Kashmir - Land of Beauty and the Beasts

Time of Visit - May,2014
Duration - 10 days

Direct Flight from Mumbai - Indigo

First Stop - Sri Nagar

Accommodation:
1) Lalit - Beautiful Property. Delicious Food Spread.
2) Taj Vivanta.
3) House boat - Dal Lake - Sukoon House Boat - superfluously luxurious

The Lalit Landscape

Places to see:
1) Gardens  - Shalimar, Nishat, Badamwari, Tulip garden, Chashmeshaheen, Pari Mahal, Mughal Garden.

The Infamous Tulip Garden

(Too many gardens. Very well constructed architecturally. However it is just  a lot to see in one day.)
2) Shankaracharya  Temple and Kir Bhawani Temple.
3) Kokernag, Verinag and Achebal. You must go to Verinag. There is a cold spring water lagoon with fishes. It is beautiful. Kokernag and Achebal should be skipped.
4) You could go visit Yous marg. I missed it. It is supposed to be really pretty.
5) Take a Shikara ride. Do not shop at the floating market. It is super expensive.

Verinag - Cold Water Lagoon

Shopping
Dal Gate Market - Hayat Store for Dry Fruits and Kesar, Lal Chowk, Residency Road
Buy saffron from the kesar farms. Good quality saffron. A word of advice to follow is that have it must be packed in front of you. Do not buy the prepacked kesar.We bought it from Dilkash Kesar farms.
Buy Woolen Coats, Silk Coats, kashmiri kurtis, salwar sets, cushion covers, paper marche artifacts, pathanis, nehru jacket, dry fruits.

Shop Sheep = Shop Wool

Pahalgam
Accommodation - Senator Pine and Peak Resorts. It has been taken over by the Fortune Group and they are in the process of renovating the rooms. The drawback being that it did not have a swimming pool and the food served was below average. However on the good side, it is higher up on the hill so the view is awesome. They have a huge property and the rooms are spacious.

But I would still recommend one to stay at the Pahalgam Hotel. It is in the market area, - Log Inn Cafe Food is sumptuous. We have eaten all our meals there.The chef is incredible. They have continental food with amazingly mouth watering desserts. I have no idea about the rooms and service but a lot of people did recommend it to me, so you must definitely go there and try booking it in advance as it gets sold out.

Log Inn Cafe -Comfort Fur Cafe Seats Pahalgam Hotel

Shopping  - More expensive than srinagar so would recommend one to shop only at srinagar.

Things to do:

1)Take a pony ride upto Bysairan. It is a massive green meadow. It reminds you of the scene in the movie Twilight where Edward takes Bella to a meadow for the first time and she sees his body glow in the sun.

Bysairan Meadow

The Kashmiris call it 'mini switzerland' and the only way to reach there is via pony or you could hike it.
Cost - 1000rs
There is a cafe up there so there is no need to carry food.

2) Book a car. The hotel will provide you with the rates.

Places to Visit:
a) Betaab Valley - where the movie Betaab was shot.
b) Chanderwari - Watch the water flowing down from the mountains. When we visited the place, the snow had not completely melted, so our visual was of that of snow melting into a water stream.
c) Aru Valley - Try going early. The drive is scenic but it is going to be a bumpy ride. Roads are not good. But Aru Valley was my favorite. There is a pony ride there also. So, if you have to do the whole tour it could take you another 3 hours again. When we reached there, it was raining, so I maybe biased towards Aru Valley because everything seemed so fresh and green.

3) Visit the Deer Park. It is a natural zoo with 2 leopards, 2 bears and deers. Luckily, we were allowed to pet the bear!! She was like this cute bundle of fur.

Fuzzy Wuzzy Bear - yeah, I did pet it!!

On the way to Pahalgam we stopped at this green tunnel dhaba - really really good dhaba food!!

Sonmarg:

Sonmarg literally translates to the path of gold. This reference comes from the fact that the refraction of the sun rays falling on the snow mountains give it an illusion of gold.

Accommodation - Rah Villas.

It is in the outskirts, but the food and the rooms are nice.

Another recommendation would be Snow Land - It is the hub for all the activities, hence making it a very crowded and noisy place. However, it is situated right at the periphery of the snow mountains.

Places to visit-

The Son Marg mountains - 0 degree - we couldn't do it as it had snowed heavily this year, so it wasn't clear to go right up till the glacier.

Things to do - Sledge ride.

When the snow melts, you need to take a pony ride all the way up to the top to view the glacier.

Things available at the top - maggi, tea, biscuits, wafers, water, and the like of general provisions.

Gulmarg

Snow Mobile Trek

Accommodation - You have to stay at the Khyber Hotel, as there is not much to do, other than the hotel.

Things to do - Gondola ride. Go till Phase 2. Its all about the snow and spend as much time in the snow.
Do not get rigged by them selling you the view point of Line Of Control. They cannot show you the LOC, guys!!

At phase 1- there is the snowmobile ride - its super fun!!
Sledge ride, Skiing, Snow cycling, basically all sorts of activities.
You will also get food there- chinese, indian and maggi of course.

Things to do:
1) Church - very pretty small church, jab tak hai jaan was shot in it.
2) Shivjis Temple.
3) Very small market. - could go browsing there.
4) Bakshi Dhabba - It has been recommended by a lot of tourists. I was happy with the food at khyber so didnt try exploring for other food options.

Ski fans, Gulmarg is the place for you to go to, but mostly in the months of January -February.

360 degree rainbow

So, moving from the beauty to the beastly side of Kashmir.

It is surprisingly not unusual to see the army with guns and police on the street every few blocks. Well, that is precisely how Kashmir functions on an everyday basis. There was a curfew when we were visiting and a couple of tourist cars did get hit by stones. But, that is a very typical Kashmir scenario. Well luck embraced us, and we sailed through the trip except for like tiny bits of derailments due to the unexpected tiny uprisings in Kashmir.

I would define Kashmir as the plot of the book Hunger Games. On one side there is the army and the police who play the role of the capitol and on the other side are the common people who are the citizens of the districts. This fight has been going on for over decades and decades. Maybe the book did get it's inspiration from the real life story of Kashmir. However, this is the fight of the people of the valley, so, it is not unsafe to travel for the tourists. Tourists are welcomed with open hearts and treated very well. In fact the locals are very nice towards the tourists. And we did really have a good trip.
However one must take caution, given the erratic conditions of Kashmir.

You will need a car to get around so many places. So, please ensure to get a good driver's number who will show you around well.

Do visit Kashmir for its beauty!! Its splendid!

Rishikesh - Fairy Land

Local Loafer has been pretty much busy loafing around, the reason for a lapse in blogging.

Beginning 2014, I have only been extensively travelling around India.

And INDIA is beautiful. It is a huge country and is beautiful.

Well, so much gushing about India, is primarily because this time fortunately I got a chance to finally visit Rishikesh.  I had been there once as a child but I have no distinct memory, so I was very happy given this chance to have gone there once again.

To not exaggerate, but I have fallen in love with this city. Well, Yet, Don't raise your expectations. I was just overwhelmed by the fact that India also has clean beaches and waters which look sterile to jump in.

To begin with, I went to Rishikesh for the International Yoga Festival, 2014 at the Parmath Ashram.
I completely enjoyed this experience. It was a one week long festival. We had a schedule of yoga exercises starting from 4 am everyday up till 5 p.m. All the yogics who have a keen inclination towards yoga, must definitely go for this festival. It gives you an introduction to all types of yoga, where you can choose which yoga class do you want to attend interspersed with spiritual discours and satsangs. And in the evening there was a ganga aarti at the ganga followed by a cultural festival or satsang.

India being the land of yoga, you would be surprised that most people who came for this festival were foreigners from more than 100 countries all across the world.

I will give you a brief detail on this festival:
1) Rooms were not superflously luxurious. They were basic but clean tidy and organized.
2) There was hot water. This is very important to me. I dislike cold showers.
3) Food was being served beginning from breakfast to lunch to evening snacks to dinner. You could never go hungry. Note, it was vegetarian food, but c'mon it is a yoga camp!
4)Laundry - Yes, laundry service was provided on payment basis.
5) Ayurvedic Massage - Yes, they did see to it to provide a massage unit to relax our sore body after yoga. To pay basis.
6)Service - Amazingly served. No complaints. They never said 'no' if you asked for anything. Baj Bihari, Subhash ji were indeed very helpful. And yes, of course Aditi.

Now,A little about the experience.
I am a novice when it comes to yoga, so I was thrilled to receive so much knowledge, meet so many people of who most were yoga professionals and interact with such wise teachers.

Swami Yogananda- You cannot miss meeting him.

My favorite form of yoga is Iyengar Yoga which H.S. Arun was teaching us there. Another yoga form which I completely enjoyed was Kundalini yoga by Gurmukh Khalsa, which puts you in some sort of trance after it, but it was a very energising, thrilling fun adaptation of yoga. There were other teachers like Erica Kauffman who taught us Lila Yoga which were a series of sun salutations. Kia Miller and Matthew Sweeney were also amazing teachers.
Well honestly, you should see the schedule of IYF as there were lots and lots of forms of yoga to practice from which I tried one new one every day and enjoyed all.
Well, I cannot finish writing my story without mentioning Swami Yogananda. He is 106 years old. He can see, eat, hear, walk, write without having any artificial accessory to aid him. I was stunned. I loved sitting and spending time with him. He taught sukshma yoga and just made people laugh. I never made it for his class and when I did, he never made it to his class. So, I guess, giving me a reason to go back to the IYF.
All work no play makes everybody dull. Well, to make our stay more enjoyable, the famous percussionist Sivamani came and performed one night. He was BRILLIANT!!

In short, every day we had yoga exercises, entertainment, speeches by some prominent gurujis. In fact Shri Moolji was also there to share his knowledge. Yeah, even I didn't know of him till I went for this festival, but he is a really famous person.

My highlight was cleaning up the ganga and playing holi by the river. The enthusiasm showed by the foreign nationalities was super.

One more aspect of Rishikesh is that, given that there are so many ashrams, people who come and decide to spend the rest of the lives here come from many different backgrounds and come together in the common cause of doing 'seva' (helping, giving, doing work for others without any expectations). Maybe that is why you get the most pure and peaceful vibes.

My uncle and aunt have also moved to the Geeta Ashram in Rishikesh to do seva. In fact, that is how I was lucky to experience the real ashram life. They eat simple food, live in simple basic accommodation and lead simple lives and have dedicated their lives to seva.


Besides the yoga festival, we went and explored around Rishikesh. Things to see
1) Neelkanth temple
2) Ram Jhula
3) Laxman Jhula


Food  - All types of food is available from italian to momos. Do visit the cafe ramblas, its adjoining an orphanage - beautiful and good food and the best best best cheesecake ever.

Kids at the Ramblas ashram- Do give them a visit. They are cute naughty brats!

There is this german bakery - I found it very average.

Shopping - Its not big on shopping, but being a keen shopper, I picked up a couple of things.

People - Very kind and generous. I just loved the people from there. I was fortunate to have met really nice helpful people.

If you do want to stay in a luxurious ashram at Rishikesh, then there is this place called Vanprasth Ashram. You could book yourself there.

I love adventures. I live for the thrill and challenges. My incentive for going for the yoga festival was rafting at rishikesh. We stayed at this secluded but not so secluded beach camp at marine drive. Beautiful camping site. Beautiful would also be an  understated word. The ganga water was pure, clean, pristine and the sands silver. We stayed there for 2 nights. We went rafting for 24 kms. We played a game of volley. Stayed right at the beach camp site. Meals were served three times and pretty good food for a campsite. We used to sit by the bonfire by the night and it was more like our own private camp. It was unreal.

There are a lot of adventure activities to do in Rishikesh now that Flying Fox is there. We were short on time but if you do get the chance, do make the most of it.

Make Rishikesh a priority city to visit. But don't be shocked with the number of animals you encounter while you are walking on the road. That is also an adventure in itself.

My favourite 'take a break' 'holiday' city in the whole world ( by which I mean whatever of the world that I have seen till now). :)

Indore - Bustling home town

Indore is like my second home, not out of preference but because my maternal grandparents live in a town close to indore.

Nevertheless, I have grown to like it. It allows me to live a life which would be difficult to in a city like Mumbai.

However, currently, it is being flooded with investment from  real estate, 5 stars, malls, brand outlets to gyms. It seems to be a lucrative market.

Indore is famous for its indori chatpattas.

1) Sarafa - An area which you could visit late in the night even at 2-3 and it will satisfy your hunger. You should try the fariyali khichdi (indori version of sabudana khichdi ) - It makes sabudana also taste so good.

2) Chappan - Again, another food joint - you must try the kachoris, pattice from this street. My favorite is johnnys veg hot dog.

3) Mr. Beans - one of the new cafes. Could be compared to a Cafe Coffee Day. But really appetizing menu. Must go there. Next to Treasure Island Mall. I just recently went back and sadly it is shut down!!

4) You can visit choukhidani and nakhrali dani.

Basically indore is a foodies paradise - but very rajasthani, marwari, chatpatta food not conrtinental.

One of the fancy membership club opened there is Sayajis - which has bowling also.

There is a place close by called Mandava nearby which has historical sites.  I really admired the Jahaz Mahal or the ship palace as it resembles a ship floating on water.

A little bit of history and a lot of food sums up pretty much of Indore.