Juzt a mom!: Dharamshala

“Awesome” One word to describe my days spent in Himachal though I covered a very small portion of the beautiful state in a very short time, I am in love with its natural beauty and can’t wait to go back again and explore it in more details.

It was magical, serene, alive, idyllic and a land of smiles.....I have never seen people so happy and chirpy everywhere I looked. What made it more special was, it was the first place we ever visited as a family of 4, yes!!! My own family of 4 :-)

If I really want to write about my trip to my heart’s content, I would have to start a new blog dedicated to it...so I have decided to sum it up in few things that I would love to share with everyone.

Here we go, highlights of my trip:

Our stay: After a lot of research and considerations to a lot of things we finalised on 2 places to stay. The first one was “Bird and Chirps” a home stay about 2 kms out of Dalhousie The place is not only amazing; it is a breath taking property. You have one of the best views of the valley from any room. We decided to try a home stay because we were travelling with 2 small kids and we wanted comfort of home away from home. We were not disappointed at all. The hospitality of the owners was par excellence, from one amazing meal after another, to looking after the kids while we were eating, to sending milk for kids daily without fail-without even asked for it, to all the guests eating together, to the host waiting for the last guest to eat.....it was true personification of the saying “Athiti devo bhava”.

From there we moved to Mc leodgunj, to a fully commercial hotel. At Mc leodgunj we were looking for some privacy and wanted to spend the last 2 days just idling away but we didn’t want to miss the amazing views of the valley. Our hotel “Triund” gave us all. From a warm and friendly staff, to an amazing view and good food, we loved everything about the place.

View from our room @ Dalhousie

View @ Mc Leodgunj

Excursions:

We made a conscious decision to not travel to Himachal during snow, because of a lot of reasons like both the kids are too small to remember snow later, and both are highly susceptible to cold....etc etc

This gave us an opportunity to travel to a lot of places around Dalhousie and Dharamshala which are normally closed down because of snow. A snapshot of it is posted below

Kalatop @ Dalhousie

Mc Leodgunj

Dharamshala

Dharamshala stadium

The inseparables

Both our kids though were very friendly at home but I never did notice how close they are. This can be because I am always around them and it’s mostly three of us together. During the trip I realized how much both of them are dependent on each other. My younger one who was only about 11 months refused to be without his brother even for 1 minute, he wanted to do everything that the elder one was doing (Witness below) and was not ready to leave him even for a minute. Their interaction and love for each other was heart warming.

My life

Lookkkkkk below the table!!!!!!!!!!!

My life

The people

One of the memories for me will always be happy and talkative people. The simplicity and naivety of them was heart melting. Here I would like to mention the members of both the places where we stayed. At Mcloedgunj our elder son fell sick and the staff of “The Triund” were so sweet and caring towards him.....because of their compassionate behaviour even the illness didn’t bring down our spirits...

Our taxi guy

Sweet kid

The shy guide who refused to look at camera

Our taxi guy

The post will not be complete without a special mention of our taxi guy..”Deep baba”. He is a 65 year old guy who has one of the sweetest voice and claims that he knows almost everything about everything (which he doesn’t :-)). He even claimed he knew Ambanis :-) and owns a bunglow ..but what made him special was his spirit to work even at his age, his innumerable memories about the region and his love for people around him.