Green Valley, Horse Riding and Yaks

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It was my first morning in Shimla. I woke up with the sound of tap dance being performed by a family of monkeys on the tin roof of my hotel room. When I got morning sunrays into my room in Delhi, I always pulled the curtains because I can never sleep with so much light. But here it was different. Who wanted to sleep when a beautiful morning was prodding me to get out of my bed? So, first rays of winter morning sun acted as a catalyst to fire me up.

After a hot shower I ordered breakfast. Sipping hot tea with morning newspapers is one of my favorite activities. After reading the news headlines I was ready for the day ahead. My programme for the day included a visit to the resort of Kufri, which has beaten to death by the Bollywood filmmakers.

At the scheduled time of 10.30 a.m. the taxi arrived to take me to Kufri. As the taxi rolled out of Shimla, the scenery began to look pretty. Slow driving on winding roads and negotiating hairpin bends makes the journey real fun. We had hardly moved few kilometers that I saw several cars parked on one side of the road and their occupants were looking down into the valley. We also stopped and joined the crowd. What I saw in the valley was an amazing display of greenery I had ever seen before.

It was so dense and green. It appeared not an inch was without some green tree or plant. No wonder, it’s named Green Valley . After spending some time there we again started on our journey for Kufri. We finally stopped at a place which to me looked like some horse market. It was not what I had expected. All I could see was lot of cars and horses everywhere. Our driver told us we would have to take horse to go up to Kufri. The rates were fixed for the to and fro horse ride. We settled for horses handled by an innocent looking teenage boy.

The path was not very steep, though at some places we had to be careful due to uneven track. Our horse ‘master’ instructed us to bend forward when horse is climbing and pull backward when it’s going down. When we reached an open field, the teenage boy told us this is Kufri. I was not impressed. I had thought it would be some green meadow but there was no sign of any green there. All I saw was garbage thrown everywhere; couple of yaks being paraded by their owners for hire to sit on and get photographed and few kiosks selling foodstuff and drinks. There were horse droppings everywhere.

I am told during winter Kufri gets good snow and tourists, especially honeymooners, throng it to play in the snow. I think during snowfall it must be better than without snow. Next time I would like to visit it when it snows. But it’s high time Kufri was saved from over commercialisation and given back it’s greenery so that it’s worth visiting throughout the year.

Our horse handler was pretty good. The teenage lad did his best to make our ride worthwhile with his info nuggets, mainly what all films were shot there. He pointed to a small hut, which he said was used in the movie called King Uncle (starring Jackie Shroff and Shahrukh Khan). He also mentioned about a tree shown in the hit movie Pyar Jhukta Nahin (Love Does Not Buckle) starring Mithun Chakraborty and Padmini Kolhapure. The said tree has the heart carved by the two lovers and has become a picnic spot for couples since then.

After doing the Kufri round we went to the adjacent Himalayan Deer Park where we spotted couple of deer. I am told Himalayan deer are in danger of getting extinct. We had lunch at the Himachal Tourism’s Cafe Lalit inside Indira Tourist Park.

We came back to The Mall Road, did some roaming around but I was finding it hard to keep myself in shape there because I was feeling feverish. So we returned to our hotel.

Next day we had to leave but I still wanted to see the place from where Viceroy ruled all over India for six months during summer. So we planned to visit Viceregal Lodge which now houses IIAS (Indian Institute of Advanced Studies). It was a magnificent building with a well-maintained and beautiful lawn in front of it. It was in this building that India’s destiny was decided by the Britishers. The tables, chairs have been kept as it is and every half an hour a tour is conducted with a guide to give you a glimpse of history. I think everybody should visit it to know about the moments when India’s Independence was given final touches.

The visit to Viceregal Lodge was worth it. I was now better informed about the goings on in the final hours before India got it’s independence.

Thus, my Shimla visit ended on a good note. At 5.30 pm I got into the Kalka bound toy train to catch the night train for Delhi.

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