A family trip to

Neela Sandh

28th October 2017

By
Shaikh Muhammad Ali
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Starting this new article and not mentioning Imran Khan would be criminal on my
part, I guess.

Imran Ahmed Khan Niazi (HI, Pride of Performance); born 5 October 1952 is a
Pakistani politician and former cricketer who is the 22nd and current Prime
Minister of Pakistan. He is also the Chairman of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf.
Previously he was a member of the National Assembly of Pakistan from 2002 to
2007, and again from 2013 to 2018. Prior to entering politics, Khan was a cricketer
and philanthropist. He played international cricket for two decades, and later
developed philanthropic projects such as the Shaukat Khanum Memorial Cancer
Hospital & Research Centre and Namal College.

After struggling for a good 22 years in politics, he has finally been elected to the
seat of Prime Minister. There are many expectations from him by the people who
chose him for this seat. Let us see how he would deliver in the next five years and
come up to the expectations of the masses.

“We travel not just to travel and marvel at people, places, things. That is not just it.
That was never just it for us. We travel to learn, to experience and to feel all the
spectrums of being human in the world”…Anonymous

I always like to explore new hiking spots and exotic places to visit with my family
so that I can write about them in my travelogues and entice my friends to visit
them. In this way, I market new places around Pakistan to my audience where they
can have a good time with their friends and families.

On a similar hike from the village of Burj to Patriata last year, I passed through a
picnic spot called Neela Sandh, which means ‘Blue Lagoon’ in the local lingo. We
took a water break here and I asked the locals about the place and had thus kept in
mind to bring my family here at a later stage.

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On Saturday 28th October 2018 we decided to visit Neela Sandh while Adil (my
older one) had gone out for lunch with his class friends. Off we started around
12:16 p.m. On the way, we decided to stop by at Savor food to pick up lunch around
12:50 p.m. and by 1:30; we stopped and offered our Zuhr prayer at a local mosque
called Jamiah Masjid Ali somewhere on Lehtrar road.

We reached our destination i.e. Neela Sandh at 2:15 p.m. and after taking our
bearings around the place, we went straight to the pond. As per the local hotel staff,
the pond on the right was reserved for families while the one on the left was
earmarked for young boys and men.

Since the kids were already hungry, we decided to eat first and out came our picnic
basket, which comprised of food and drinks.

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Once we had our grub, the children took to the pond while both of us parents
watched over them. The rocks were slippery and thus some of them were
dangerous and thus the kids were appropriately warned to take caution.

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While we enjoyed our stay at the pond, the kids frolicked in the water and Adil was
surely missed who must be enjoying with his friends somewhere in sector F-7.

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The stream was flowing from East to West while we also noticed some small fish
skirting their ways around the pond. By 3:19 p.m., we decided to leave the pond
and go up and check out the roadside hotel.

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Before we left the place, Mohsin took this parting picture, which would continue
to remind us of Neela Sandh.

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Quite an advertisement on the outer wall of the Neela Sandh hotel and restaurant.

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We came up to the roadside hotel & restaurant and ordered some hot cups of tea.
We also enquired from the waiter about the four rooms, which were available on
rent. Each double bed costs Rs. 2,500, which was quite reasonable, and surely, this
could be a one-night excursion for happy travelers like us.

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Before the tea arrived, Mohsin and I visited the other pond which was reserved for
Bachelors. This one was much bigger than the one that we visited and had ample
space for many a young teenagers and water enthusiasts.

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The water from the first pond, which was on the other side of the road; flows into
this one and subsequently leaves the valley in the form of smaller springs. We
rushed back to the restaurant where a hot cup of tea was waiting for us. After
enjoying our tea, we left the place around 4:00 p.m.

We stopped at a place called Chirrah, offered our Asr prayer around 4:29 p.m., and
ultimately leave for Islamabad in the next 10 minutes while reaching home around
5:30 p.m.

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Here is the map of Neela Sandh from my house in G-13/3.

Shaikh Muhammad Ali

‘The Wandering Dervish’
E-mail: dushkashaikh@gmail.com
Cell: +00-92-317-0003623
Tuesday, 10 Zilhaj, 1439 Hijri
21 August 2018, 4:27 p.m. (PST)
st

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