Manikaran
Monday, March 17th, 2008Before heading to the main tourist attraction in Himachel Pradesh I decided to take a little trip up the Parathi valley which is a tributary of sorts than runs off the main Kullu valley. The town that tweaked my interest up there while I went through the guidebook was a town called Manikaran – the site of several natural hot water springs. Figured it was worth a look seeing as I was in the area, twould’ve been fierce rude of me to not drop in and say hello.
To get here from Mandi was a relatively simple and short 4 hour journey that involved just two changes of bus. The trip up the valley was pretty special. It didn’t have the same edge of your seat tension that the trip up the chamba valley trip had – it was the surrounding scenery that really stood out. The river that runs through the valley was big and full of white rapid waters – even over the sound of the cranky old bus you could hear the roaring gush of the water. On either side of the river bank there were pine forests reach up as far and beyond the snow line – past that again there were the domineering mountain peaks. I arrived into Manikaran at about 4 in the afternoon. Its has a really dramatic setting but with mountains on 3 sides of the town it doesn’t get too much sunshine. Add to this the rising steam from all sorts of places it gives the town a murky almost eirie feeling. After booking into a hotel close enough to the bus stop I went looking for some food.
The town is seperated from the main valley road by the parathi river. Its a noisy body of water which can only be crossed at two points via footbridges. As a result there is no motorised traffic in the town. With the exception of one small bazaare the houses are very close to each other, the streets themselves aren’t the best, you really have to watch your step especially after a shower as there are murky puddles everywhere. It was while I was trying to avoid one of these puddles that I ended up in the place where I had something to eat. I litterally had to step into the little shack of a building to avoid a sock soaking experience. The woman who ran the place was lovely, never seen someone smile so much. Before long there was a feast of samosas and chai in front of me – definitely what the doctor called for. With my belly full I took another little wander around the town, to be honest it didn’t take long as it is tiny. Twasn’t long before I retired for the evening.
I got up early enough the next morning with trekking on my mind. Before I arrived in the town I assumed that the town itself was the end point of the road in the valley, there was another village 14 km further up the valley. I knew this was never going to be done on foot, starting at 2,000 metres the road rose pretty quickly it would be two days walking at least. My plan though was to go up and explore what I could, walk till about 3 in the afternoon then turn and get back before sunset. The first mile or two was fairly flat, running along the roaring river with pine forests on either side it was pretty exhilarating stuff. As the road climbed up I got better and better views down to the valley and the river below and up to the skyline you just had to stop sometimes to try and take in the majestic nature of the snow peaks. It really did leave you breathless. There is loads of opportunity to get off the road and explore some of the steep terraced fields though you have to watch your step, one slip and you are a gonner.
As 3 o’clock approached I came across this group of young people, they were farmers taking a break from a hard slog. They were all gathered around this nice little campfire. Unusually (for india) it was the women who were the first to say hello, they asked me to sit down and then asked me every english question that came into their head. No matter what I replied with I was met with a barage of giggles. I think they thought my voice was a little funny, come to think of it I get that alot. Even the canadian girls in mcleod ganj kept asking me to say mother – hilarious apparently. Hmmmm. I asked one of the young lads if he would take a few pictures of me with my camera, to kinda prove to you good folks that I am not making all of this stuff up. What followed was a pretty hilarious scene of him thinking that I wanted to just take photos of him rather than him take a photo of me. I eventually managed to get the message across and got some decent enough pictures. When we finished he asked me to go back to his house for some dinner, they all chimed in asking me to go back. I asked them where their house was and they pointed right up the side of the valley – I have to say that I was tempted and really humbled that they would ask me but spots of rain had started to fall and I was still 2 hours out of manikaran. I declined their offer ruefully and set off back to the village. Tis a good job I left when I did, the weather turned nasty and those mountain roads are not a good place to be especially when they get slippery not to mention the permenant threat of a landslide.
The walk back was miserable, I don’t have any wet gear so I arrived back into the village resembling and oversized drowned rat – though if you have seen some of the rats I have seen here I was almost just a normal sized drowned rat. I dropped my wet clothes into the hotel and set off for something to eat. Now I figured that it was about 2 and a half weeks since I had some western style food, so as a bit of a treat for myself I decided I would splash out and go to the nicest restaurant as per the lonely planet and get myself some proper western grub into me. Now let me put this a little into the context, we are talking about a village that is buried right up in the middle of the himalayas, they do their own stuff well but its hardly michellen star territory, but even taking that into consideration it was no excuse for what was put in front of me. I am seriously considering writing to the UN to set up something equivalent to the war crimes tribunal to deal with the atrocity, the manglement the downright bastardisation of tomatoes and flour they had a cheek to call a pizza. All I wanted was some comfort food!!! I consumed what I could before defeated, desolate I took to the rain drenched broken cobblestoned streets of manikaran on my way home I picked up two fake mars bars, 1 bottle of coke and a small bottle of rum. Shakespeare couldn’t come up with such tragedy!!!
Back in the hotel I decided to make my way up to Manali, back to a civilisation of sorts. My passport has finally arrived at the embassey in Dehli so I will go to get it after a couple of days in manali.
Happy Paddies day to all, and well done to Sean Gaffney on his stage debut. Looking forward to the dvd kido!! Oh and I have no phone anymore, ask no questions I will tell no lies!!!
later,
Phil
Phil Gill