Mussoorie - 3 day itinerary (28-30 Apr)
At a time when rest of India, particularly Bangalore was dealing with dealing with ~40 deg weather, we were using room heaters in Mussoorie. It was truly a hill station experience in summers.
Day 0 - Land in Dehradun
Dehradun is like Bangalore - a concrete jungle with lots and lots of restaurants and malls. Kanishka landed at around 330 pm. I was already in Dehradun back from my Surya top trek . I had alerady packed a quick lunch from Chetan Swadisht Kachori. It was amazing - one of the food recommendations that does not disappoint.
Next, we went to Buddha statue and Stupa. It is written that all your 'paap' will go away if you visit the Stupa. So, there you go, we are now again in net-zero. Stupa paintings were wonderful. Good place to visit. It started a heavy downpour while we were there. We could not visit the Mindrolling monastery which was just next to us. Our next stop was a quick stop at Ellora's Melting moments bakery - a very highly rated bakery in Dehradun which is now 60+ years old. We packed a few sandwiches for our trek tomorrow. Our dinner was at Orchard restaurant and on the way, we got to witness a BLR nostalgic traffic jam. Food was ok at Orchard but we were tired and full from the Pudis. They had a live band which played Local Train and Lucky Ali, so it was good.
Day 1 - Benog Tibba hike, Landour
We hired a trek guide from Easy Prime Holidays to take us for a day hike to Benog Tibba (tibba means top) It was a ~7.5KM round trip hike. It was awesome, I loved it. The trail is very clean, easy to walk. Goes through a nice forest cover first and then opens to a ledge walk. Benog Tibba - from the top, you get to see Mussoorie and other mountains. There was no one else, so it was very peaceful to walk. Our guide also delighted us with local stories. We started from Dehradun at 7 am and reached the starting point at around 830 am. The weather was also good - not too sunny, not too hot either. All in all, a perfect day hike.
From Benog Tibba, we visited the famous touristy spot of Company garden. It was past 1:30, so we were hungry. The local chana chat was yummy. COmpany garden is decent, small garden park, but it attracts lot of crowds. It is maintained well. Our lunch was a typical Garhwal food at Hill-e-ishq in Mussoorie, near to Landour. The food was good - a particluar delight is the saag from stinging nettle leaves . Rotis were made of bajra and we also got Pahadi Rajma, Stinging nettle kebabs, all was good. Place could use better hygiene though - it was very dusty.
Our car dropped us at our airbnb homestay which was right next to CharDukaan. It was a steep walk down but there was a guide to help us. Our homestay was a 1BHK so it had a kitchen too. In the evening, we walked to the famous Landour Bakehouse where we had coffee and orange marmalade cake. We also packed some salad items, eggs and break for our breakfast the next day.
Day 2 - Landour walk, Mall road
We did yet another walking tour in Landour on day 2 - Landour Infinity walk, again with Easy Prime travels. Landour Infinity walk is almost on a plain surface and covers the famous lal tibba, Bakehouse. Landour is a corner of Mussorie and is famous for being Ruskin Bond's place. It was also an old English settlement which has not been commercialized much. So, it is pretty good to walk. Our guide regaled with the history of Landour, who has houses there, took us to bakehouse (again), churches etc. This walking tour was a really good idea.
After the walk, we decided to have something at CharDukaan :) - Kanishka had ginger lemon tea and I had Chilli cheese sandwich. The walk started at 8 and ended at 11. We had salad and boiled eggs for lunch. Our plan in 2nd half was to walk down to Mall road (2.3 km walk to Picture Palace) and then do some shopping and do a food walk on the Mall road.
The walk to Mall road is all downhill, so it makes sense to walk down and take a cab back. Transportation in Mussoorie is incredibly expensive. There is no Ola/Uber and you should call 3-4 vendors and negotitate the best price. People are good though. The drive from Mall road to our homestay, we heard rate of INR 800/INR1000 but eventually found a person that took only INR 500.
Mall road runs from Picture Palace at one end to Library Chowk at the other. We walked from one end to another (almost till Library Chowk) and then turned back. Along the way, we did some shopping from Kashmiri sellers. In terms of food, we had -
- Delhi style Suji golgappas - A food walk without golgappas is not possible.
- Corn roasted on coal - It was a very sweet corn
- Jalebi with Rabdi at Kulhad Rabdi wala- a local delight
- Amritsari Chole Kulche, street food vendor. The chole kulche were so good that I got it packed for next day breakfast. We had only Kulcha to taste it there so that we can save appetite.
- Wood-fired pizza and beer at the Tavern - Their pizza was decent. They had pizza named after interesting folks such as Tom Alter, we had the Bill Aitkens pizza and this is the first time I heard his name. Pretty amazin guy
We were pretty tired after the walk and the food, so we took the cab back.
Day 3 - Museums and George Everest
We checked out from our Airbnb and our tonight's stay was at Everest base camp. Along the way, we stopped at the Soham Himalayan Centre - a private, family run museum that displays local arts. Run by a couple, the husband is a sculpturist and wife a painter. Their crafts depict local traditions. They also have a good collection of coins, stamps, manuscripts, old photos. A really good place to visit and know about the history. We got a local tour from them.
After Soham, we headed to Everest Base Camp. This was a luxury stay, even though it was in a tent. Little at the outskirts but still a lovely one. After checking in, we decided to check out the George Everest cartography museum and hike up the George Everest mountain.
George Everest was the surveyor general of India, responsible to map out the Indian terrain. It is the museum of cartography and a very well managed museum. One of the best museums that I have seen in India. We got to know that the Everest mountain is actually named after George Everest because it was under him that the right height of mountain was identified. Even though it was done by a guy called Sikandar who did the actual work. We also learn about other folks who played a key role in understanding the terrain, one example to know that how both Tsangpo and Brahmputra is the same river. Overall, I would highly recommend this place.
After the museum, we hiked up to the George Everest hill. Pretty easy 1Km hike up. It is known for good views of sunrise and sunset. We were nearing the sunset time and had really good views from there. After coming down, we had maggi at a local shop :)
At dinner., we played Jaipur board game and had good. Night time temperature was ~5 deg.
Next day was just drive down from Mussoorie to Dehradun, a brief stop at Ellora again to pack some goodies. When we landed in BLR, at around 8pm, BLR was nearing 37 degrees and it felt so hot. If I had known this, I may have stayed there for two more days :)
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