Me and my two lazy friends (Devina & Manpreet) decided to go to a
Hill-Station for a cool, calm, relaxed vacation after our 2nd year college
end-term exams. This was when we were still in our graduation class in LSR,
cribbing about compulsory attendance and life in general. We actually did go
for that trip this summer- at the end of our Post-Graduation, still continuing
that cribbing about life and the heat of the summer.
Did I mention our laziness in planning and actualizing our plans into reality? Let’s just say, the almost 4 day trip was a great learning experience, where the 1st lesson we learnt was that Planning did involve more than a booking to ensure a bed under a solid roof and getting to know major tourist places from a 10 minute google search.
The plan itself was last minute. I talked to my dad and asked him to book a room in 'any damn hill station' he could find a decent reservation in, considering the peak tourist period and our last minute resolve to just go for it. It was on Wednesday (27th May) that we were sure that it was Manali that we were going to go, and the staying arrangement was made for the weekend- 29th, 30th, 31st and the 1st. Before anything else could get cancelled for any reason my friends could come up with (and they could come up with a lot!), I booked an overnight AC Volvo HRTC bus ticket for the 28th evening (6:30 P.M)
DOs- Always plan a trip at least a week prior to it. Last minute travel arrangements to a hill-station with a cool temperature (that requires you to search for coats, gloves and that cute pink jacket you packed in some mysterious trunk that would look cute in pictures) may lead to panic, particularly if you are planning to go directly from your hostel. Washing them and drying them and packing them may again involve a lot of four-letter word swearing.
DON'Ts- Do not trust your fellow mates to get you that coffee-bite you like a lot. Always take care of your own travel- eateries.
Did I mention our laziness in planning and actualizing our plans into reality? Let’s just say, the almost 4 day trip was a great learning experience, where the 1st lesson we learnt was that Planning did involve more than a booking to ensure a bed under a solid roof and getting to know major tourist places from a 10 minute google search.
The plan itself was last minute. I talked to my dad and asked him to book a room in 'any damn hill station' he could find a decent reservation in, considering the peak tourist period and our last minute resolve to just go for it. It was on Wednesday (27th May) that we were sure that it was Manali that we were going to go, and the staying arrangement was made for the weekend- 29th, 30th, 31st and the 1st. Before anything else could get cancelled for any reason my friends could come up with (and they could come up with a lot!), I booked an overnight AC Volvo HRTC bus ticket for the 28th evening (6:30 P.M)
DOs- Always plan a trip at least a week prior to it. Last minute travel arrangements to a hill-station with a cool temperature (that requires you to search for coats, gloves and that cute pink jacket you packed in some mysterious trunk that would look cute in pictures) may lead to panic, particularly if you are planning to go directly from your hostel. Washing them and drying them and packing them may again involve a lot of four-letter word swearing.
DON'Ts- Do not trust your fellow mates to get you that coffee-bite you like a lot. Always take care of your own travel- eateries.
The HRTC bus is a little costlier than other private buses, but
reliable. We packed (all our chips, biscuits and the mush necessary pack of
Avomin) and got ready for our 14 hour ride to Manali and the bus (comfortable
semi-sleeper seats) started at the right time from Mandi House, Himachal
Bhawan.
DOs- It doesn’t matter if you have a strong stomach or not. Take that tablet of Avomin if you want to survive that twisty hilly badly-maintained road to Manali.
Also, take your playlist with you if you don’t want to hear that fluffy, lovey-dovey life-history based conversation of the couple sitting behind you.
DOs- It doesn’t matter if you have a strong stomach or not. Take that tablet of Avomin if you want to survive that twisty hilly badly-maintained road to Manali.
Also, take your playlist with you if you don’t want to hear that fluffy, lovey-dovey life-history based conversation of the couple sitting behind you.
We stopped at two major places- Ambala for dinner and Mandi for morning tea. The bus dropped us at Manali, Main Market at around 9, where we got our 1st learning experience- Always make sure if there is a taxi strike in the place you wish to travel. We got down, tired from the long travel, to find no wheels around us. The coolie’s were demanding an obnoxious amount. So there we decided to carry all our luggage and walk around 4-5 Kms to Vashisht. We also found out that everything was closed that day and so we settled in the room after a long, hot bath and lunch. Then we decided to walk around till the Main Market. We spent some time sitting on a rock, our feet in the freaking-cold water of River Beas, ‘contemplating’ about life. And clicking pictures of each other pretend- contemplating. Also, selfies. :P
DAY 2: The strike was over by them (Thank God). Took an Auto to the Hidimba Devi Temple. The auto vallah will over-charge you and being a tourist you will end up paying whatever he charges you. So no point getting outraged when you see a local paying half of what you paid up.
The Hidimba temple welcomes you with Rabbits and Yaks, each of which, as a
tourist you are expected to click a picture with. The Temple itself is
beautiful but it’s better to visit early or it gets too crowded. There is also
a small Ghatotkacha temple nearby.
We then took a local bus from the main market to Naggar (took around an hour and 30 bucks, with a background of honey singh music played by the driver). It drops you to a market from where there we walked around half a Km of steep hilly distance to reach the Naggar castle. It’s a beautiful place. (Just with not a very hygienic bathroom, but peeing is a human necessity- so close all your senses and do your thing)
We mostly ate our meals back in our rest house, but for lunch that day we decided to eat at the much-heard about Chopsticks- a Chinese place in the Main market. The food was tasty (not much to write about though) and not very costly.
We decided to book a Taxi to Rohtang Pass that we had to visit the next day. Due to some changes brought about by the NGT, the number of cars allowed to go were limited to a 1000, due to which the driver advised us to start the journey at 1:30 in the morning. So we did not have much time to sleep, and we packed up with woolen scarfs and caps for it.
We then took a local bus from the main market to Naggar (took around an hour and 30 bucks, with a background of honey singh music played by the driver). It drops you to a market from where there we walked around half a Km of steep hilly distance to reach the Naggar castle. It’s a beautiful place. (Just with not a very hygienic bathroom, but peeing is a human necessity- so close all your senses and do your thing)
We mostly ate our meals back in our rest house, but for lunch that day we decided to eat at the much-heard about Chopsticks- a Chinese place in the Main market. The food was tasty (not much to write about though) and not very costly.
We decided to book a Taxi to Rohtang Pass that we had to visit the next day. Due to some changes brought about by the NGT, the number of cars allowed to go were limited to a 1000, due to which the driver advised us to start the journey at 1:30 in the morning. So we did not have much time to sleep, and we packed up with woolen scarfs and caps for it.
DAY 3:
DOs- Rohtang Pass is crazy cold. Wear woolen inners before starting the journey. When you buy the much-needed jumpers and boots, do it over your coat. Make sure that everything is comfortable because the reality of snow is very different from that movie one. Also, Pee before you go.
Avomin again.
So the car stopped at a point, and there were around 200 cars ahead of us and god knows how many behind us. The window much ahead was to open around 6 and so the driver told us to sleep in that very-small too cramped- to- rest car. The urge to pee made all 3 of us to somehow walk in those uncomfortable boots up the hill, to look for a tree, at around 3:30 in the morning. That was not funny.
In the morning, we got in the line for the go-ahead slip after showing the R.C. and pollution-free certificate of the car.
Advice: Click pictures on the way to the Pass. Coming back, you will be too tired to stop anywhere. The view is spectacular. Rohtang Pass itself is beautiful (and cold!).
We also visited Solang Valley where you will get very expensive food. The Gol-Gappas are cheap and worth trying though. We were too tired to do anything, but you can enjoy the ropeway, paragliding or Zorbing.
DAY 4: We had no concrete plans of how we would return to Delhi, except for a Shatabdi train ticket the next day from Chandigarh. We made the mistake of not properly acquiring information on how to reach Chandigarh from Manali. We ended up taking a local bus from Manali that took almost 14-15 hrs to reach Chandigarh. Murphy’s Law was in full force: we suffered through bad roads, a tyre puncture in the middle of nowhere, water getting splashed on us as we waited by the side of the road for the tyre to be replaced, bad bathrooms, worst seats with no leg space, luggage-paranoia (that needs to be explained in a separate post!).
As if that was not enough, when we did reach our rest-house in Chandigarh, the room wasn’t booked. After waking up people all around at 3 in the morning, we finally got a room where we took a bath to cleanse ourselves from the solid and liquid particles stuck on us. We stunk.
The Shatabdi train stops for 5 min and we got in at the last minute at 6:50 A.M; the ticket was with Manpreet in her phone- well, she dropped her phone in water, so we were going on no ticket. Thankfully, we got the PNR number and ‘print ticket’ version on Devina’s cracked-screen phone. It was an experience, as I said before.
DOs- Rohtang Pass is crazy cold. Wear woolen inners before starting the journey. When you buy the much-needed jumpers and boots, do it over your coat. Make sure that everything is comfortable because the reality of snow is very different from that movie one. Also, Pee before you go.
Avomin again.
So the car stopped at a point, and there were around 200 cars ahead of us and god knows how many behind us. The window much ahead was to open around 6 and so the driver told us to sleep in that very-small too cramped- to- rest car. The urge to pee made all 3 of us to somehow walk in those uncomfortable boots up the hill, to look for a tree, at around 3:30 in the morning. That was not funny.
In the morning, we got in the line for the go-ahead slip after showing the R.C. and pollution-free certificate of the car.
Advice: Click pictures on the way to the Pass. Coming back, you will be too tired to stop anywhere. The view is spectacular. Rohtang Pass itself is beautiful (and cold!).
We also visited Solang Valley where you will get very expensive food. The Gol-Gappas are cheap and worth trying though. We were too tired to do anything, but you can enjoy the ropeway, paragliding or Zorbing.
DAY 4: We had no concrete plans of how we would return to Delhi, except for a Shatabdi train ticket the next day from Chandigarh. We made the mistake of not properly acquiring information on how to reach Chandigarh from Manali. We ended up taking a local bus from Manali that took almost 14-15 hrs to reach Chandigarh. Murphy’s Law was in full force: we suffered through bad roads, a tyre puncture in the middle of nowhere, water getting splashed on us as we waited by the side of the road for the tyre to be replaced, bad bathrooms, worst seats with no leg space, luggage-paranoia (that needs to be explained in a separate post!).
As if that was not enough, when we did reach our rest-house in Chandigarh, the room wasn’t booked. After waking up people all around at 3 in the morning, we finally got a room where we took a bath to cleanse ourselves from the solid and liquid particles stuck on us. We stunk.
The Shatabdi train stops for 5 min and we got in at the last minute at 6:50 A.M; the ticket was with Manpreet in her phone- well, she dropped her phone in water, so we were going on no ticket. Thankfully, we got the PNR number and ‘print ticket’ version on Devina’s cracked-screen phone. It was an experience, as I said before.
We slept so deeply- I think we looked like drug addicts with drool
coming out of our open-mouth expressions. The guy sitting beside me was telling
me about his Jewellery business and he told me later that I apparently slept
off in between the conversation.
We reached Delhi around 10:30 in the morning, tired and almost ready to drop.
But now that 2 days have
passed where I have done nothing but sleep and eat, I can say that the trip was
a success. No one died, nothing got lost (except my earphone). And maybe now we
can ‘plan’ to go to a new place that probably will translate into reality after
2 years. :)We reached Delhi around 10:30 in the morning, tired and almost ready to drop.
Note: Pack light. As light as possible. Dont rely on getting a 'cab'.
ReplyDelete