Tour of Himachal

My last full week in India, I spent with Nidhi’s entire family (mother, father, sister, brother, and grandmother) getting to know their state inside and out. We hired a driver to take us to all the major destinations in Himachal, and spent one night in each. It was a great trip, with spectacular views and amazing culture.
The first day we drove to Kullu Manali, apparently the place to go for tourists, though we didn’t see what it had that Solan didn’t (Home is always best, isn’t it?). We drove all day, and it was hell. The roads were so small and twisted, and the driver took the turns so fast (so we’d get there before dark) that everyone in the car was sick. Guddu, Nidhi’s brother, spent the whole drive throwing up out the window, which meant that I couldn’t open my window for fear of getting splattered. The rest of us huddled down in silent misery, hoping it would pass. After lunch though, it was better. We’d gotten used to the roads (all except Guddu) and felt well enough to enjoy the beautiful vistas of mountains and rivers and more mountains.

Kullu Manali is just another Hill Station (their term for a town in the mountains) except that everyone goes there, so it’s very touristy. I was counting westerners here, but in Manali I stopped at around 250 because there were so many. I felt weird, being one of many westerners; I think I like it better when I’m the only one – I feel more individual, rather than part of a (not very respected) group.
The next morning we went up to Roatang Pass, on the way to Kashmir. We didn’t go to Kashmir – too dangerous – but the pass was gorgeous. Truly Himalayan as I’d imagined it, with high, craggy, snowcapped peaks in the distance and lower but still snowy mountains where we were. We drove and drove up the mountains on tiny bumpy dirt roads (and I swear that car had no shock absorbers whatsoever) and watched as the clouds grew lower and lower. It felt like we were driving to heaven (“take a good look,” we told each other, “you’ll never get there after you die.”) with the beautiful mountains and the round wispy clouds below us.

We spent about an hour up there, and then drove downdowndown back to Manali and then on to our next destination.

This was a town deep in the mountains accessible only by narrow dirt roads, which is home to hot springs and temples and is a pilgrimage spot for both Seiks and Hindus, Seiks for the beautiful silver Gurudwara and Hindus for the many temples dedicated to Shiva and his wife, Parvati. The water is so hot there that the Gurudwara boils its rice in the pools, and when you walk barefoot into the temples, you have to walk on wooden planks because the stone floor is so hot.

The next day we went to Daramshala, the home of His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama in exile from Tibet. Unfortunately he wasn’t there when we were there, but we walked around the monastery and watched the monks singing and playing their horns and flutes in devotion. It was a wonderful place, very peaceful and spiritual, and I was sorry to get back in the car and drive away.

Drive, drive, drive, drive. That was most of the tour, actually, we spent all day in the car and only got to out destination in the evening. But it was nice, and when I wasn’t sleeping or getting bored with nothing to do (you can’t really read when you’re bouncing around all the time) I enjoyed it almost as much as the places we were going. I loved passing by the tiny villages and watching the glimpses of people’s lives, the women carrying water in big brass pots on their shoulders, the two children, maybe five and seven years old, pushing with all their might on the pump handle to fill a plastic jug, the girl lazily switching the backs of cows as she led them down the mountain to graze, the two walking trees – wait, no, they’re people, with huge piles of grass strapped to their backs so that you can’t even see them, just a pair of legs under a bundle of grass for the cows…it was so simple and peaceful, it once again made me wonder why we bother with all the stuff we have in America when we could live perfectly happily like this.

We next went to Dalhousie, another Hill Station, and officially Nidhi’s father’s favorite Hill Station in the country. It’s very peaceful and quite there, I found myself slowing down and speaking less because of the aura of the place. It was covered in clouds so close I kept reaching out to touch them, and green trees overhung all the quiet little roads and added to the sense of peace.
The next morning we went to “India’s Switzerland” which was a nice place, though it didn’t actually look very much like Switzerland. There was a pond and a big open field where everyone was strolling around and relaxing. We got cotton candy and rode horses around the perimeter (because I said I’d ridden before my guide let me gallop, which was exhilarating, but I was sorry for him running beside me to keep up with the horse) and then started our journey back to Solan.
The last night we spent in a town known for its temple, where they worship, not idols as usual, but blue flames that come out of bare rock. It was an interesting sight to see, but the temple felt all wrong. It was very dirty and the people seemed somehow insincere. Nobody liked it, and we got out as soon as we’d paid our respects to all the little shrines. It was also surrounded by people trying to make money off of piety – shops and shops selling devotional music and offerings and pictures of the gods, which seemed to sap the holiness out of the temple itself.

And then back to Solan. The last day I got sick – a stomach ache – and I couldn’t eat at all, it was made worse by the curvy roads we were driving on. It was something that everyone except Nidhi’s father got, and I actually got off lightly compared to Nidhi’s grandmother and brother. I still feel sort of dizzy, but thankfully my stomach doesn’t hurt as much and I can eat a little bit.