Let me start from the beginning. I was on a trip to Palampur, Himachal with a friend(Himanshu) and was tired of the same old tourist spots as advised by many who have been there. I woke up late that morning with this constant ringing in my head to do something/ go somewhere but didn’t really want to go to those crowded places, which I was taking a holiday from. So I decided to explore something new and ask around what else is there to do that would be a bit more stimulating. One of the employee(sansar) at the hotel suggested to go to this mountain which had a temple rarely visited by people, but had amazing views on the way. Seems it gets fewer people than we have at Domino’s on a Monday morning. This seemed to be a pretty terrific place and as soon as I heard the description I wanted to go. To top it all off this place was reachable by car. It took me no more than 1 hr to take a bath, get ready have my brunch, get in car and reach this place.

As the journey began I was getting more and more excited to reach there, first 10km went pretty fast. Road was good, no traffic, beautiful weather, then suddenly our escot told us to take a left. So we did, the road started getting narrow with houses on both sides and rough patches (nothing was thrilling about this) and as I was thinking this in my head I saw the mountain we were about to drive to, and the road with rough patches just got rougher. Only dirt and pebbles as if the road itself had just carved in. It was hardly big enough for a single vehicle to drive. That meant if someone was coming from the other side it would take some serious efforts to make room for them to pass.

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So we started to climb the mountain and let me tell you, it was no joke to drive on that terrain. One wrong turn and you would be going down the mountain along with your car. I was driving carefully never being able to cross 20km/hr and kind oo managing to make that steep climb. When I got comfortable with the driving conditions I started noticing everything around me. As we went higher and higher the mountain, more spectacular the view became. Half way up there, I was so excited, I just had to get down to look around and capture it all in my head. Don’t worry I captured it on camera as well for you to see.

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We stopped there for 15 mins and then started to move again. As we were about to reach the top the road it just seemed to be heading straight into the sky and I thought to myself is this the road to heaven because it sure does look like it.

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Finally we reached the top of the mountain, parked our car and realized that we are at a place where there are more chances you would run into a wild animal or a bird than running into another vehicle. Even the mobile networks weren’t working. After I parked the car we made a climb of around 5-10 mins on foot to reach a small ground where we could sit and enjoy the nature in its purest form and I realized no wonder the shepherds who live on top of the mountains rarely come down and spend most of their lives on the mountain. It was more tranquil, beautiful and soothing than anything I had ever experienced in a my life. Here are some images for you.

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After a good 1 hr or so, sometime around sunset I thought it would be best if we started to head back home but not without paying our regards to the deity who was situated there. So we headed to Maa Vindhyavasini temple which was another 15 mins from there but a bit downhill. We reached there paid our regards to the deity and as we came out we saw a small waterfall just below the temple with a little pond if you fancy a swim in an open area. With a view that spectacular we ended up spending the whole sunset there and it was breathtaking .

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When we realized we had to come down the same shaky road by which we came up We started to head back home with a feeling in my heart that its places like these where I want to be for all my holiday.

Here is a pic of the road at night and I would really advice not to drive there at night.

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How to reach here - Take a Volvo to Palampur and then hire a cab till Maa Vindhyavasini temple.

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

For any additional queries feel free to reach out to me at +91 8447839703.

 

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