Himachal Pradesh

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We decided to get the toy train to Shimla, the Raj summer capital of India. A 5 hour train left Delhi for Kolka where we switched to the toy train which was more narrow and a lot less comfortable. The train was an interesting novelty and the mountains were enjoyable for the first hour or two but after 6/7 hours the novelty had well and truly worn off and the bench like seats, with no leg room, had become instruments of torture. There was no baggage racks in the carriages and the toilet doors at either end were left open wafting unpleasantness around the tiny compartment. We would advise if anyone is spending any time in Himachel Pradesh and plans to do some sight seeing not to get this train as you'll see the views in a far more comfortable fashion from your tour bus or taxi. We were also delayed but apparently this happens a lot as there is only one track so if any train sets off late then others have to stop at each station to let the others go by. It was cool watching the tiny track twist built on old brick walls down below us through the forrest as we snaked our way up each hill even though we were only travelling at 30km per hour.

Shimla is a hill station in the north west Indian state of Himachel Pradesh. There is a cluster of tudor buildings on the ridge and mall indicating the towns history of British influence. India's second oldest church (the oldest being in Kochi, Kerala) presides over the whole town up on the ridge. It's a huge yellow church and lit up at night looks quite Daliesque. Irrelevantly, it's clock was kindly donated from one Colonel Dumbleton! The town is most popular with well to do Indian families and honeymoon couples and nestles along a hillside covered in guesthouses, trees and monkeys. There is a monkey problem here and many houses, usually those with young children resident, have metal cages set up around their front and/or back doors and gardens for children to play in safely. We weren't in the city long before we met the furry friends as they scampered up the stairs in front of us and clung to the metal bars on hour hotel window. They are quite intimidating even though you know they can't get through metal bars! Shimla is also unique (as far as we've seen anyway) in that it has a public elevator from the road on which the bus and train station are up to the main shopping street, known as the Mall. It is in 2 stages split by a 15 mt walk and you have to pay for it, extra for bags of course, in true Indian fashion. No cars are allowed on the mall so you don't really have a choice. On one side you have a spectacular view of the biggest city in Himachel Pradesh cascading down a steep hill top and on the other a steep, big pile of rubbish down the back of the elevator shaft. We spent a few days here but didn't do much but chill and eat out. Of the many places we dined at The Comembere and Embassy were the best. If you're ever in the area the Embassy’s spinach and chicken dish with chapatis is definitely worth seeking out. We did spend an interesting half hour on the roller skating rink with bemused Indians watching although no-one joined us. The rollerskates were hilarious, wheels on a piece of metal tied to our shoes with rope! We also had the experience of sending a parcel home which took much time and energy including a trip to the tailors for the necessary sewing. On our last day we set off to the monkey temple on the top of the hill. The description in the guide book should have been a warning 'on top of the hill', but we were not expecting quite such a steep gradient. Many people warned about the absolute certainty that monkeys would snatch Ash's glasses so we stowed them safely in our bag. This was far from ideal though as it's widely accepted, the key in sightseeing to actually see the sights! We sampled some local fruit wines one evening (the following day Ash was strangely taken ill with an upset stomach) and agreed that in order of preference Plum wine is by far the nicest followed by Apple, Peach and trailing badly was Pineapple.

Dharmsala was our next stop. The bus left at approximately 9pm and arrived at 5.30 am. This would seem like a pretty badly scheduled bus in any other country but perfectly normal here. The bus was fairly comfortable apart from the first hour where it was packed in the aisles with Indian men on their way home from work being dropped off along the outskirts of Shimla. The driver also had a delusion of formula 1 glory which ended in a 2am puncture and half and hour of ear splitting metal on metal hammering. With a good night's sleep tucked under our belts we hailed a cab for McLeod Ganj, the home of the Dalai Lama, 10km up the hill. We arrived in the town as it was still sleeping and unable to get a chai (milk tea) anywhere. After trying out a few places to no avail it became clear we'd arrived at a busy time and booking ahead may have been wise. We did however manage to secure a basement room with an open sewer running outside the door which we humbly accepted. After some hanging around in the restaurant and no additional time spent in the room we upgraded to the penthouse suite with balcony and panoramic views, hot water and cable tv for triple the price. Money well spent. Turned out it was the Dalai Lama's birthday, for which there was a Puja ceremony being held as well as birthday festivities and in addition to 7 days of lectures held at the monastery (Gompa). It wasn't long before we noticed the hundreds of monks hanging out all around McLeod; some were staying in our guesthouse, playing pool in the pool hall, eating in restaurants and the like. From the pool hall we watched the female monks debating using the trade mark stamping of feet and slapping of hands. Very interesting but a pity we hadn't a notion of what they were saying.

The Puja ceremony was held for the longevity of the Dalai Lama's life. We turned up not knowing what to expect and were thoroughly surprised. On the advice of the security desk at which we had to register for the lectures, we had turned up 6am. The service didn't start until 8am so we had prime seats but very numb butts. We were surrounded mostly my monks from all over India, Nepal and Tibet as well as from other parts of Asia. Many Tibetan people were downstairs all dressed in the traditional long, heavy but brightly coloured attire. We had a grumpy old monk on our right who wasn't too happy we were there earlier than him and got a better seat but the nice old man to our left (who had dozens of people come to bow and greet him during our wait) told us to stay where we were and enjoy the view and not take any notice of the other guy. Seeing as his status was clearly higher and nobody came to greet grumpy pants we stayed where we were. Unfortunately we were not permitted to bring cameras into the ceremony so we have no photopictals. The temple was up a flight of stairs and faced out towards the courtyard beneath with a large seating area upstairs too. The temple was reserved for officials and the area immediately surrounding was reserved for monks. We were seated on a step upstairs right in front of the temple so were the closest we could possibly be and when the Dalai Lama came up the steps into the temple we had a clear, unobstructed view of him. There was a large space cleared directly in front of the temple in the middle of the seating area where a few big tables were set up with crates and what looked like massive saucepans that no burner could ever heat. These were filled with sweets, doughnuts, bread rolls, fruit, biscuits, crisps, muffins and all other sorts of food. As people arrived they added something to the pots. We wondered throughout what would happen to that vast supply of food. As soon as the ceremony began some monks began distributing butter tea, in styrofoam cups if you did not have your own, and saffron rice. As we had no plates we took it in our hands and it was quite delicious not to mention welcome as we'd sat there for over two hours starving. At the end of the service the monks came around with baskets each and filled them up with the goodies before distributing them all over the upper and lower levels! They kept coming back to stock up until the whole lot had been given out. It was amazing! We were shy at first as we had not known what was to happen and hadn't contributed but our companion to the left kept grabbing the monks robes as they passed us by and forcing him to give us stuff. We ended up with doughnuts, bananas, sweets and bread rolls. The lectures were not quite as inspiring mostly as due to the native Chinese speaker translating it was hard to decipher what he was saying in English and then try and get meaning from it in a timely manner. We got lost and kept forgetting what he said so gave up after two days. The cheap fm radios available weren't great either. Definitely worth heading along though and not an experience to forget anytime soon.

The rest of our time at McLeod was dominated by expanding our skill set. First up we took a 5 day Tibetan Massage course at the Tibetan Massage Center on Bagsu Road beside the Green Hotel. Our instructor was a friendly Tibetan named Tenzin and our victim, Chootak. It was very well organised with demonstrations followed by us trying each move. We also had diagram instructions, a cd for when we get home and a certificate to prove we spent the money trying. It was a lot of fun and we'd highly recommend it. Cheap too. Our second skill was card tricks but we aren't at liberty to discuss this in too much detail ;-) It was interesting enough but neither if us are masters just yet.

We walked to the nearby town of Bagsu one day which sounds impressive but it's only 2/3km away. It is home to a pretty waterfall where people come to swim as a novelty but more often used by locals for laundry purposes. Down a steep track from the main square in McLeod is a monastery where a high population of child monks live. This was quite interesting to see too. We met quite a few travellers in the town which made a change and the feel was distinctly different from other places in India largely due to the majority population being Tibetan. Unless you're really in to meditating though there isn't much else to do here though. Food wise we didn't think it had a lot to offer either; Nick's Cafe had a huge roof top terrace where we ate most days enjoying the view with a good book, McLlo's was our evening haunt and not too bad on the food front and Taste of India was ok but expensive and service wasn't the best the day we went. We did check out Japanese Lung-Ta every Tuesday and Friday for their vegetarian sushi set specials. These were great value and really tasty. We found a home made cinema just off the main street where we caught pirated recent Hollywood releases shown on projectors in a basement. Quite a welcome treat! The pool hall was pretty good and served beer. They have boys on the floor who are supposed to rack the balls at the start of each game who take their jobs very seriously. If you so much as try to rack yourself they swarm around and snatch the balls right out of your hands! Ade couldn't help himself, trying to rack each time to watch them run.

Shimla wasn't the only town wih a high monkey population. One day Ade stepped out on to the balcony for a smoke only to be greeted by two large monkeys (photo posted), he screamed like a girl and ran back inside. Next he decided to try and take pictures with his arm out the window which the monkeys had little interest in. The zoology background kicked in at this point so he decided to have a staring match with the monkey. It looked away first and he counted it as a win. The rematch followed but Ade got bored after a few minutes and looked away. Realising the bathroom window was open he went in to close it thus encountering the monkey who from his recent victory was emboldened. He started to climb through the window but luckily we had a big stick handy so Ade started banging it while freaking out. The monkey scarpered and the window was locked but Ade was shaken for awhile after!

The bus from McLeod to Manali left at 8pm and arrived at the ungodly hour of 4.30am. No rickshaws or taxis waited to meet us leaving the majority of passengers to walk the few kilometers to Old Manali, the backpacking village. We were not as ambitious as most though and approached the only rickshaw driver in sight who seemed to be texting on his mobile. He'd no objections to the fare and so we over-took everybody else and got the only available room at Travellers Nest, a nice friendly guesthouse. We stayed three nights in Manali taking in the small temples around the village in a one day sight seeing venture.

Old Manali is also surrounded by mountains with waterfalls visible to us from our balcony but doesn't have a sleepy village feel despite the picture postcard view. It's a popular village with travellers and referred to, according to the lonely planet, as the Goa of the Himalayas. Don't be expecting nightclubs though, the bars may be open late and filled with people but it's distinctly different from the party scene of Goa, the drug of choice here being cannabis. We didn't hang about long, soon setting off on a two day bus journey to Leh in the barren state of Ladakh.

As an aside, on the train journey from Kolka to Shimla we had the pleasure of sharing our cell with two over-fed, self important Indian youngsters. We had ordered some rice and curry from a stall on the platform and were eating, along with everyone else who was getting the connecting train (which was 70% of the passengers on board our carriage). The father of these youngsters found it necessary to voice his disgust at people eating 'fast food' on the train. He was also over fed and no stranger to fast food himself we suspected. Much to our satisfaction the whole family loaded up on burgers about 3 hours in and pigged out on the train too. Feeling loud remarks to this end would not be appreciated in the present audience we saved them for you guys. His youngest and plumpest son laid out some napkins on the seat where our food had been resting unopened on his seat before he had boarded the train. Ash initially thought this was a derogatory gesture aimed at her but Ade wisely pointed out that these folk were most likely Brahmin (upper caste Indian who are considered to be more important and worthy than the rest) and the food was most likely to have been prepared by Dalits (lowest caste, who are also historically known as untouchables as they are not to touch any other caste or anything they may touch). The child was acting on the direction of his parents who clearly still believe this type of prejudice is their prerogative. Welcome back to backward India.

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Photos

Shimla building
with sleeping dogs

Hanuman
Monkey God