Maha kumbh — Practical Yatra Tips

If you can afford to take a longer break from your usual routine, have a relaxed rather than a rushed trip. All 3️⃣ amr̥t snāns are over (I was privileged to be part of 2️⃣ of them‼️) but 2️⃣ to 3️⃣ extra-auspicious bathing days remain. In my experience however, every moment of the entire 45-day period as well as every bit of the 12-km length of the ghāṭs adjoining the prayāgrāj mahākumbh district are all phenomenally profound.

If going on or around māgh pūrnimā or mahāśivarātri or weekends, then be prepared for unusually long travel times from the bumrauli airport on multi-modal relay transport! On these 2️⃣ remaining special days, do take advantage of the actual tithitimings as per prayāgrāj pañcāṅgam̐ to take a dip earlier than the heavy crowds.

For example, the māgh pūrnimā begins at prayāg trivéni saṅgam̐'s exact latitude & longitude this year at 6:55 PM IST on Feb 11th & lasts till 7:22PM the next day (on the 12th)... Hence, you can take a dip on 11th late evening/night itself, as the ghāṭs are open 24x7. Apart from the main dip at the trivéni saṅgam̐, try to take as many amazingly-refreshing dips as you can in the naini/arail sōmēśvar ghāṭ, near the ancient & powerful but relatively lesser known rāmēśvar+sōmēśvar mahādév mandir❣️ Most importantly, just go without any anticipation/expectation whatsoever. That way, you'll discover hidden gems with long-lasting transformative capabilities.

Coming to the practical aspects, try to book your accommodation🏨&🛩️flights ASAP, if you haven't already. Prices, even for the same flight/property, keep fluctuating a lot within minutes. So, just keep a watch on what suits you best, tracking for a couple of hours before taking the final booking/reservation plunge.

Out of the 25 sectors carved out for the temporary district of mahākumbh, Sector#25 is relatively cleaner, more hygienic, safer & less crowded, & thus worth the bit extra that’s paid. The next best are the other two camps 🏕️ in the arail tent city (Sectors 23 & 24). But, there’s a wide range of offerings based on the budget ranges of different people, right from free/complimentary to ₹1.5 lakhs/night‼️ Check out the UP Government-authorised accommodation list on the official mahakumbh website for providers with the best value & vetted facilities.

Even more energising than the dips, in my experience, was the visit to all the 14 akhāḍās in jhūsi. It was absolutely mesmerizing & mind-boggling. Instead of one-on-one discussions on worldly/religious/personal/spiritual matters with the bābās, which most visitors hanker for, I instead sat silently within each akhāḍā & meditated open-eyed amidst the bābās. It was a unique lifetime experience. And don’t miss out on their sumptuously-delicious laṅgar/annadānam̐ happening throughout the day in every akhāḍā. Even if your schedule happens to be tighter than my five-day yātrā, I'd suggest that you don't miss out on this most special inner adventure, potentially reverberating in the consecrated conglomeration of innumerable sādhūs.

It's OK even if you don't get to visit the famous ancient temples such as nāg vāsuki, dozen-odd véni mādhav series etc. or even the khilā/fort with akṣayvaṭ & sarasvati kūp, followed by the friendly neighborhood baḍé lété hanumān etc., which are anyway permanent structures that you can savour during any future visit too on any arbitrary date, rather than this special set of 45 days, occurring only once in 144 years! Please feel free to ask if you've any further queries/doubts. Now that I've written this response in so much detail, maybe I can share it with others too who are making similar enquiries! Have a fabulous pilgrimage to the king of all tīrthakṣétrās.

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Dinesh, thanks for your detailed response.

I am leaving for Prayagraj this Friday (7th) and returning on Monday (10th) - so I am avoiding the main snan dates. And I have accommodation in Sector 25 - so I am hoping for a less crowded and cleaner experience.

Yes, I plan to spend this Friday roaming around the akhadas. Great suggestion about just meditating at these akhadas!

And yes, I was ready to drop any plans to visit the permanent temples depending on the crowd. Now, I will definitely postpone them to a later date.

I do have a few specific questions for you:

1. Since the Ganga and the Yamuna sangam is a curve with the Sangam nose at one end,  there must be a ghat at the far end of this curve on the Arail/Naini side. Do you know which ghat is that?

2. I was planning to take a boat from the Arail side to the Sangam. But I noticed in various YouTube videos that the flotilla of boats converges to a place where you can distinctly see that you are in the Ganga waters and not at the exact confluence. Do the boatmen stop at the confluence curve for you to take a dip there? Is it deeper here than at the so-called Sangam flotilla? I will probably have to book the entire boat for this to be possible (?). I am asking this since I believe that the turbulence and aeration at the confluence of the two holy rivers is important for the cleansing - both external and internal (just like a shower is more refreshing than bathing from a bucket/tub full of water).

3. How much do the boatmen charge for the trip to the Sangam from the Arail side?

4. How much cash should I carry? Or should I just rely on UPI? What if the cellular network is overloaded?

5. Did you hire a pujari for sankalpam/puja etc at the Sangam? What is the going rate?

6. Do you have a map of all the sectors with markers for the important mandapams/ akhadas/swamiji shivirs?  Perhaps a Google map with markers?

7. I am traveling alone. So how does one manage one's belongings while taking a dip? I have bought waterproof cases for my phone and wallet. However, I am not comfortable with these additional adornments - perhaps the cell phone will be disrupting my electrical balance during the dip?

8. What is the "ideal" time you would recommend for a dip? Early morning? Or mid-morning? When is the crowd thinner?

I will post more questions as and when they occur.

Thanks Dinesh 🙏

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Sheer pleasure. Glad to note your plans are already in place & sound most conducive to maximising your spiritual experience. Regarding your specific queries:

1. It’s a very crowded ghāṭ in Sector 23 known as arail ghāṭ from where lots & lots of boats are available to the saṅgam̐. The immediately adjacent ghāṭ (to the south of arail ghāṭ) on the arail side itself is in fact called “trivéni saṅgam̐ ghāṭ 2.” Hence, it’s not too conducive for a clean ethereal dip! Since you’re not there on a notified amr̥t snān date, you could easily should definitely 💯 take a boat from this ghāṭ to the saṅgam̐.

2. ⁠I fully agree with your analogies. However, our boatman told us that the depth (at the exact confluence of distinct colourations & turbulence levels) is 15’–20’. I couldn’t cross-verify that. But apparently, for public safety & waterway traffic management purposes, the boatmen have strict instructions from the admin not to allow their passengers to get off at any spots other than the designated ones.

3. ⁠There’s a lot of room for haggling & hence the rates are very flexible depending on the dates & the passengers’ bargaining skills & looks… if my memory serves me right, you’re good at this! We were lucky to discover many new friends at the neighbouring cottages & hence 6️⃣ of us (all adults) went together & hired a full comfy boat for a ₹3,500 relaxed round trip on the day next to THE most crowded day of🤫mauni🌚amāvasyā.

4. ⁠UPI is quite reliable most times & in fact I didn’t carry any cash with me… literally ZERO 0️⃣‼️ I should confess however that I had to borrow small amounts of cash (a couple of 💯 ₹) from our 🆕-found friends & later transfer to their UPI back at our cottage with high-speed WiFi. So, I’d say about ₹500–₹1,000 cash per person should be more than enough for your entire weekend trip.

5. ⁠The pūjāri for saṅkal̥pam̐ is the first individual who greets & meets you, even as you set your first foot on the central deck!!!! Yes, thanks to my better half, who I had convinced overnight not to agree, but succumbed to the temptation at the last minute‼️ It costed us ₹2,600, which I personally felt was an overkill for the short process.

6. ⁠I haven’t made one yet but the regular Google Maps was decent enough perhaps because I already had a few sectorial maps seen on the internet juxtaposed in my mind!

7. ⁠Lucky! Nothing like enjoying such a yātrā in solitude & silence… remember the global optimum of this 45-day period is named after silence as mauni amāvasyā. However, the practical difficulty of taking a dip without EM is indeed a concern. I’d suggest you make & take a friend from your cottage for this purpose. Sometimes the hosts themselves are numerous & one of them could voluntarily accompany you. But to be fair to current tech, I went in for all my dips with my Apple Watch Ultra & didn’t feel its interference. Even the iPhone 16 Pro Max is rated IP68. Yes, the wallet does require waterproofing but heh who carries physical wallets anymore⁉️ Perhaps I’ve become too🐃thick-skinned to the EM omnipresence. I’m glad you’re still sensitive to it.

8. ⁠There’s a crowd 24x7, but relatively thinner late nights & early mornings since many are just coming for a single day trip, without planning a stay. While many prefer brahma muhurtam̐ just before sunrise 🌅 & it’s also beautiful 😻 to watch the rising/setting suns from the water, I specifically chose the amr̥t kāl̥ each day of my 5-day stay. For your stay, I checked out these amr̥t kāl̥ time slots: Fri 3:34 PM to 5:07 PM; Sat 9:31 AM to 11:05 AM & Sun 7:58 AM to 9:34 AM.

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Thanks a lot for your detailed response 🙏

Based on your inputs, even more excited about the trip!

I forgot to thank you for looking up the Amrit kaal timings.

Btw, on a more fundamental level, I have been trying to understand why 144- year kumbh is more special than just the regular 12 year kumbh - astronomically.

And I am not sure it is any more special!

To begin with, Jupiter stays in each rashi for a year and the Sun stays in each rashi for a month. So having a Kumbh every 12 years means that the Sun and Jupiter are in the same place astronomically.

At the intuitive level, once Jupiter covers a circle in 12 years then any multiple of 12 years should bring you to the same place - and so astronomically it should not make a difference.

I looked further into the location of Jupiter and the Sun during past Kumbh melas all the way back to 1882.

Since Kumbh is always after Makara Sankranti, the Sun is understandably in the Makara Rashi.

However, Jupiter seems to be either in the Vrushabha rashi or Mesha rashi. I thought Kumbh is defined by Jupiter being in a particular rashi.

Also, if we are looking for periodicity of astronomical phenomena, then the LCM of the effective periods of Jupiter and Saturn (the two large outer planets with long periods) is 60 - hence the 60 names for the years in the Hindu panchang. So, ideally, every 60 years Jupiter and Saturn should be at the same points in space wrt Earth. And so if we have to celebrate Kumbhs that have almost identical Kundali, then it should be at multiples of 60 rather than powers of 12. However, even this is approximate since these periods are not exact integers.

So all this digging has left me even more confused about why the 144th year Kumbh is more special than 12-year Kumbhs.

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OMG I went through exactly the identical set of reasoning, including roping in Saturn 🪐 & LCMs but got diverted with other things. The nearest I found anyone get to perhaps explaining this was nityānandjī, but even he didn’t go all the way. Nonetheless, lemme share his short video approaching this mathematically, but not yet fully convincing astronomically. Let’s get back to each other if we figure this out.

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Since the orbital periods are not exactly 12, I realised there will be a leap year type concept here as well. But I didn't bother to figure the exact offset for the Kumbh. But the fact that some Kumbhs have Jupiter in Mesha and some in Vrushabha bothers me. What is the universal principle? I know that the Ganga pushkar requires Jupiter to be in Mesha. But Yamuna pushkar requires Karka and Saraswati requires Mithuna. So how does one triangulate across all 3 rivers?

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In my understanding so far, I see that there are at least 2️⃣ other complexities, which when roped in, may help us explain the significance of the 143-144 year cycle of the mahākumbh as well as why it sometimes occurs when Jupiter 🟤 is in Aries ♈️ instead of Taurus ♉️:

1. the ayanāmśā due to the precession of the earth’s axis of rotation & the precession, if any, of Jupiter.

2. ⁠the purely solar sauramāna calendar’s asynchronicity with the luni-solar cāndramāna pūrṇimānta calendar used to determine māgh māsa & hence mauni amāvasyā as the peak of the annual māgh mél̥ā, which is what transforms into the ardha, pūrṇa & mahā kumbhs in the respective years.

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But the fact that some Kumbhs have Jupiter in Mesha and some in Vrushabha bothers me. What is the universal principle? I know that the Ganga pushkar requires Jupiter to be in Mesha. But Yamuna pushkar requires Karka and Saraswati requires Mithuna. So how does one triangulate across all 3 rivers?

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Since yamunā & sarasvati are tributaries of gaṅgā, the latter’s puṣkar might take the precedence. Hence, Jupiter in Aries ♈️.

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Makes sense. 

The ayanamsa is about 1 degree every 72 years. But then  Jupiter goes from Mesha to Vrushabha and back to Mesha - all within these past 143-144 years. If it's only the ayanamsa then it has to be unidirectional. Also, I had done some cross-checking of the online calendars wrt astronomy software like Stellarium in the past - they already account for ayanamsa when showing you the charts for a particular day.
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That leaves us with cāndramāna-sauramāna mismatch because of which an adhika māsa is added once in a few years. So, we need to cross-verify if this alternating sequence of Jupiter’s presence every mahākumbh speculater by some is actually right:

From our Earth-fixed reference frame, we’ve to account for the frequently retrograde motions of Jupiter too.
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Question for you:

Background information for Question:

1. Gita Jayanti Day this year was on 11 December 2024 - which is nominally the first day of the Kurukshetra war.

2. Kurukshetra war lasted only 18 days. If it were to be this year, then it would have been over on 29 December 2024

3. Vaikuntha Ekadashi this year was on 10 January 2025.

4. But Bhishma Ekadashi is on 8 February, 2025.

Question:

1. So although Vaikuntha Dwaram was open on Vaikuntha Ekadashi, Bhishma decided to wait for one whole month. Why? Particularly when passing away on Vaikuntha Ekadashi would have "assured" merging with Krishna/Vishnu whom he extolled in the Vishnu Sahasranamam.

2. One possibility is that Vaikuntha Ekadashi is before Makara Sankranti which Sanatana Dharma considers is the official beginning of Uttarayanam - although, strictly speaking, the Sun's northward journey (wrt Earth) has already begun. So Bhishma would probably have preferred any date after Makara Sankranti since Uttarayanam is the preferred phase to relinquish the body in Sanatana Dharma. If so, then why is Vaikuntha Ekadashi considered auspicious and even more sacred to get mukti from the body (but not for Bhishma apparently).

Any light on the Vaikuntha Ekadashi vs Bhishma Ekadashi is appreciated 🙏

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Very interesting questions those, my dear friend. In my current perception, all the 18 purāṇās & both the itihāsās, despite their strong historical relevance, are far more significant for seekers/sādhaks here & now as internally ongoing figurative/allegorical/symbolic/dialectical narratives/mnemonics. In this sense, I perceive the cāndramāna calendar (used to calculate/schedule, or rather identify, vaikunṭha, bhīśma & other ēkādaśis as well as the waxing śukl̥a pakṣā, the auspicious fortnightly/half-monthly period) as most relevant for our subtle bodies, in general, & our emotional minds/hearts, in particular. On the other hand, the sauramāna calendar (used to calculate/schedule, or rather identify, saura makara saṅkrānti & therefore uttarāyanā, the auspicious half-yearly period) is most relevant to ourSelf, in its more fundamental form as a singular causal body, in general, or ātmā=paramātmā=brahman=parabrahman, in particular. Hence, bhīśmā's choice five millennia+ ago seems to be catering to both his subtle & causal bodies by choosing the first waxing fortnight of uttarāyana. As you know, he was a stickler for rules/laws/words literally... be it his promise to his dad śāntanu or the viṣṇu sahasranāmā... so is his meticulous choice of his own💀 maraṇa☠️muhurtam̐⚠️

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FAQ: Sir, Namaste 🙏. I have booked my travel to Prayagraj on 23rd feb night. Can you please guide about what are the travel ways to the main city from airport?

Ans: 🪷namaskāram̐🙏&🇮🇳jaihind🌏, delighted 🤩 to note your ultimate pilgrimage plans. Don’t worry about the landing time. Time has frozen in prayāgrāj & it’s the same level of activity day or night. I tried Ola/Uber unsuccessfully. 2️⃣ best options are prepaid taxi 🚖 booking before exiting the airport & requesting your host (cottage/hotel) to arrange for the pickup. The latter maybe expensive, but worth it since you’re going with your family. In either case, get everyone’s mind well-prepared to unusual ways for the last mile connectivity. For example, you may have to take bike rides & rickshaws for your luggage, if you can’t carry it yourselves while you walk long distances AND tuk-tuk. So, travel as lightly as you can. Note that I didn’t use “OR”  but “AND,” because various small regions have been demarcated & cordoned off & only vehicles within that region can ply. So at the border of each such region, you’ll have to alight & take up a 🆕 mode of transportation. Go with an open mind to thoroughly relish the experience from all dimensions of who you’re irrespective of situations that you encounter while being alert all the time, 🙇🏻‍♂️pranām̐👣&🕉️dhanyōsmi🫡, 🌄din-ēś-kumār🌅har-ūr-sam̐-path🛕

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