I’m not going to bore you with the history of the Shimla. I mean who wants to learn history on a vacation – right? Anyway if you want to learn history you can always visit a history web site.
Before I start writing this article let me tell you about my visit there a long time back. Back then it was known as Simla and was really beautiful. The hills were unpolluted and there were a few buildings in site. Just the way they were supposed to be. Who wants to go to a hill station where the roads are as busy as a Delhi or Mumbai road? Though I was really fascinated with the hills, I never really had a chance to go there though I’ve been to Dehradun side many times.
Last month it was my friend’s birthday and he suggested that we go and spend three/four days in the hills hiking and camping. I had a better idea. Why not go on our bikes? So it was decided. There were four of us and we decided to go on our Enfield bikes (come on, you really didn’t expect me to go on my Hero Honda CD-100 did you?) Now I’m going to write a day-by-day account of my vacation.
Day 1
I and my friends (Manpreet, Tarique and Kapil) packed lightly and set out at 5 in the morning from Patiala (that’s where I live)
Within an hour we reached Chandigarh and in another twenty minutes we were in the hills. We reached Kalka, which is about half an hour of driving up the hills where we stopped again. Now if you don’t stop at Kalka then dude, you don’t know what you are missing. It’s customary for the traveler to stop here and have some beer or in case you don’t drink beer fruit juice with some pickled meat. The meat here is very famous and people come from far just to taste it. Try it - you won’t be disappointed.
We went some distance up and came upon “Patiala Dhaba” Being from Patiala we naturally stopped and questioned the owner. It turned out that he was not from Patiala but was very friendly. He rented us four beds for partly sum of Rs. 150. We left our luggage at the Dhaba and parked our bikes at the famous Timber Trail resorts. We found the restaurant too expensive for our liking but had a good time going up on the trolley. Don’t try the Timber Trail if you have a weak stomach and can’t stand being suspended way up in the sky without getting sick because that’s what you get to do here. We left our bikes here and spent the rest of the day trekking up and having lunch at another Dhaba We came back at five in the evening and collected our bikes and went back to the Dhaba where we were supposed to stay and spent the rest of the evening playing cards and drinking beer while watching “The Legend of Bhagat Singh” on T.V. In case you are wondering what the hell it was doing on TV then you should know that in the North cable operators tend to be a little casual about piracy. It was fun sleeping out in the open and thankfully it didn’t rain.
Day Two
I woke up at 8 and found that all my friends were awake. So we set out again for Kasauli. We found that the Enfield bikes coped pretty well with slopes and were pleasantly surprised to find that the roads were pretty wide. We went slowly and reached Kasauli at about 12 noon. We had already decided that we were going to visit Monkey Point because we had heard a lot about it. Basically it’s a mountain with a lot of steep steps and at the top is a temple where Lord Hanuman supposedly rested on his way back when has coming after getting the Sanjivni herb. The climb was tough and consisted of never ending steps. It took us half an hour to reach the top! By the time we got back it was 3 PM. We decided to roam around for a bit and check out the scenery. After which we went back and turned towards the point where the road forks towards Shimla. We reached Hotel Pinewood where we had lunch that was pretty expensive but my birthday friend had to pay! We then stayed at a private rest house, which offered pretty decent rooms for Rs. 500. After the usual routine of sitting in the garden and playing cards we decided to go to sleep early as we had decided to set out for Shimla in the morning.
Day Three
We woke up early and after a quick breakfast at the rest house we set out for Shimla. The journey upwards was long and boring and pretty uneventful. The scenery was pretty beautiful though traffic on the road was a major irritant. Trucks would pop out suddenly out of blind corners and excessive building was an eye sore. As usual we had lunch at a Dhaba and then set out again. We made Shimla in four hours, which is pretty long because of the fact that we drove slowly. Shimla was ok. The mall is the main attraction. It was a long walk up to the mall but really worth it. It was pretty modern with international coffee houses and you can have a lot of fun horse riding and camel riding. There are also people who will click photos of you dressed up as a king or some ancient Maharaja for an amount of Rs. 50. This is the place to be if you want to do your shopping though I think that it is pretty stupid to do your shopping up in the hills because everything costs twice as much.
After roaming around for a while, we had lunch and had a change of plan. We were getting tired of the Queen of the Hills though they were beautiful and decided to go back to Patiala. The journey back was pretty long and we were out of the hills on flat grounds in about six hours. Here, in Pinjore, my Bullet had a flat and I barely managed to avoid falling. It was already dark and we managed to find a mechanic whose usual job was to repair truck punctures so he didn’t have the right tools. After a lot of fuss he managed to repair the puncture but by that time it was already nine PM. Tired but happy, we uneventfully managed to make it to Patiala by 10:30
Budget – If you don’t want to travel like we did but still want to travel on a budget then a budget of Rs. 2000 per day including lodging will do. We managed to stay on a budget of 1000 per person including the petrol.
Places to Visit – Pinjore Gardens, Monkey Point, The Mall Shimla
Avoid – Traveling with a lot of stuff.