Sundaranand would accompany his Guruji to Gangotri each year to serve him and so started visiting and exploring Gaumukh and the deeper Himalayas beyond. He lived through the winters between 1950 and 1954 in the wilderness, braving extreme cold while doing hatha-yoga and tapasya. In Swamiji's words, "During the tapasya, I had glimpses of the celestial beauty of the Himalayas, which were beyond words, listened to the enchanting heavenly music of the invisible (frozen) Ganges. In solitude and physically daunting conditions, eating meager food and scantily clad in rags, barely enough to keep body and soul together, I had my first encounter with Death. After that during mountain climbing and travels through snow-bound valleys and passes, there came many occasions when I had narrow escapes from death. bSince then, I have had no fear of death. Embracing sanyas and life of a sanyasi is itself a difficult siddhi - a spiritual achievement, but freedom from fear of death was an even greater siddhi".

Lord Krishna said in the Bhagwad Gita - Among all the physical objects, the Himalayas are as beautiful as heaven. No surprise, therefore, that Swamiji and other Yogis through the ages sought God through the medium of Himalayas. Swami Sundaranand was a fearless mountaineer and trekker. He scaled dozens of high peaks solo or with small groups and trekked to almost all parts of India. He led mountaineering teams and guided army climbers. Expeditions to Gangotri peaks made it a rule to call on him for tips on survival techniques. As a trained climber, he participated in a number of international mountaineering meets. Everest hero Edmond Hillary was his personal friend. And so was the late Tenzing Norkay. Swami Sundaranand was a record holder of sorts. Till 1962 he had trekked to Gomukh and back 108 times. According to Swamiji, I was reborn at Gomukh, an event which marked the beginning of my Karma-Yoga. He reached Gomukh first in 1948 when one had to trek all the way from Uttarkashi. In 1955, he crossed the hazardous and treacherous Kalindi Khal Pass (Alt. 19510 ft.) on his first trek from Gomukh to Badrinath-a route known as Dev-Marg. Then he escorted a party of seven on this difficult route. While trying to rescue his companions, he himself fell into a deep crevice.

But this expedition was significant for a different reason. For the first time in his life, Swami Sundaranand used a camera to record the beauty of the mountains. Thus began his life-long passionate affair with Himalayan photography. He bought a box camera for Rs. 25 and repeated the trek on the Dev Marg primarily to take photographs of peaks, glaciers, ice-filled valleys and glacial lakes. Thereafter, high mountain climbing, trekking and photography became his addiction. By and by he came to be known as the photographer of the Himalayas - the clicking Swami - with a record number of photographs of Himalaya to his credit.

Once, all his cameras, transparencies, and climbing equipment were stolen. He shot over a hundred thousand transparencies all over again, but what had been lost had historical and environmental importance. The ecology of the Himalayas was not the same as it had been years ago. In fact, what had been stolen could well have served as a document of environmental destruction in the Himalayas.

Among the peaks he climbed and documented were Jogin, Gangotri Peaks, Koteshwar, Kedar Dom, Chandra Parvat, Bhagirath Parvat, Kumaon Nana Khat, Baljori, and Kabra (Sikkim). His collection of slides included rare shots from difficult angles and locations of Shivling, Meru, Someru, Satopant, Mana, and Chaturangi ranges. Although 65 years old, he did not stop climbing and his latest (Sept. 1990) trek to Kedar Tal produced some of the most beautiful 'reflections' . The HIMALAYA DARSHAN-BHARAT DARSHAN studies of Bhrigupanth Peak in tens of moods were a unique collection. Swami Sundaranand arranged the slides sequentially and topic-wise. Through slide-shows, he brought to the viewers the captivating beauty and grandeur of the Himalayas and the life of the people of different parts of the Himalayas. His collection consisted of not only landscapes but also portraits of people and flowers and sadhus and temples. He presented a large number of such slide-shows accompanied with his own unique commentary in several metropolitan towns throughout the length and breadth of the land.

Hundreds and thousands of people saw and appreciated his monumental work. The institutions where he gave slide-shows included Chitra Kala Sangam, Delhi, AIFACS, New Delhi, Jahangir Art Gallery, Bombay, Birla Academy of Arts, Calcutta, Railway Board, New Delhi, World Cultural Institute, Bangalore, Mountaineering Club, Pune, Poddareshwar Temple, Nagpur, Parliament Central Hall, Rashtrapati Bhawan, Prime Minister's residence, College of Arts, Chandigarh, Ravindra Bhavan, Lucknow, the Hindustan Times House, New Delhi, India International Centre, New Delhi, and at places such as Ahmadabad, Meerut, Uttarkashi, Rishikesh (Bharat Mandir), and Dehradun. Swami Sundaranand held several one-man photographic exhibitions that were widely reviewed by newspapers and periodicals in Delhi, Jaipur, and several other cities. These expositions drew praise from prominent Indian and foreign photographers as well as national leaders. The appreciative remarks he received from ordinary people and V.V.I.Ps. would fill volumes.