Behind the wheel & Contributor

Travelogue

Day - 1 - Shimla
A 3 day weekend trip - One night at Shimla, one night at Narkanda and one night at Chail. All bookings were done. HPTDC Hotel Holiday Home at Shimla, Hatu at Narkanda and Ekant at Chail. Being off-season we got 20% discount in all the three hotels. Started by 5 am and took a good 7 hour to reach Shimla. Reached Shimla at 12.15.

Jubbal airport


Shimla




HPTDC Hotel Holiday Home


Shimla was as usual packed, season or offseason doesn't matter. Luckily Hotel Holiday Home had enough parking and the quality of accomodation was very good. Places we planned to see were Mall, Ridge, Lakkar Bazaar and Jakoo Hills trek. Mall was crowded and we had our lunch at Baljee's restaurant. There are lots of eating outlets few that I remember near the post office are Indian coffee house, Dominos, Sagar Ratna and Combermere, the latter offer tasty pastries.

Library


Mall road


Mall Shimla


Evening mall road


Muncipal office


Scandal point


View of Shimla


We spent around an hour strolling the mall , then to ridge, lakkar bazaar and finally the 2 kms trek to Jakoo hill. The trek is a bit difficult as the climb is very steep. It took us nearly 40mins to reach the top to the Hanuman temple. We were completly exhausted after the climb but its serene and calm at the top. Alternately one can also reach here via taxi.

Trek to Jakoo hill


Monkeys enroute


sunset view


Night view from top


Day - 2 - Narkanda
We headed to Narkanda hoping to find snow. Local taxi guys had tiped that there is lots of snow in the Narkanda - Thanedar road and Hatu peak road is closed due to heavy snow. Started by 9.30 am. Roads are bad from Kufri - Narkanda, it took good 2.5 hrs to cover 65kms. Some patches of good road also are there, between Theog - Matyana. Matyana has a apple storage center from where apples can be bought. We already had booking at Hotel Hatu.

Hotel hatu


View somewhere enroute


Snow at Narkanda


Had our lunch at hotel, and set to visit Hatu peak. We were informed that the road is closed due to snow and only one can trek halfway to the top. Still thought of giving it a try. Went on the Thanedar road and took a risk to climb the hills come what may be. To our surprise after the initial climb, the snow had almost melted and we climbed around 4 kms to reach some where top which was a sort of a hill top , where there was a mud house and a frozen pond. Further we could see no road as it was fully covered with snow. Parked the beast and started trekking as much as we could, only went up to another 1.5 kms as there was a lot of snow further. We stayed there for an hour and returned to hotel.

Half way trek to Hatu










Now about the road, it was drivable till the Gurjar Hut(later the hotel guys told me), from there peak is just 2 kms. Post April one can climb almost till the peak. Only concern will be if any vehicle comes from opposite side, then it will be a very difficult task to give side. Hatu Peak is around 9 kms from Narkanda and Narkanda is 65 kms from Shimla.

Snow at top


Day - 3 - Chail
Checked out at 9am from Hotel Hatu. Our last destination was Chail. It was around 80 kms from here took MDR 8. Reached Chail by 12 pm. Chail is a sleepy hill station with wide roads and hardly any tourist, when we were there. Cant say about peak season. We stayed at Hotel Ekant, it had a good valley view.



Places to see
Cricket Stadium - The world's highest cricke statium.






Kali ka tibba - Awesome view around.


View from top


Sidh baba ka mandir - A secluded temple.








Sadupul, riverside - the bridge was destroyed later in the floods.




We didn't visit Chail Palace as none of us was interested. Kali ka tibba has awesome view and the best place of the lot to visit. It will have beautiful sun rise and sunset view. When we visited , it has overcast and count see the sunset. Kali ka tibba at a hight of 7000+ feet, and drive of 8 kms. One can spend hours here. Its a beautiful place.

Day - 4
Checked out of hotel headed back to home. En route we stopped over at Sadhu pur, its 16 odd kms from Chail towards Kandaghat. Spent around an hour and headed back to base. Reached Delhi by 5 pm. This brings an end to our trip.