03 February,2011 07:31 AM IST | | Shashank Shekhar
Eleven students of JNU trek for 80 kilometers in Rajasthan to test their endurance limits
They look quite romantic in the pictures and movies but sand dunes are a gruelling terrain to tread through. But not for these adventure loving students from Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU).
Mirage: The students from JNU walked around 15 kilometres on the
sand everyday. Pic/Mid Day
Eleven members of JNU Mountaineering Club (JNUMC) recently organised Desert Trek, where they walked through desert in Rajasthan for five days covering around 80 kilometers on a limited supply of food, ration and water.
The team, led by Zafar Iqbal and supported by Sushant Saini, started their journey from Khuri village in Jaisalmer , where the sand-dunes start. The students carried with them cooking utensil, stove, water, ration, tents and sleeping bags.
Every day, the team started at 5 in the morning and prepared breakfast and lunch and packed up the tents. "We took special care of environment and ensured that no waste material was left out in desert. The mornings there are cool but days are quite hot. We carried around 12 kg each (including ration, sleeping bags, and clothes) between us which made walking 15 kilometers in desert every day very difficult," said Sushant Saini a student of Russian language.
The most difficult part of the trek was finding water in desert. "There were few wells and water tanks, but finding clean water was quite a tough task. We took special care to save water and use it sparingly. The trek was more to challenge our limits of endurance and the whole experience turned out to be quite exciting," Saini added.u00a0
Though the trek had officially started on January 21, the student had been undergoing preparations for it for about a month back.
| More adventure |
| JNU mountaineering club conducts various trips to encourage mountaineering and exploring of unexplored areas of Delhi. A moonlight trek was organized two months back which was attended by 860 students who walked from JNU via Sanjay Van to Qutub Minar. Next week the club will organise a cave trip around JNU. There are many unexplored caves near JNU campus which act as habitat for peacocks and other animals.u00a0 The Club also conducts high-altitude trekking (from 9,000 ft to 19,000 ft approximately) in the Garhwal,u00a0 Kumaon,u00a0 Himachal,u00a0 Ladakh,u00a0 Nepal and Eastern Himalayas. |
