project we take with a school. You can download our sample safety plan here.

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Most of the modern safety equipment used in the Indian trekking community has been introduced by us. This has fundamentally changed how trekking is done in our country.

In all of our treks, we carry a high-altitude medical kit, an evacuation kit, a technical kit, radio equipment, and oxygen cylinders (pulse oximeters and BP monitors are standard equipment carried by our Trek Leaders, including ropes and carabiners). 

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Why fitness matters on the Deoriatal Chandrashila Trek

On Easy-Moderate treks, you’re likely to trek around 5-6 km each day. Expect gradual ascents and descents along the way. The maximum altitude will be about 12,500 ft. There are no technical sections on these treks, but there could be small sections of steep gradients or tricky patches that require you to be surefooted.

So, it's important to prepare your child physically for the summer camp. Refer this video where we talk about how to prepare your child for a trek.

Why fitness matters on the Deoriatal Chandrashila Trek

On Easy-Moderate treks, you’re likely to trek around 5-6 km each day. Expect gradual ascents and descents along the way. The maximum altitude will be about 12,500 ft. There are no technical sections on these treks, but there could be small sections of steep gradients or tricky patches that require you to be surefooted.

So, it's important to prepare your child physically for the summer camp. Refer this video where we talk about how to prepare your child for a trek.

Green Trails

Leaving the mountains better than we find them

At Indiahikes, we focus on bringing in new practices that can reduce our impact on the environment.  This is done through constant R&D.  Once these new practices are implemented we focus on achieving the results consistently on all our treks. You will see this as part of our G6 practices. 

Golden 1: Green Sweep - Clean the trail of visible litter.  We have collected more than 1,00,000 kgs of waste since 2016.

Golden 2: Segregation At Source - Segregate all waste collected so that we do not add all this waste to the landfill.  We have diverted 50% of the waste from landfill through segregation

Golden 3: Food Composting - All our kitchen waste is composted into useful humus for the mountain soil.  All food waste is either eaten by mules or composted at source.

Golden 4: Biotoilets - All our human waste is composted at source through our specially designed dry toilet pits. 

Golden 5: Water efficient dispenser  - We have reduced our waste used per trekker by 70% through specially designed water dispenser systems.

Golden 6: Save energy - We use solar panels for our energy use at our campsites.  We are also in the process of redesigning our stove and menu to reduce the amount of gas used on our treks.

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Our trekkers are a big part of us keeping our promise to leave the mountains better than we found them. 

  • Indiahikes trekkers do not carry anything that can harm the environment - be it wet wipes, or any packaged food on the trek.  In fact they practice a zero waste trek.
  • Indiahikes trekkers do not buy any packaged food in the dhabas on the trek - they do not take part in feeding the demand for packaged food 
  • Indiahikes trekkers clean the trails of waste using the eco bag as part of the Green Sweep Initiattive 
  • Indiaihikes trekkers carry their own backpack on the trek. They do not offload unless absolutely necessary
  • Indiahikes trekkers do not pee/poop near any water source 
  • Indiahikes trekkers do not stray away from the marked trail

Trekkers who sign up with us pledge to follow these practices.  When you sign up with us, you do too.

How you can be a Green Trails Crusader on the Deoriatal Chandrashila trek? - There are 3 major waste hotspots which you can collect and leave the mountains better. One is near Chopta before the summit climb to Chandrashila, the second would be on the summit and close to Tungnath and the third spot is Burj Gali meadows.

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Everything you do on a trek creates an impact. The trail you trek on, the water you use, the waste you generate, how you poop, how you cook, what you eat — everything has an impact. The higher the impact, the greater the damage to the environment. 

Yet, when done sustainably, trekking is one of the most environment-friendly sports.

When you trek with Indiahikes, you trek to leave the mountains better than we found them. This is part of our Green Trails promise.

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