Hairpin Bends: Winter in the Kangra region

A visit to Delhi, even if it is a pitstop on the way to more exotic locales, is always meticulously planned. There are plans and then there are back-up plans to take the place of last moment fall-outs. Our initial twelve hours (8a.m. to 8p.m.) in the national capital, time was budegeted for shopping, eating and meeting people. We managed to do all three though with varying degrees of success and satisfaction.

Kitschy India at New Delhi

Sarojini yielded that diamond I had been coveting: a smart black woollen winter coat that my classmate, who met us at the market, haggled down to one-third of the asking price. I could not be happier! Other members of my party loaded up with trinkets, palazzos, socks etc. A typical girls' day out. Reeling under the weight of our shopping bags we headed to Nando's CP for a hearty meal only to be disappointed thoroughly by the dryness of the grilled chicken and the overall lack of taste in our meal. However, those who are travelling by overnight buses should make use of swank restrooms in restaurants, no matter how sorry the food so that done we headed to the Metro Cloakroom (at NDLS station) to collect our luggage.

The bus journey was initially exciting. Seats were great (Volvo Himsuta semi-sleeper A/C buses operated by Himachal Road Transport Corp. for 1100/- per person) and we even had a mobile charging point so everyone was happy. The temperature inside the bus was many many degrees higher than the freezing 5 degrees of the Delhi winter outside and promptly the word for the trip became: TOASTY. This was to indicate the state of being that was desirable within as opposed to the bone-chilling cold that existed without.

Mission Impossible V  ridiculously dubbed in Hindi was playing on the TV screen at the front of the bus which made it quite difficult to sleep. However our fatigue got the better of us and we dozed off. Trouble started after 3 a.m. when a member of our group started being violently sick because by now the bus had begun climbing up the ghat roads. Our driver was a near-maniac, not caring that his passengers were being flung around like beads inside a rattle and tackling the hairpin-bends without ever considering speed reduction. Soon one-third of the passengers began throwing up and this being an air-conditioned bus it became impossible to escape nausea. My friend and I moved to the front of the vehicle to get some fresh air and to avoid being sick ourselves. It wasn't a good night and the journey was anything but pleasant. Words of advice post-suffering: prepare to be sick, take medication prior to the journey, carry plastic bags and tissue paper.

As dawn broke on the mountains, I viewed an orange and pink sunrise through the windshield of the bus as by this time quite a few passengers had gotten off and I was sitting on the very first seat right behind the driver. The conductor was overheard saying that our stop was approaching so I got up and exhorted my troops to Up Up and Away! Thankfully both were awake. Soon the bus stopped and with a loud "Dharamshala!" the conductor opened the door and jumped off. I let my friend know that I was going to get our luggage from the belly of the bus and they should get off after me. I got off to a chilly morning in dharamshala. We were on a bit of mountain road that had a taxi stand on the gravel shoulder and the main bus station loomed over us. Clearly this wasn't going to be the last stop for our bus because it had not entered the bus station but was still on the road. I collected three pieces of luggage and then  before I could say a word the conductor got onto the bus, shut the door and the bus rumbled away down the hillside with my friends still inside it. I was so shocked at my predicament that I started laughing uproariously.

When my hysteria had lessened I called one of the girls and found out they had managed to get off albeit a couple of kilometres away and were now trudging towards me. I waited for what seemed like a very long time before they finally appeared; all sheepish smiles and plaintive excuses. Our joyous reunion, however, was rudely cut short by the discovery that in their hurry to get off they had forgotten on of their backpacks on the bus. It wasn't something that could be given up so we walked up to the bus station explained our predicament and asked for help. Not one, not two but three damsels in distress was just too exciting for the bus station authorities who insisted that we wait there for them to contact our bus conductor, locate the bag and then have it brought down. Tired and in need of a bath, I impudently asked if we could come back later for it but no...that was not going to happen.

We had had the good sense to hire a taxi to take us to our homestay cottage and had left one member of the trio seated in it with all our luggage. It was she who suggested we scrap the waiting and chase the runaway bus with the red bag in it. It sounded like a plan so we started our journey to Mcleodganj where the bus apparently had been in such a tearing hurry to get to.

Tibetan War memorial

We reached the bus station and found our bus. She was empty save a grumpy janitor who was cleaning the interiors. I did not envy that man his job! We asked him to go in and look for a red bag kept in the luggage rack above our seat numbers but he came back to us with the news that there was no red bag there and the conductor had left for the Dharamshala bus station with something similar just a while ago. We were tired of the wild goose chase and decided to stop by at the Namgyal Monsatery home of His Holiness The Dalai Lama which was just 5 minutes away.

Inside the Namgyal monastery

The monastery complex was diffrent from any that I had ever seen. There was a statue of a burning monk outside commemorating martyrs to the Tibetan cause but all in all it was simple and austere. Felt like a house more than a monsatery and the golden Buddha statue had a head painted cobalt blue. I know it might sound blasphemous but I did not feel an iota of the calm cool innner tranquility that other Buddhist places of worship exude. This, notwithstanding the fact that we were literally surrounded by maroon-clad monks and the monsatery was replete with prayer wheels and people in various postures of salutation in front of the main shrine room.

That done we found a cafe with just one empty table, always a good sign, peopled with monks foreign tourists and the like. We sat down and ordered food and were surprised by the quality. Their pancakes are absolutely the best I have ever had: soft, fluffy, melt-in-your-mouth served with local honey. The Lemon Yoghurt Cake was the star of the show: a light airy sponge with just a hint of lemoniness. It was exactly the pick me up we needed. It gave us the strength to get into the waiting taxi and travel 10 more kilometres back to Dharamshala and to our lodgings.

A heritage property belonging to the Maharaja of Katoch and fondly called Chandresh Kumari Kothi (I imagined an aquiline-nosed elderly regal matriarch) near the library, all the drivers seemed to know it well. Ours was Cottage no.4 which the smiling caretaker/manager Mr. Raghubir showed us into. Dining table with chairs, sitting room furniture, a double-bed with a darling patchwork coverlet, a well-appointed kitchenette and a dressing area leading off into a tiny but neat loo....we were more than happy with the cottage.

Our Cottage at Cloud's End

We ordered lunch at the cottage itself, too lazy to go into town again for it and enjoyed the homecooked but delicious meal of rice, chapatis, dal, sabji and chicken curry that was provided. Our plans of going paragliding the next day were thwarted as the governement had ordered all such activity to be cancelled on account of the Republic Day and threat to security in the Himalayan region. Refusing this to dampen our plans we decided to cut our stay at Dharamshala short and head to Dalhousie by road the next day to return the day after in time for our bus back to Delhi. Raghubir ji was kind enough not to crib, complain or ask for extra money when we told him of our change of plans and we murmured amongst ourselves on the innate goodness of hill-people once he was out of ear-shot.

Cloud's end Villa

That afternoon after lunch we hired a cab and went to see the Bhagsu falls, (terrible waste of time trying to locate a trickle of water far away amidst the rocks and boulders) the Dal lake (nothing to do with the majestic lake in Kashmir and renamed Dull Lake by us) and the Naddi viewpoint (the one redeeming factor). at the viewpoint we were entertained by a telescope-wielding gentleman, who in exchange for 10/- per person showed us the army base camp, snow on the mountains, village belles doing their chores and a substantial waterfall, all of which were far far away but seemed so near.

Naddi viepoint: Dhauladhar range

Next morning we set off for Dalhousie in an upbeat mood. First stop was the Dharamshala Cricket Stadium which is the highest stadium in the country. Beautifully kept and fringed by mountains it provided numerous photo-ops for tourists.

Dharamshala Cricket Stadium

 On the mountains every hairpin bend, every curve, throws up a different dimension of the view. The scene keeps shifting so there's never a dull moment. The movie business churns out hundreds of songs each year but all the hill-stations in the Himalayan region of India are caught in a time-warp of 1990's Bollywood cheesey romatic numbers. Unfailingly, if the taxi/car you hire has a stereo, the driver will play these almost-forgotten songs. One such ditty stuck in our heads like chewing gum would not come off till we recorded a dubsmash duet rendition of it. A bit of crazy on the trip!

The bracing cold wind kept nausea at bay and we reached Chamera Dam around 3p.m. The water looked blue from above when we spotted the lake and wound our way down but at the dam level it looked like liquid onyx. The Army personnel guarding the dam (also a hydel power project hence the safety requirements) asked us where we came from and spouted a few lines in Bengali saying that he had been posted for a few years in the Kidderpore docks in Kolkata.

Chamera Dam

When we reached Snow Valley Resort in Dalhousie the sun had set but the imposing 180 degree panorama of the snow-covered Dhauladhar Range was bathed in a pinkish-orange hue. One wall of our room was made of glass and provided a breathtaking view and we went shutter-crazy for a while. After being seated inside a moving vehicle for the better part of the day all of us wanted to walk. So we layered up and went out to the town and browsed the shops. My friends bought mementoes and edibles for home while I just soaked in the winter night in a quaint little mountain-town that retained the flavour of the Raj in it's buildings.

Snow Valley Resort, Dalhousie

The journey back to Dharamshala the next day was uneventful. After a hearty breakfast at the hotel we did not even need to stop for lunch but one member of our party who was sick on the way from Delhi decided to skip the bus jorney and fly back. We said our goodbyes at the airport and then made our way back to the very same cottage we had occupied a night ago as the caretaker had very kindly agreed to rest there for an hour or two before we caught our bus back to Delhi.

The return journey to Delhi was much smoother than the onward one, not least because the hairpin bends and ghat roads were over by 10p.m. and after that it was just any other normal bus journey. I wanted to record the dinner stop on this route. The bus pulled into an imposing driveway and in front of us stood a palatial building called Haveli built in sandstone. It was eerie and weird...exactly the sort of setting for a low-budget horror flick where a bus-full of passengers disembark in the middle of a lonely highway and one by one inevitably they die. As we walked up the 50 or so steps into the grand main hall and had our dinner the feeling of eeriness and unease never left us for a second. As I kept teasing my friend, it seemed as though many skeletons were literally buried in the closets of this house. We felt infinitely better when we were back on the road.

The bus reached Delhi at around 4:30a.m. and dropped us off at ISBT Kashmiri Gate. I haggled with an auto driver and fixed a decent price before climbing in with my friend. We were both quiet for the first five minutes and then I turned to her and exclaimed that we had left our trolley bags behind in the bus. Feeling like morons we requested the auto to turn back all the while praying that our bags would still be there and thankfully, they were. We tried explaining to ourselves why we kept leaving luggage behind on buses..fatigue, cold, nervousness at travelling in the wee hours of the night...we trailed off.

Our trip was almost over. One member of the trio left to catch a morning flight so she could be in office by 2p.m. and we shopped at Lajpat Nagar Market for the greater part of the morning. Delhi sure knows how to deck it's women up and that too at budget prices. Just like Sarojini Nagar Market is the mecca of westernwear for women with dresses and skirts averaging at about 200/- a piece; Lajpat was a revelation in terms of ethnic wear and junk jewellery at throwaway prices. In the latter half of the day we classed up our act a bit and visited the much hyped Select City Walk mall in Malviya Nagar partly to kill time and partly because my companion was a brand fetish-ist. After lunch some On Sale shopping at GAP ensued and then we headed to the airport to fly back.