Utrala is a small region situated at a high altitude near Palampur and is famous for its Hydro Power Plants. The whole journey started because I had never seen a Hydro Plant up close and wanted to see how it all works.

So we started with our journey from the hotel, it’s a 30 km drive till Utrala after which project border starts. The project is situated at a higher altitude and the power house is below near Utrala village, Hydro Plants are generally situated at high altitudes as they require a steady water flow and pressure to convert Kinetic energy of the falling water into electricity, it is one of the most competitive source of Renewable energy. Utrala hydro power plant project produces no direct waste, and has a considerably lower output level of the greenhouse gas - carbon dioxide.

The Climb from the lower power station till the Utrala dam was a steep and risky one, this road is mostly used by people who work at the power plant, so it is not maintained and pretty narrow with quite a few places where you could see the rubble of previous landslides but despite every hardship and risk it’s one of the most beautiful roads I have been to, you would find vegetation all over the mountain even on the roads. The road provides spectacular views of the valley, mountains and if you look closely enough you could see the shepherds and their sheep flocks grazing on the mountain slopes. Here is an image of the path we treaded.

 

After about 30 mins of careful driving we reached the Utrala Dam it’s not a huge dam considering other dams in India but it surely is one of the most beautiful one, it is situated around 4000 Ft above sea level midst the Dhauladhar range with a breathtaking view and vegetation all around the place, area around the Dam is not really explored by tourist and is naturally rich. Whole place seems so quiet and pleasant with large grounds just beside where you could sit down for a small break or snack.

We were also able to sneak into the dam and take a pic which turned out to be a real beauty.

From there we moved on to the main power generation unit which is another 15 in ride through the beautiful road filled with vegetation. The plant has 2 Hydropower generation units which give around 4.5 MW of annual generation depending on the water flow and pressure. The Guard was kind enough to guide us through the plant and explain us how it all actually works but we were not allowed to click any images inside the plant. The whole plant is made inside a mountain by strategically blasting the mountain and then removing the rocks and placing dozens of 8Ft iron rods into the mountain so that it does not fall apart. The water is released from the mountain top through large pipes which increases the water pressure to generate electricity.

Below is the mountain image from where the water is released

After checking out the whole project we thought to walk a bit more as there was still walkable road ahead of us, so we parked the car and started walking and to our surprise we found out a perfect spot to relax and chill out(It even had Welcome engraved in moss), , the area is surrounded by mountains with cold water flowing through your feet and view of the mountains we left behind while coming here, so we decided to sit there for a while leaving all our problems behind and let nature take over. Here are some pics below.

 

 

Stairs in the second last image lead to a village where mainly the local population visits and is famous for its marijuana vegetation.

 

How to reach here - Take a Volvo to Palampur and then hire a cab till Utrala Hydro Project

Cost to reach here - Volvo - INR 1200- 2000 from Delhi, Cab - INR 2000-3000.

 

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