Shimla - 2 Days to run down the Memory Lane

Though the trip was short, going back to Shimla after more than 8 years now has left me feeling wanting for more of it. :)

Up on the mountains, away from the plains between the pine trees and the sky , this place has always charmed me with its nealry peaceful existence.

Eight years is a long time and yet I feel as if all the time I had spent there before, has happened just a few days back.

My first visit at Shimla in the summer of  July 2001, was an experience untold.  Staying back at the HPU hostel at a friend's room , with her room mates, was so much fun.
My joining HPU and my first day at Gargi Hostel.
I remember every detail still.

Rain drops on the window of Rajdhani Express

All those sweet memories came back flooding to me.



I and my spouse had boarded The Rajdhani express from Kolkata for Delhi in the month if August. When we left Kolkata, the weather was cloudy and it had rained while we were travelling.
We reached Delhi the enxt day evening as the train was 6 hours late. We had planned for a sight seeing at Delhi had we reached there on time, but since we reached in the evening we went directly to a Hotel.


We booked one auto and it took us to Hotel MEM International, not too far from the station. Its a good budget hotel.  The deluxe room on the third floor was nice and cozy and the service was not that bad.

The room at Hotel MEM

For dinner, we had chicken corn soup,sandwiches and chicken pakoras. The food at the hotel is good.

Next day morning we had to catch the Kalka satabdi to reach Kalka and from there towards Shimla .. yooohoooo !!    
 We got up early next morning to catch the Kalka satabdi. I was jumping with joy.

The train was on time and we had our breakfast on the train.

I made it a point to click the pics of breakfast served .. he he he

The view of greenery was mesmerising. Green fields and clear blue sky.
We could imagine the cool air blowing through the fields. Slowly the landscape started changing and we could see small hills on the horizon.

It was in the afternoon that we reached Kalka. I remember time when I had been here before."A car had come to pick us up to take us to the Guest House at Barmana and I spent the whole way puking and feeling dizzy because of the terrains"

This time I had brought the medicine, but I took the risk of enjoying the journey from Kalka to Shimla without any medicines. A car had been arranged to pick us up. We found the car. The driver was a nice lean man. He put our luggage in the back of the car and there we went UPPPPPPPPP on the Hills...

The mountains start from the Kalka belt itself. The scenery the whole way upto Shimla was so enticing .. one would only keep staring at it. The clouds playing hide and seek with the sun, hiding behind and mountians and sometimes covering the whole mountains.  
 


 The weather was spikingly clean, but pollution is increasing daily up there too, with the trucks going uphill, smoking diesel and tar all the way. These polluting trucks are a big concern to the environement. I dont know why such trucks are allowed, and why are they not checked for No Pollution certificate.




Shimla , has become too much populated now, to me it seemed more populated than 8 yrs back and more polluted too. I wish people would be able to keep the Queen of Hills as beautiful aws it was before, but industrialisation and modern development are leaving its ugly mark on the hills as well.

Day 1 at Shimla - The driver dropped us at the Lakkar Bazaar bus stand saying that it would be nearer to The Mall  than going from the Lift side. Stayi ng away from a place makes you forget things and the same happed to me for so many years in between had made me forget that the way from Lakkar Bazaar bus stand to The Mall goes through the Tibetian market, which is a STEEEEEEEEEEEEP climb UP. And with the bags and luggage we were huffing and puffing to reach the mall.  I got a grumling husband with me, who kept on bickering about the callousness of the driver and my forgetfulness. Anyhow, after a long journey of walking UPPPPP from the bus stand we reached the Mall after half an hour.   Now we had another challange of reaching our hotel at the Ridge. Since we got tired from the mounting, that seemed like a challange, but Thanks God to Himachal Pradesh Corporation that they have still maintained the Mall and the Ridge, and we could pull our luggage towards the Ridge easily.

We had booked the Hotel Mayur, right at the Ridge, just behind The Ridge Church. We got the room which overlooked the Mall and the Ridge. So, i could click pictures from the back of the Church.

View from our hotel window

The weather was COLD and CLOUDY, and you cannot see too far but we were enjoying the weather. After freshing up, we went down to meet a friend. We spent the evening at The Devicos , now turned as Cafe Coffee Day,  remembering old times. After the friends left, we walked up and down the Mall, clicked pictures and enjoyed the weather. I had never stayed late at the Mall ever, maximum being 7:00 p.m as  8:00 pm was the curfew time at our hostel and the last bus from Shimla for Summer Hill left  at 7:30 p.m. So, I was enjoying the scenery around. The hanuman statue at  jakhoo temple could be seen from the Mall, and looked awe inspiring.
 

Jakhoo Temple - The Hanuman Ji statue

At dinner we had invitied my ex-room mate and her beau for dinner at Ashianaa, our dream spot during the university days, when,  Ashianaa was out of our budget, a costly affiar for us, and we used to look inside at the tourists and mused that there will be a day, when we will have a good job in hand and we will be on the other side of the window enjoying the ambience inside.
It was really a very nice feeling meeting friends after such a long time. We gossipped on varoius matters and various things. How time flies by and yet when you meet a friend, time seems to go back to those years when we were so much different, so much naive, and yet so much carefree, had so much time. Didn't feel like going away, yet, the night was falling and we had to go back to our quarters.

After they left we walked up towards the Mall. It was 10:30 P.M. Shops were closing down, but few were open. Tourists were still walking down the place, though very few now.

The temperature had dropped quite drastically but.... who can be kept away from enjoying an ice-creme at the Mall at 10:00 in the night??

Ah !!!! the ice-creme never melts except inside your mouth  :)

Day 2 at Shimla - Next day morning, the weather was quite musty, wet and foggy. The driver picked us up from the Lakkar Bazaar bus stand. Our legs were becoming used to with the terrain now, and the climb down was much easier.

The University Library

First on the agenda - I wanted to visit the University. The university campus has changed a lot. New buildigns are coming up, there's a lot of security around, some ATM's have mushroomed, admission windows have come up below the library. The area behing the Library have been converted into parking space. The area near the SBI Bank has become the dumping ground for old furniture. Its really very sad to see the serenity and beauty of the University Campus going for a toss.

Second -  my Hostel - I wanted to go down till the door of my room , but somehow felt uncomfertable with so  much security around. A female security guard has been placed at the hostel gate, where she was asking details to some students who wanted to go down

IIAS - Indian Institute of Advanced Studies

Third on the list was Advanced Studies - This place has retained its beauty in all these years and becoming beautiful daily with some renovations going around it. I wished the day was not as cloudy as it was, as on a lear day the views from the back garden of the IIAS is breathtaking. We roamed around the garden and then took the tickets for the museum inside. 

 

Holding on to my old memories of the University days and adding many new in my memory album we moved towards "Kufri".

We stopped the car at the Kufri China Guest House. Many people hop on the mules and go to "Faggu" at a higher point at Kufri. Though I have never been at Faggu and wanted to, but I dont like getiing on the mules on such bad roads and such bad weather, so I opted out and instead went for the Kufri zoo. The zoo was a nice tour in that weather. Cold, creepy, No pollution, No noise except the ones of the insects on the trees.

 It's a forest area, barricaded by nets on both sides of the stair cases running through the whole zoo. We saw the Barking deers (but since they were not barking we actually dont know if they are the barking deers, but they were not the spotted deers so we believed that they ARE the Barking Deers), the BROWN Bear (Balloo), the snow leapord, the cheetah,  and some birds. The BIG CATS were magnificient and posing for us, but we being ameture photographers coudnt catch up with thier timings :) .. Oh!! even Balloo posed for us and we could click him.

 

"BALLOO"

After the zoo, we decided to explore "Chail". We went to see the cricket ground which is the highest cricket ground being used by the Chail Military school. While returning, we were quitrte hungry and planned have lunch at "The Palace" of Maharaja Bhupinder Singh of Patiala. (Built in 1891, the Maharaja's palace is set in approximately 75 acres and has a truly regal setting with spectacular views.)

 

The Palace is as beautiful inside as outside. As it was raining we were not able to see the beautiful mountains surrounding Chail, but yet the ambience of the place is so wonderful, one wouldn't want to return from that place

 . The royal rooms are open for booking by the people who want to spend their holidays surrounded by the mountains, clouds and the pine trees, only the chirping of the birds disturbing the peace of the land.

The lunch was awesome and delicious. The menu has Indian as well as Continental stuffs.

Returning from Chail was quite a dangerous ....  Going down the mountains in that foggy, cloudy weather. The driver was too good and was driving very slowly for safety. The clouds were so low , it was wonderful experience.

While coming back, we visited Mashobra where one of my friends is staying. Spending the evening at his place we returned back to the hotel, tired and exhausted and yet having energy to sit the whole night through. We had our dinner at the hotel itself , took two buckets of hot water near the window, opened the windows, wrapped ourselves in the shawls, dipped our feet in the hot water and Ahhhhhhhhh ..... REEEELLLLLAAAXXXEDDDDDDD............


Day 3 Last but not the Least - We had to leave in the afternoon and so in the morning decided to visit the Jakkhu Mandir, the Hunam ji temple at the topmost hill at Shimla. Though I have spent three years at Shimla, I had never the chance to visi this place, and I did not want to miss it this time. Initially we had thought of walking up there, but after two days of going up and down the Tibetan market, the mall and the ridge, we didnt want to take the risk of tirirng our little feet so we booked a car fromt he hotel (the driver took 400Rs. for the trip) and again went down the tibetan market to reach the car .. Woooooo it was our fifth trip on that steeeep road. The weather had cleared a bit and the sun was shining at the mountains, giving us a view of some of the ranges which were nearer to vision.

"Jakkhu  Mandir" the top most peak of Shimla is dedicated to the Lord Hanuman with a 108 feet Hanuman Statue. We look like dwarfs beside it.

Monkeys roam around the complex freely and they are not scared of anything. If you have anything in your hand, please keep them inside the car or deep inside the pocket. If you are wearing specs ..pleaseeeee keep it out of sight as the monkeys may suddenly remember that their eye sights is weak and they may want to try yours........That's what happend to my hub's specs.

After coming out of the temple, I was contemplating a visit to the Baba Balaknath temple, just opposite to the main temple, when suddenly a female monkey jumped on my hubby, took away his specs, put it in her mouth and sat a bit far away from us between some other monkeys. The situation was shocking  as well as hilarious. We were still recovering from the shock and also trying to think of how to get back his specs when the small vendors around gave the monkey some packets of chana and nakul dana(small white sweets) . The monkey threw away the specs in style picked up the packets and ran away .. Phew !! At least we got his specs back. I couldnt stop laughing the whole way back to the hotel.

Afternoon, we packed ........ and got ready to leave. Since the sun had been shining in th morning the weather became so wonderful  by the afternoon, it seemed like a sin to leave. But we had to go as our train tickets were already reserved. On the way, we went to Sankat Mochan temple, dedicated to Lord Ganesha.

This is also a wonderful temple where we used to have our lunch on Sundays. The temple commttiee organises "Dhaam" (lunch served in traditional occasions) every Sunday and people and students flock the place for the wonderful meal.

My trip to Shimla ended here with spending some peaceful time in the temple area, my hubs clicking pics of the region and the terrains, before leaving for Kalka to come back home ....

.. There are a couple of places on earth where you want to go back again and again ... far away from home ........

Out to the South

"Hyderabad", the city of the Nizams and our H.O. becokend us for some work in the month of November. Winters were yet to start there, or may be winters never start there. We reached there by the East Coast Express from Howrah in the evening. The car picked us up from the station and went around winding on the unknown roads at night. There are no taxis available like Kolkata, but the autos work as taxis and you have to book an auto to travel from one place to another.

The evening life seemed quite buzy just like any other city. After all it was Saturday night- weekend.

Day 1: Sunday, we had the whole day and to do nothing.. and so we decided to go sight seeing the city.

We found that the best way to see the most of the city was to take a city tour bus ride, and so we went at Prenderghast road, where many tour operators are working. We booked our tickets for a city bus leaving at 9AM from that point.

The manager of the travel agency, put us on a bus, and there it went round the city. At one point an old man , nealry the age of 60yrs boarded the bus and started shouting that all people who have come for city tour should disembark from the bus, and those who are going to visit the Ramuji citu should stay on the bus. Since that person's accent was so much different from ours, we felt quite confused as to what was happening and got down the bus. The bus went aways and we saw that the old man started taking the names of travel agency and no. of tickets who had booked thorugh them. there were amny people who had booked tickets from different travel agencies. We were all gathered together when the old man said that the city tour starts from 'here'. "Here"??? What did he mean??
We asked him again and he mumbled something. "Why cannot he tell clearly??" and then he said that this was "The Birla Mandir's" entarance. Everyone is being given a time of one hour to visit the temple and come back, as the city tour bus will be coming to pick us all up within an hour.

Ok, so that was the "here". THE BIRLA MANDIR is situated at a height and we had to climb up the hill. It reminded me of going up the Jwala Devi temple at Himachal Pradesh, the difference being that the path  is not so clumsy there.

While walking we met a lady who had also come from Mumbai for some work and that day being Sunday, just like us decided to have a look around the city.

The Birla Mandir - Hyderabad

The Birla mandir is a beautiful place, neat and clean with very strict security. We passed through the security after keeping our mobiles and camera at the counter. It is a nice place, built of white marble with a clock tower. We spent a nice time sitting at the temple. One can see the view of the whole city and the HUssainsagar Lake. the breeze felt so good and we did not feel like coming back, but had to, or else we would miss the bus.
After coming down back to the main road, we saw the bus was standing and was about to leave. We reached 'JIT" = Just in time, or else the bus would have left without us.

We boarded the bus, this was a different bus, and were instructed that whenever, we get up the bus after a sight seeing we sit back in the same seats to avoid any arguments with anyone. The Guide, took 150 Rs. each for tickets for all the other places where we would be visitng during the tour, which included the Nizam's Museum, The Chowmahhala Palace, The National Museum and The Golconda Fort.

And so, after the Birla Mandir, we went towards the Nizam's Museum. This place looked more or less like "Bengal's Bonedi bari" (Old houses of Rich Bengalis). The garden was missing more greeny and flowering plants and the palace was surrounded by a scanty the garden. We entered one of the building which has been transformed as the museum.

Entrance to the Nizam's Museum

If one wants to click pictures inside the museum, they have to pay for the click, and I was happy go clicking around the museum. 

The Throne

Glass painting portrait of The nizam
A Full length portrait of Osman Ali Khan 

Magnifying glass

Royal Closets

Then the bus went through the city and from near the famous "Charmiar". the bus didnot stop at the Charminar, as it is a specifically shopping area and crowdy. In fact there's no plce to park the bus. 

Clicked from the bus

From there we were taken to the "Chowmahala palace". This palace is very beautiful with nice gardens and foutains. The belgium cut glass chandeliers are awesome. One could imagine how they would look when they are lighted with the candles "The Dancing of the lights on the floor, along with the singing of the dear, the beauty is never faded,  from the eyes of the beloved" .Don't know wether anything like that ever did happen on those days within those walls, but thts how I felt about the place. The Chowmahala Palace has also been transformed as a musem of the Nizams and I clicked more pics 

The 

 It was a "durbaar hall" where the Takht-e-Nishan  was placed, but looked more like a dancing hall to me, where everyone could go round and round dancing.

the Chandelier

The Chandeliers - Look at the difraction of light

Doorway

Tea Table

Going for the Hunt

Killing our Tigers

The Dining Hall chandelier

Types of Swords and Shields

Buggy

Royal Buggies minus the Horses

From the Chowmahalla palace we were taken for lunch at 1:00 P.M. We could realise that the bus was going round and round the same places each time we passed a place. We ate at an All-veg "Ayenger's Lakshmi Restaurant" at Nampally. The food was good. Not so spicy as we had heard of the food at Hyderabad. 

Somewhere at Nampally - clicked after lunch

After lunch, we again boarded the bus and were taken to The National Museum. Photography at the National Museum is not allowed. Infact they dont even allow to take the camera inside the complex even if the batteries are out. So all the travellers had to  leave our cameras with the travel agent. So, we just took one pic outside the building.


Then we were taken to a shop, for purchasing pearl jewellery. It was a standalone shop somewhere within the city, but looked as if it was in some lonely area. The guide told us that , it was a Govt. recognised subsidised shop, but somehow it didnt seem so as the jewellery items seemed to be quite highly priced. 
It was nearly 3:30 P.M when we left that shop and now the bus was moving towards "The Golconda Fort"

The Sensor

The guides there told us that that the above metal ball like instrument is a vibration sensor. If someone clapped at this point, it can be heard at the top of the fort. Quite interesting mechanism. I wish i could have gone to the top of the fort to hear that , but it would mean a time and energy consuming effort, for which I was not prepared at that time . May be some other time , if I visit this place again!! 

 We reached The Golconda Fort by 4;00P.m. The evening sun just behind the highest tower of the fort was stunning. the slanting rays made me think, how the fort must have been duing its hey days. 

The Breeze was cool in the evening sun, and after the hectic day in the hot sun, the The Golconda fort provided us the respite of coolness and peace. People were picnicing over the gardens surrounding the fort. 

The city tour was supposed to end at The Lumbini park, but I and my friend had decided to go for a bit of shopping at Charminar. So, we left the bus and took an auto to Charminar, who took Rs 80 for the trip (after we cancelled many autos as they were charging higher rates as much as 150rs.)

Commuting of tourists by autos at Hyderabad can be a big headache, as the autowalls tend to charge a high amount for commuting from one area to another. Bargaining is a must. 

At Charminar, we shopped for glass and stone studded bangles. Most of the market was closed as it was a Sunday. So we coudnt buy any pearl items, but spent a lot of time for the bangles. Many of the vendors sell their wares at cheap rates by the footpath.
As the night started to fall, we decided to go back to our guest house and went to the bus stand. There we saw, that The Chowmahalla palace is just in the next road near the Chaarminar. So if by any chance you are at Charminar and want to see the Chowmahalla palace, you need not take any auto or rickshaw.

(Day - 2 : OFFICE. In the evening a few of our colleauges from Kolkata joined us at the Guest House)

Day 3: Morning we spent at the GH as we had no tickets for going back home. But because of one of our colleauges, also visiting Hyderabad for the first time (reached Hyd. last night) and had to attend office that day, was too much excited to see around, at least nearby places. Though he had wanted to visit the Charminar, but due to some altercations last night,a curfew had been announced in that area, and so we decided not to go there. 

The Lumbini Park

Booking an auto we went to Lumbini Park adjoining the Hussain Sagar lake (Hussain Sagar is a lake in Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh, India, built by Hazrat Hussain Shah Wali in 1562, during the rule of Ibrahim Quli Qutb Shah. ) 
You have to take tickets to enter the Lumbini Park. It is a childrens park with lots of activities for the kids as well as adults . 

Ferry to the Rock of Gibraltar at Hussain sagar

We went directly to the ticket counter for the ferry ride in the Hussain sagar Lake. In the middle of the lake there is small island called the Rock of Gibraltar (i don't know why)where an 18 mtr high Buddha Statue has been erected. 

In the evening sun the city, the park and the lake, everything seems beautiful and calm. 

The Rock of Gibraltar

The Buddha Statue 

We stayed there for an hour watching the changing lights flooded at the statue. It was already dark when we reached back the Lumbini Park. From there we went walking towards the NTR Park. Its about 15-20 minutes walk from the Lumbini park on the opposite side of the Road. 

The NTR Park is a big park, and seemed good for familiy picnic. Though it was night, the park has been properly lighted to get the desired ambience of calmness. 

Ticket Counter of NTR Park

Snail Fountain

 Lights in the fountain

View of the NTR Park

Garden in full bloom

While going back to the Guest House, we stopped at The Paradise, famous for its mouth watering Biriyani, to get some packed for us too.
That was the end of out trip to Hyderabad, as we had got tickets back for home for the next day.  

................Coming back home is always a Good Feeling :)  ...........................