Panch Kedar
पंच केदार
5 temples in the tradition. Listed in the order tradition follows. The note at the foot of the page says how much of that order a text actually fixes.
In the traditional order
- 1
Kedarnath
केदारनाथ
Kedarnath, Uttarakhand
Nara and Narayana ask Shiva to stay. Nara and Narayana, two incarnations of Vishnu, perform penance in Bharata Khanda and worship Shiva every day in an earthen linga. Shiva, pleased after a long time, offers them a boon.…
- 2
Tungnath
तुंगनाथ
Tungnath, Uttarakhand
Where Shiva's arms appeared. After the Kurukshetra war the Pandavas seek Shiva's forgiveness. He avoids them and becomes a bull at Kedarnath; when they catch up he sinks into the ground. His hump remains at…
- 3
Rudranath
रुद्रनाथ
Gopeshwar, Uttarakhand
The bull that would not be caught. After Kurukshetra, Krishna advises the Pandavas to seek Shiva's blessing and atone for the battle. Shiva, angered by the bloodshed, avoids them by taking the form of a bull and going…
- 4
Madhyamaheshwar
मध्यमहेश्वर
Ukhimath, Uttarakhand
The bull that would not be caught. After Kurukshetra, Krishna advises the Pandavas to seek Shiva's blessing and atone for the battle. Shiva, angered by the bloodshed, avoids them by taking the form of a bull and going…
- 5
Kalpeshwar
कल्पेश्वर
Helang, Uttarakhand
The bull that would not be caught. After Kurukshetra, Krishna advises the Pandavas to seek Shiva's blessing and atone for the battle. Shiva, angered by the bloodshed, avoids them by taking the form of a bull and going…
Plan the circuit
Side by side, so you can see the season, the walking and the nearest station for each. Where we have not confirmed something, the cell says so. Always check dates and conditions before you travel — especially with elders.
- Kedarnath
- Main months
- Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov
- Altitude
- 3,584 m
- Walking and access
- There is no road to the temple. From Gaurikund the approach is on foot or by helicopter; the state trust page gives the trek as about 21 km, a figure that predates the post-2013 route and must be confirmed. We have found no official information on pony, palki or doli services or their rates. Helicopter seats are booked only through IRCTC HeliYatra after yatra registration. The shrine is at 3,584 m; the temple committee links the state health advisory from its home page.
- Nearest station / airport
- Rishikesh · Jolly Grant Airport, Dehradun
Not yet confirmed: darshan hours.
- Tungnath
- Altitude
- 3,680 m
- Walking and access
- No road reaches the temple: it is a 3 km trek uphill from Chopta, at an altitude of about 3,680 m. No official information on pony or doli services on this route has been found yet.
- Nearest station / airport
- Rishikesh · Jolly Grant Airport, Dehradun
Not yet confirmed: main months, darshan hours.
- Rudranath
- Walking and access
- No road reaches the shrine: the Chamoli district page gives a 20 km trek from Sagar village. The shrine is closed in winter — in 2025 it reopened on 18 May and closed on 17 October (press). Official altitude figures disagree: the Kedarnath trust gives 3,600 m, the Chamoli district page 2,290 m.
- Nearest station / airport
- Rishikesh · Jolly Grant Airport, Dehradun
Not yet confirmed: main months, darshan hours, altitude.
- Madhyamaheshwar
- Main months
- May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov
- Altitude
- 3,497 m
- Walking and access
- No road reaches the temple; the processional route runs on foot from Ransi via Gaundar. The temple committee mentions a 16 km uphill trek with pony and manchan (palanquin) service, but the passage sits ambiguously between its Madhyamaheshwar and Gaurikund entries. Closed in winter; open roughly six months from late May.
- Nearest station / airport
- Rishikesh · Jolly Grant Airport, Dehradun
Not yet confirmed: darshan hours.
- Kalpeshwar
- Darshan hours
- 6:00 am – 6:00 pm
- Altitude
- 2,200 m
- Walking and access
- Reached on foot through forest and the village of Urgam; the trek is described as easy. Open all year, unlike the other four Panch Kedar shrines.
- Nearest station / airport
- Jolly Grant Airport, Dehradun
Not yet confirmed: main months.
Where this list and its order comes from
- Government: Uttarakhand Tourism, Panch Kedar Circuit, which runs an explicit start-to-end itinerary Kedarnath → Tungnath → Rudranath → Madhyamaheshwar → Kalpeshwar and states that the trail ends at Kalpeshwar. Corroborated by Harshwanti Bisht, Tourism in Garhwal Himalaya, Indus Publishing, 1994, pp. 84–86, which describes a strict order for pilgrimage worship. uttarakhandtourism.gov.in · seen 2026-09-18
A note for the curious
The order is neither the body-part sequence nor the geographic one, and no Purana was found naming it. A scholarly account holds that the yatra originally culminated at Pashupatinath in Nepal, where Shiva's head is worshipped, which would make the five-site closed circuit a truncation.