Shimla ... strange ...

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After our time in lovely H.P, we were keen to get back into the country side. We had booked ourselves onto the Himalayan Queen toy train that slowly climbs up the hills from Kalka to Shimla.

Our car driver was waiting for us at 5am in Rishikish but that’s where his efficiency ended. We explained that we absolutely HAD to be at the train station for the 12:30 train because the trains were fully booked for the next couple of days. The last thing we wanted to do was spend the next 3 nights in Kalka.
This didn’t stop our driver from taking us the wrong way, having to stop every 20 minutes to ask for directions, having a half hour long coffee break and making frequent toilet stops. All the time the clock was ticking on and then we got stuck in two tense demonstrations and protests about the upheaval in Kashmir. Argh! By the time we arrival at the train station (seven hours later) we made a mad dash to our train with only 3 minutes to spare!

Our arrival into Shimla wasn’t much more fun. As the train climbed higher and higher, the temperature changed from intense heat to freezing cold and heavy rain. For once we hadn’t organised accommodation in Shimla, so we were at the mercy of some of the most annoying touts ever.

We troughed through the pouring rain with our heavy packs as a persistent tout followed us, prattling non-stop about his ‘cheap and good’ hotel. After threatening him with the tourist police, we were finally able to search in peace. Our search didn’t take long. We booked into the first place we looked at. A suite that was well over our budget - absolutely huge with two LCD televisions and luxury bathroom. By this stage we were wet, tired and seriously grumpy after travelling non-stop for 14 hours - we would have paid anything for a hot shower and those fluffy white towels!

I found Shimla to be a strange place. The town was used by the British Raj in the nineteenth century as a escape from the summer heat on the plains. The town is built on a steep hillside and contains all sorts of British style buildings that were constructed before independence. Many of them are constructed from wood and look a bit shabby now. It was the weirdest thing to be walking through an English ‘town square’ complete with an English Church and Tudor style library! All of a sudden we saw western shops such as addidas and even Baskin Robbins!

On first glance, the difference between Shimla and the other places we had been was that it was actually quite clean! There are signs threatening fines for litter dropping and spitting in the main street - although a look over the edge of the cliff revealed mountains of rubbish that had obviously been chucked over. Nice one guys…
The other thing that didn’t help Shimla was the rain! It poured basically non-stop the whole time we were there. Apparently it had been pouring without break for the last four days and the town was covered in think fog. Since rain and fog isn’t exactly conducive for any outdoor activities, we cut our stay short after two nights and arranged a driver to take us on the next route of our journey up to Manali.

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