Have you ever dreamed of traveling to Bhutan or wondered what it’s like to visit this remote kingdom tucked away in the Himalayan mountains? From Buddhist temples and fortress visits, to Bhutanese cuisine to trekking in the Himalayas — all with the Buddhist mysticism and legend that surrounds it — we cover the essential Bhutan travel experiences, things to do and places to visit. In addition, we address all the questions about traveling to Bhutan including best times to visit, how to get a visa to Bhutan, Gross National Happiness and more.

Prior to our visit, Bhutan was a destination that, for us, held the space of the protected, the preserved, the unknown.

Upon landing in Bhutan, we grasped how our experience would reflect that notion. We were removed physically but also mentally from the day-to-day, tucked away in this mysterious place. It is perhaps rather fitting that Bhutan was the last trip we took prior to the pandemic so that we were able to take away some of its lessons regarding the value of a community approach that by protecting others we protect ourselves and everyone benefits.

Covid-19 Update for Bhutan Travel: Bhutan opened its borders on 23 September, 2022 for all tourists without mandatory quarantines (check for updates). We know people who have already traveled there since this opening and had a very good experience.

Known as the Land of the Thunder Dragon because of the alpine storms which sweep in from the Himalayas, Bhutan understands the value of protecting itself — just as it did when marauding Tibetans historically rolled in from the plateau seeking coveted Buddhist relics. The Kingdom of Bhutan, forged from fortress-bound kingdoms, was for much of its history off limits. In fact, international tourism only began in the 1970s and there are still limits on the number of visitors allowed per year to manage this.

Even now, open yet careful, Bhutan feels somehow out of reach — yet it’s not. It’s accessible. But it is one-of-a-kind with all the cultural facets one might expect from a place flush with a complicated royal family history, monasteries stitched into Himalayan hillsides, and a pervasive mysticism which does not find distinction from the state.  

That’s the allure of visiting, especially as the country and its people define their place in the world and teach others through its example as the first carbon-negative country in the world and its focus on prioritizing community.

This is what we encountered in Bhutan. And why you may want to consider adding Bhutan to your travel wish list when it is safe to travel again.

The following experiences are highlights from our Bhutan Tour with G Adventures and are presented in chronological order as we experienced them. If you are considering a similar tour to Bhutan and want to know what to expect, here’s a taste of the itinerary, activities and destinations you'll experience. Our tour included the Druk Path Trek, but this trek has been replaced by an exciting new hiking option – the Trans Bhutan Trail – that is the same path used by royals, monks, and traders for thousands of years that has been revived for hikers to enjoy. Not all G Adventures tours to Bhutan include hiking so if you are a big hiker you might want to choose either the Camp the Trans Bhutan Trail (11 days) or Highlights of the Trans Bhutan Trail (12 days) that include some hiking as well as many of the experiences highlighted below. Disclosure: This tour was sponsored and provided to us in conjunction with our partnership with G Adventures as Wanderers

Bhutan Travel: 20 Things to Do, Places to Visit and Experience

1) Hike up to Bhutan’s oldest nunnery, Kila Goempa

Spend any time in Bhutan and you’ll quickly realize that many of the country’s temples, monasteries and meditation centers are perched on cliff or stuffed into a mountain’s edge. Kila Goempa, located near Paro and believed to be Bhutan’s oldest nunnery, is no exception. But, you have to work a bit —i.e., hike for several hours — in order to see it for yourself.

Our hike began at Chelela Pass at 3,810 meters/13,500 feet, a layer of snow and frozen prayer flags reminding us of the season: winter. The hike follows a relatively easy trail through the forest, though with snow it becomes a little tricky and slippery. After a couple of hours you emerge from the trees below Kila Goempa and its compound of meditation cells and residential halls perched above.

It’s believed that this has been a place for meditation since the 9^th century, but that the temple and monastery was built in the 17^th century. Today, it is home to around 50-70 nuns who live and study there, including a few in the process of doing a 3 year, 3 month, 3 week silent and solitary meditation retreat. Respect.

Bonus: This is good acclimatization hike. It also exercises some of your gear if you plan to do the Druk Path Trek. (link)

2) Immerse yourself in Bhutan’s mountains on the Druk Path Trek

If you know us, you’ll know we take every opportunity we can to go trekking and get into nature. We specifically chose our tour because it included trekking in Bhutan on the Druk Path Trek — four days exploring Bhutan’s mountains, disconnecting and getting away from it all.

Each day of the trek included a diversity of landscapes and trails – through the forest, along mountain ridges, up rocky inclines, over mountain passes. As we chose to do a winter trek we also experienced the thrill of occasional snow, which turned out to be both beautiful and peaceful. Evenings and nights could get quite cold, but a sense of “invigorating” adventure pervaded as we camped in the Himalayas in winter.

3) Celebrate at the highest point of the Druk Path, Labana Pass (4,200 meters/13,800 feet)

One of the highlights of the Druk Path Trek was reaching Labana Pass, with its views of the nearby Himalayan sub-ranges and surrounding valleys. Not only was this a challenge to reach because its elevation at 4,200 meters/13,800 feet, but during our winter trek we also had to make our way through a considerable amount of snow and ice to reach this pass.

All worth it though.

4) Admire the temple cats…and understand their symbolism

Buddhism, the primary religion of Bhutan, asks its devotees to care for all sentient beings, including all animals. This is why you’ll often see food left out for stray dogs and cats near Buddhist temples and monasteries, as well as in chosen spots in towns and cities. It was no different at the Thujidrak Goemba temple on the third day of our Druk Path Trek. Water and food was left out for local cats and dogs. Signs were posted about caring for animals, too.

It’s also worth noting that in Bhutan there are four levels of prayers for devotees entering a temple. The first is for animals since they do not have the ability to pray for themselves. Then comes prayers for society and the nation, followed by prayers for family. And last, are the prayers for oneself. A very fitting – and deliberate — order.

5) Circumambulate around Memorial Chorten in Thimphu

Built in remembrance of Bhutan’s third king, Jigme Dorji Wangchuck, the Memorial Chorten (or National Memorial Stupa) is a popular place for locals to hang out. The tradition now is that family members drop their elderly parents off on the way to work so they can spend the day with their friends, take time to pray, do circumambulations of the Memorial Chorten and nearby prayer wheels, and have some fresh air.

(Note: circumambulations – movements around a sacred object – in Bhutan are always done in a clockwise direction.)

Although the Memorial Chorten is painted white and may appear plain on the outside, the three-story interior is flush with color, imagery and idolatry — paintings, statues, shrines, mandalas and more. Our CEO (tour leader) walked us through each floor, explaining the meaning of and stories behind the different deities, Buddhas, incarnations and shrines.

Note: It is forbidden to take photos inside any Buddhist temple in Bhutan, which is why you see only exterior images here. This restriction is minded out of respect to sacred destinations and to avoid disturbing or distracting praying visitors. We like it.

6) Get your fill of Bhutanese food, especially ema datshi (chili and cheese)

We didn't know what to expect of Bhutanese cuisine before our trip, but were pleasantly surprised. It’s tasty, generally pretty healthy and distinct yet influenced by its neighbors (India, China and Nepal).

Also pictured in the image: mixed veggies, Bhutanese chili sauce “Ezay” (yes, you read that right), pakshaa paa (greens or green beans, chili peppers and hefty strips of pork fat), buckwheat noodles, carrot ginger soup, and Jasha Maru (Bhutanese chicken curry).⁠⠀

A typical Bhutanese meal will consist of several, mainly vegetarian, dishes like you see in the image below. One traditional dish that stands out and is a nearly ubiquitous favorite: Ema Datshi — chili and cheese (pictured top right in the image). In this dish, the chili peppers are the vegetables. Each version we tried featured varying levels of heat, but they all gave a kick and served as a welcome side or condiment.⁠⠀

⁠Our recommendation for eating in Bhutan: focus on the veggies. Almost all vegetables you find in meals in Bhutan are organic and grown locally. All meat is imported from India. This is because killing animals is outlawed in Bhutan for religious purposes.⁠⠀

7) Admire traditional Bhutanese archery at a local competition.

Archery is the national sport of Bhutan. Yes, it’s much more difficult than it looks. (We know as we tried it later in the trip.)

Traditional Bhutanese archery employs a bamboo bow in an effort to strike a tiny 90 cm/3 feet tall and 30 cm/11 inches wide bullseye from 145 meters/475 feet away. Yes, that’s almost 1.5 football or soccer fields away. It’s insanely far.

And yet, when we crashed an archery competition in Thimphu, we saw an occasional arrow strike the target. When it did, the shooting team would do a short dance and sing in celebration. Silence returned soon after as deep concentration was needed to repeat.

8) Try to count the 100,000 statues inside the giant golden Buddha Dordenma 

Overlooking Thimphu sits the massive golden Buddha Dordenma, the second largest seated Buddha statue in the world (the largest is in Hong Kong). Although this Buddha is impressive from the outside, what’s inside is even more remarkable: an estimated 100,000+ small Buddha statues, all of gilded bronze.

In addition to several shrines and a large meditation area, the interior also features several photos of the Bhutanese royal family which tell the succession of kings and queens over the centuries. An in-depth visit here will outline the role of and relationship between the royal family in Bhutan and Buddhism, the country’s primary religion by constitution.

9) Visit the open air market to learn about local spices, chilis and incense

While in Bhutan, take all opportunities to visit local markets and strings of local vendors on the street.  We suggest this not only to learn about the ingredients of and culture around local food, but also to engage with and meet local people in Bhutan. The Centenary Farmer’s Market in Thimphu is definitely worth a visit, with its piles of dried and fresh chili peppers (why Bhutanese food has such a kick to it), Sichuan peppers, chopped bitter gourd and much more. (Note: we picked up some Sichuan peppers and roasted chili flakes and they definitely have a kick!)

We were also impressed also by the endless varieties of incense, of varying colors, textures and blends. Incense is a bit of an art in Bhutan and is used to purify air in temples, homes and markets.

10) Check out some live rock music for a taste of modern Bhutan

You wouldn’t think a visit to a venue featuring rock music cover bands should make a top travel in a destination list. In Bhutan, it’s different.  

While much of what you’ll see and experience in Bhutan is connected to traditional culture, it’s worthwhile to spend a night out at live rock music bar to get a feel for the flip side of modern day Bhutan and its youth culture.

The highlight at Mojo Park in Thimphu isn’t hearing a live band cover songs from Coldplay to David Bowie. Instead, it’s being in a bar — one that could be anywhere in the world — and watching young Bhutanese interact, dress in both traditional and non-traditional Bhutanese clothing, drink, sing along with western rock songs, but sing even louder and more passionately to Bhutanese rock songs.

If you happen to spend a night or two in Thimphu, hop on over to Mojo Park for a craft beer, a fun night, and a little insight into Bhutan’s future.

11) Admire the phalluses (in sculptures and paintings) en route to Chime Lhakhang, The Temple of the Divine Madman

Yes, you are seeing these photos correctly. Phalluses of all sizes, colors and designs are painted on the sides of homes in Bhutan. They symbolize power and are thought to ward away evil spirits and protect against gossip. As a side benefit, they also shock – and sometimes delight – visitors.

The prevalence of painted and sculpted phalluses is especially high around Chime Lhakhang, or Temple of the Divine Madman, dedicated to the lama Drukpa Kunley of the 15^th and 16^th century. He was a rather unconventional lama who preached in an unorthodox way which shocked traditional Buddhist priests and the hierarchy of the day. He is known to have subdued a demon with his “magic thunderbolt of wisdom” and advocated for people to display the phallus symbol on walls and to hang it from the four corners of their homes.

To no surprise, the Chime Lhakhang temple is also known as a fertility temple. Visitors travel there from all over Bhutan and the world to be blessed and to have special prayers said for them in their hopes of having offspring. The temple even maintains a photo album of photos sent by parents who’ve borne children after their visit.

12) Take in the rituals and living history at Bhutan’s Temples

 All of Bhutan’s temples and fortresses are alive, active with monks, nuns, and devotees. None, it seems, are static. Few if any serve only as museum. This means that as a visitor you are a guest, respectful of the local people, and the rituals, blessings and silence happening around you.

For example, it’s common for locals to make offerings — of food, money, incense, etc. — for blessing and to pay respect. For those who have made them, these offerings don’t serve as pretty displays. Instead, offerings like the fruit bowl above are used to feed and support the monks studying at the attached monastery school. Often, these young monks come from poorer families who rely on the monastery to educate and support their children.

13) Admire Punakha Dzong (Fortress) in Bhutan’s old capital

Punakha Dzong is among a series of fortresses built across Bhutan in the 17th century to protect the country from invaders (mainly from Tibet) as it formed a union of the country’s various kingdoms. The fortress is strategically built between the Pho Chhu (Male) and Mo Chhu (Female) river in the Punakha–valley. In lore, it draws on the strengths of both genders. 

Although it has suffered several fires and invasions, Punakha Dzong stands as Bhutan’s second largest and second oldest fortress, and is widely considered the country’s most impressive. It remains home to the same holy Buddhist relic — Ranjung Karsapani, the “self-created” statue — that attracted Tibetan invaders all those centuries ago, and is flush with local mystique and legend.

14) Turn the prayer wheels at Kyichu Lhakhang Temple in Paro

Prayer wheels are ubiquitous in Bhutan. Used to accumulate good karma (which is often equated with wisdom to combat ignorance) and to rid oneself of impurities (bad karma), prayer wheels are always spun clockwise, typically while reciting prayers or mantras.

At Kyichu Lhakhang, one of Bhutan's oldest temples located in the town of Paro, an elderly nun spins the prayer wheels during a visit to the temple with her family.

As anywhere, a moment or two of people watching in Bhutan tells a good deal about the importance of belief and the role of devotion in Bhutanese society.

15) Soak your muscles in a traditional Bhutanese hot stone bath

Think of the hot stone bath as the traditional Bhutanese farmhouse spa. River stones, supposedly mineral-laden, are collected and heated on hot coals for several hours until they are glowing red (and around a temperature of 300 Celsius). They are then deposited into a wooden tub filled with water in order to heat it, thereby releasing minerals. This process is what local people historically used for bathing prior to in-house plumbing taking over.

The way it works here is that you are in a hot tub of your own, on the other side of the wooden tub holding the hot stones which heat your water. While you share the water warmed by the hot stones, you are protected from accidentally touching them by a secure divider. The idea: you get to enjoy privacy and the warmth and minerals from the stones, but you don’t risk burning yourself.

Should you require more heat or warmer water, there’s no switch or tap. Instead you call out “more stones” and another glowing hot stone will be deposited on the other side of your tub. You keep doing this until your desired temperature, which we found to be about 3 or 4 stones (in the middle of winter). You can also ask for cold water if you find that you’ve been overly ambitious along the way.

Then, you soak in the mineral-laden hot water. The water is relaxing and therapeutic. Particularly after four days of trekking in the mountains on the Druk Path Trek, this experience is well-timed and just about perfect.

Note: While many hotels and spas offer hot stone baths, we did ours at a family farmhouse outside of Paro. It was a nice family-run operation and we know that the money we paid went directly to the family.

16) Visit a local family farmhouse for a home-cooked Bhutanese meal

As much as we enjoy eating in restaurants, we’ll opt for a home-cooked meal in a family home any day. These opportunities not only often result in delicious meals, but they also provide an opportunity to meet a local family, see how they live and know that your tour money is truly staying local.

This was the experience we had at a local family farmhouse our CEO (tour leader) took us to outside of Paro on one of our last nights in Bhutan. We enjoyed a hearty meal featuring several vegetable dishes, pork, ezay (Bhutanese chili sauce) and homemade rice wine in a pleasant living room adorned with paintings and symbols.

The 5-year old granddaughter played host, making sure we were well fed and that we possessed all the right utensils. Unwittingly funny and entertaining, she also practiced her English with us. Despite only being five years old, she’d already figured out how to manage everyone and had assumed full control of the house. We wouldn’t be surprised if she’s prime minister one day.

17) Join the pilgrims on the hike up to Taktsang Monastery (Tiger's Nest)

Before arriving in Bhutan, we’d come across plenty of Tiger's Nest temple images. It’s the de facto symbol of the country. What those photos often don’t convey is what an enjoyable and challenging experience it is to get up there, including sharing the path with local pilgrims along the way.

Our G Adventures group set out early in the morning. The idea: to capitalize on the crispness of the early morning light and air and to avoid the crowds. If you look closely in the photo above you might be able to spot the tiny Tiger's Nest tucked high (3,120 meters/10,240 ft) into the mountain in front of us as we set off on what would be three miles (or five kilometers) of winding uphill.

On the way up, you’ll encounter prayer wheels and prayer flags at different turns. You’ll find all manner of contemplation, including locals reciting mantras, saying prayers. The arrangement, tone and color of this particular scene really struck us.⁠⠀

While a visit inside the monastery itself is worthwhile, it was the journey up for us that made the Tiger's Nest experience so memorable.⁠

18) Admire Tiger’s Nest from across the canyon

After hiking for several hours up some steep hills you finally reach a turn and a short descent. From there, Tiger’s Nest finally appears in full view across the canyon. It’s a remarkable sight; the 17^th century temple is built right on the mountain’s edge.

Tiger’s Nest is placed at the location where the Guru Rinpoche (Padmasambhava) is believed to have brought Buddhism to Bhutan in the 8th century and is said to have meditated in a cave for 3+ months. This direct connection to Guru Rinpoche has made Tiger’s Nest one of the most sacred temple sites in the country. It is not only popular for foreign visitors, but also for Bhutanese visitors who come as part of a pilgrimage to pray and to receive blessings.⁠⠀

After a short descent back into the canyon and a short hike back up again we finally reached the entrance to Tiger’s Nest. Due to the early hour we had much of the temple to ourselves, sharing it only with a few monks providing blessings. By the time we began our descent, most others were just beginning their hike up. Perfect timing for us.

Note: Upon arrival at the monastery at the top, you’ll be required to secure your phone, camera and any other bags or electronics in a locker at the entrance to the temple. This is to prevent any photos from being taken inside the temple, as well as to avoid distraction and bumping into things with bulky items.

19) Get all dressed up, Bhutanese-style

 On our last night we got decked out in the traditional Gho (for men) and Kira (for women). While traditional dress such as this is required for official visits, in official buildings and at festivals, you’ll find men and women throughout Bhutan continuing to wear similar clothing in everyday life.

While the outfits are attractive and surprisingly comfortable, like any traditional outfit of its kind, there’s a sort of magic to cinching and securing it.

We’d like to think we cleaned up pretty well.

20) Take a spin during a Bhutanese mask dance

Bhutan is a country of festivals and dances, each having its own special symbolism and purpose. Many are connected to Buddhist traditions, beliefs and legends, and the planting and harvest cycles of the agricultural calendar. Some are also connected to the universal themes of love, life, and death.

Although our visit didn’t coincide with festival season, we managed to experience some traditional and mask dances on our last night. Some were light and comical (the two guys who dressed as the self-deprecating yak had us howling!), while others more serious and spiritual. Most impressive, however, were the spins and jumps.

In this way, Bhutanese dance reflects the ups and downs, the contours of daily life and the passage of the seasons.

How to Plan Your Bhutan Travels + Common Questions about Visiting Bhutan

During our travels in Bhutan, we fielded a lot of excellent questions about visiting Bhutan, including some of the practical considerations regarding traveling there, organizing a tour, and all you need to know for your trip.

How to get a visa to Bhutan?

Getting a visa to visit Bhutan is not difficult in terms of submitting a lot of documents to an embassy and waiting for a visa to be issued. However, you must book a tour with the required minimum daily spending requirements (see #3 below). Then, the tour operator will coordinate your visa for you based on the dates of your trip. Although we’ve heard the visa costs $40, this was included in the price of our tour so we did not pay for it separately.

We received our Bhutanese visa by email from G Adventures about a week prior to our tour departure. We printed out the PDF document and showed it when we checked in for our flight to Bhutan and at immigration upon arrival. More information on visas to Bhutan here.

Note: This visa information applies to all nationalities except Indian, Bangladeshi and Maldivian. Citizens from these countries do not require a special tourist visa dependent upon a tour.

Must I take a tour to visit Bhutan?

Starting from June 2022 an authorized tour is not a requirement of obtaining a tourist visa to Bhutan and it is possible to book your trip independently and pay the required SDF ($200/day) to the Bhutanese government.

However, if you choose to take a tour you have the choice whether you want to book a small group tour (e.g., similar to our tour with G Adventures) or an individual or private tour. You have full flexibility to decide your Bhutan travel itinerary, length of your tour, and your activities.

How much is the minimum daily package for a tour in Bhutan? Why is Bhutan so expensive?

The Bhutanese government tourism policy for over 40 years has been that of “High Value, Low Impact.” The goal: to minimize the potential negative impacts of high-volume tourism while maximizing the potential positive impacts and focusing on sustainability from high value or “high quality” tourism.

In June 2022, the Bhutanese government its increased the Sustainable Development Fee (SDF) — the amount that goes to the government from tourists for development project — from $65 USD per traveler per day to $200 USD per traveler per day. All other travel costs are on top of that SDF amount (e.g., accommodation, food, transport, guiding services, etc.). The SDF fee is included in the price of all Bhutan tours.

The idea: a high daily SDF will automatically filter out the large number of budget travelers who do not want to spend that much, yet it will not deter those who really want to visit Bhutan and have no issue spending the required amounts. Note: This fee does not apply to citizens of India, Bangladesh and the Maldives.

If you are price sensitive then the least expensive option for Bhutan is to travel in a small group in the low season. This is what we did by taking a G Adventures small group tour (we had 7 people in our group) during the low season (late January to early February).

Bhutan also limits the number of tourists who can visit Bhutan each year (currently at around 100,000 people/year) so as to avoid overcrowding. Even if you travel in the high season you shouldn’t face loads of tour groups and travelers, which could negatively impact your travel experience.

What is included in a Bhutan tour? How is the money used? 

Essentially, a tour to Bhutan is pretty much all-inclusive. This means that the price and tour includes accommodation, local guide, transport, entrance fees, activities, support services for trekking, and all meals. What’s not included are things like additional drinks (alcohol, sodas, etc.), souvenirs/shopping, personal activities (e.g., spa treatments) and tips.

In addition, $65/day goes to the government as a Sustainable Development Fee. We were told that this money is allocated towards providing free healthcare and education to Bhutanese people. This is an example of how tourism money is invested directly back into the country and its development. 

How do I travel to Bhutan? What airlines fly to Bhutan?

We won’t lie, Bhutan is not the easiest or cheapest destination to reach. There is only one international airport, Paro (PBH). Only two airlines, Druk Air and Bhutan Airlines, are authorized to fly there, and only a limited number of airports links are available in Asia for inbound and outbound flights.

Since neither Druk Air or Bhutan Airways is connected with other international airlines or systems, you often need to overnight in the departure destination (and possibly sort out a visa there) to be sure you don’t miss your fight into Bhutan. In addition, the price of the flights to Bhutan are exceptionally high considering the distance and the general price of flights across the rest of Asia.

However, since don’t have much of a choice flying to Bhutan, you make the best of the situation and try to find the most convenient flights and connections. For us, that meant flying into Delhi, India and overnighting there before getting a flight to Paro on Druk Air. On the return we flew directly from Paro to Bangkok, Thailand on Bhutan Airways. Most of our group flew in from Kathmandu, Nepal.

The price of flights is pretty much the same between Druk Air and Bhutan Airways. We tried both airlines just to see if there was a difference. Although they are pretty similar we’d suggest Druk Air as being a bit more organized and put together. You can book your tickets and pay online with both Druk Air and Bhutan Airways.

Note: The price of flights to and from Bhutan depends on whether you are a Bhutanese citizen, a citizen from a SAARC country (e.g., India, Bangladesh, Nepal, etc.) or a non-SAARC foreigner (i.e., rest of the world). The latter group has the most expensive tickets. If  you think you can trick the system regarding your country of origin, note that Bhutan airline websites will ask for your visa type in advance and warn that they can cancel your ticket if you provide incorrect information.

Which is the best side of the plane to sit on when flying into Paro, Bhutan?

When flying from Kathmandu to Paro, the left side of the aircraft offers the best views. A window seat on the left side (try to get one that’s not directly over the wing, of course) will provide the best views of the high Himalayan mountains, including Mount Everest.

When is the best time to travel to Bhutan?

Many people say that the best time to visit is in the spring months of mid-March to early May when the rhododendrons and other flowers are in bloom and the weather has begun to turn warm. Another good time from September to November, in autumn when skies are supposed to be clear so you should have good views of the mountains. Festival season seems to be mostly in March/April and September/October (you can see a list of all 2022 festivals in Bhutan here).

The monsoon rains usually arrive late May and last through the summer until late August. Although the fields and hills would be super green during this time, I don’t think I’d recommend doing a trek then because of the rain, mud and clouds (no views).

We visited Bhutan in late January/early February, meaning the heart of winter. We chose this time as we usually enjoy visiting places in the shoulder or off season. Although we had to be prepared for some cold weather, especially during the Druk Path Trek with camping in snow, we found winter a good time to visit Bhutan. It was usually sunny and relatively warm during the day, which was quite pleasant. 

In addition, we encountered almost no other tourists the whole time we were in Bhutan, and that also included having the Druk Path Trek trails and campsites to ourselves. Almost all the temples, fortresses and other sites were also quite empty, save an Indian tour group from time to time. This also meant that our walk up and visit to Tiger’s Nest Temple was pleasantly empty.

Are there ATMs in Bhutan?

Before we proceed to the long and somewhat complicated story of using ATMs in Bhutan, we note that carrying U.S. dollars($) or Euros(€) cash is wise. You’ll find this money useful in making exchanges in a pinch and also using in many shops. Exchange rates vary widely between currencies, as well as the denomination of bill (i.e., higher denomination = better rate), and from hotel to hotel and shop to shop, but they are usually based on the Bank of Bhutan rates.

Although there are ATMs in Bhutan (in major cities like Paro and Thimphu), the machines are fickle. We and others in our group made several failed ATM withdrawal attempts before figuring out what steps to take and which types of available ATM withdrawal requests to make in order to see money emerge from the machine.

If you wish to use an ATM card to make withdrawals of local Bhutanese currency (the Ngultrum), you should notify the bank associated with your ATM or debit card that you will be traveling in Bhutan. When withdrawing money from major banks (e.g., Bank of Bhutan, a.k.a. BOB), the “fast cash” withdrawal options (e.g., 5000, 3000 or 1000) were the only ones that seemed to work for us. Selecting the regular withdrawal from a current or savings account did not work. When we needed more money than those options offered, we simply made multiple withdrawals.  (Note: ATM fees are less a concern for us because we bank with Charles Schwab Bank, which refunds to us any ATM fees at the end of each month.)

Even if you notified your bank in advance of your trip to Bhutan, might still fail in getting money out at the Bhutanese ATM and then need to call your bank again…as we did. When inquiring as to why we were experiencing difficulty, we discovered that while there was no issue or block with our bank, there was an issue with the interbank network (Visa, Maestro, Cirrus, etc.). In our case, our bank had to have a conversation with Visa to request that they allow withdrawal transactions from Bhutan to proceed.  Again, try your ATM card first and the fast-cash option might work. If it doesn’t, call the bank and make sure that neither they nor the intrabank network are in the way.

Finally, although you should officially be able to exchange any leftover Bhutanese currency back into a major currency, we would not recommend piling up cash and expecting the exchange to be easy at Paro airport.  Perhaps because it was low season (or the coronavirus pandemic was just underway), money exchanges were empty. Even they were open, I would not be particularly confident that they would be adequately supplied with the proper denominations of currency you prefer or require on your way out of Bhutan.

What is Gross National Happiness in Bhutan?

While most countries in the world gauge their progress using a measure known as Gross Domestic Product (GDP), one based ostensibly on output as a measure of collective wealth, Bhutan uses something different called Gross National Happiness (GNH). The idea: that there is a more holistic or multi-dimensional approach to development and measuring “success” than just GDP and financial yardsticks.

The idea of GNH originally came from Bhutan’s fourth king, Jigme Singye Wangchuck, in the 1970s. Since then it has evolved into measurement device which attempts to quantify whether or not the country is meeting its happiness development goals. The four pillars of GNH include:

• Sustainable Socioeconomic Development
• Environmental Conservation
• Preservation and Promotion of Culture
• Good Governance

While we are not particularly big fans of the “Gross National Happiness” title (it’s a bit gimmicky and reductive) we do respect and appreciate making a more holistic attempt to understand and measure progress and development. It’s admirable that any government, national or otherwise, might attempt to elevate and somehow quantify social, environment, cultural and governance factors – in pursuit of a more sustainable development model. More on GNH here.

As for Bhutan being the “happiest country” and its people being “the happiest in the world” that also strikes us as a gimmick and art of marketing. It’s interesting to note that many of the articles I read authored by Bhutanese people highlighted that “happiness” is personal and what makes one “happy” is often based on a variety of subjective factors.

Bhutan struggles with development and the rush of modernity as many societies do and have. That will likely be apparent to any visitor to the country. And while there’s no one way to make anyone “happy”, there’s arguably some benefit to a people when its government makes an effort to elevate the importance of the environment, culture, social issues and transparency.

Disclosure: Our tour to Bhutan was provided to us by G Adventures in cooperation with its Wanderers in Residence program. This article includes affiliate links — that is, if you book a G Adventures tour by clicking on one of the links above the price stays the same to you and we earn a small commission to support this website and stories like this. Check out all the different G Adventures tours we've taken and recommend. As always, the thoughts contained herein — the what, the why, and the how — are entirely our own.

The post Travel to Bhutan: A Guide to Explore this Remote Kingdom appeared first on Uncornered Market.

Thinking of traveling to Sri Lanka, but not sure of where to start? Which places to visit, things to do or how to plan your trip? And how can you best avoid the crowds? We’ll answer all those questions and more in this Sri Lanka Experiential Travel Guide and two-week itinerary.

From meeting people on trains, sharing sunrise with pilgrims and travelers alike at the top of Adam’s Peak, wandering through the tea gardens, learning to pop spices and cook Sri Lankan food in clay pots, admiring sleeping Buddha sculptures in caves, and much more, here is a taste of the diversity of experiences and destinations you'll find traveling through Sri Lanka.

Sri Lanka. Ceylon. The little tear-shaped island just south of India. Our visit there wasn't my first.

I lived there for 18 months when my father worked at the U.S. Embassy. My memories of Sri Lanka from my six to seven year-old self consisted of brightly colored saffron robes worn by Buddhist monks, baby orphan elephants bathing in the river, giant sleeping gilded Buddhas, and a vibrant green as far as I could see across the rolling hills of tea plantations in the north.

Something I appreciate now as an adult, yet didn’t fully understand as a child except to note differences in people’s clothing, was the diversity of ethnicities, cultures and religions in Sri Lanka. This includes a majority Sinhalese population who are predominately Buddhist, a Tamil community composed of both Sri Lankan and Indian Tamils who are mostly Hindu, and also Christians and Muslims.

Add to this a long and complicated history dating back 8,000+ years — including power struggles between kingdoms, colonialism, and forced migration — and you have the blend that makes Sri Lanka the fascinating and complex place that it is, the same blend which helped divide it and drive it into a devastating 26-year civil war (1983-2009).

My family left before the civil war began. As the war unfolded, we watched as Sri Lankan friends emigrated to avoid the conflict. And just as peace and stability returned over the last decade, we watched as many of them returned home. Dan and I came close to visiting Sri Lanka in 2008 when we were in southern India. It was a time just before the end of the civil war. At the counsel of Sri Lankan friends, we decided to wait. When the war finally ended in May 2009, we looked for an opportunity to visit.

One finally presented itself years later. Spurred by an opening in a Vipassana meditation course at a center in Sri Lanka, we booked a last-minute flight to Colombo. As I sat my meditation course, Dan made his way south to a beach for his own self-made retreat. After the meditation course finished, we embarked on a two week journey around the island together.

To assemble an itinerary we collected recommendations from friends who had lived or visited there recently, piecing together a rough route focused on train journeys, tea gardens and treks. We left things flexible, often booking accommodation the day before or the day of, to allow shifts and adjustments as we wished.

In the end, it turned out to be an even better two-week trip than we'd imagined, flush with a diversity of experiences and destinations which belied the relatively short amount of time we had. Despite the ground we'd covered and all that we'd experienced, we never felt rushed.

Trains, tea gardens and treks. Here are the best experiences from our Sri Lanka travels and two-week itinerary.

Update: This post was first published in April 2019 and was updated and republished with more details and options for day trips on 28 December, 2019.

Our Sri Lanka 2-Week Itinerary: A Map

Our two week journey together through Sri Lanka included:

• Colombo – Kandy (train): 2 days
• Kandy – Dambulla Caves – Sigiriya – Kandy (bus): 2 days
• Kandy – Hatton (train) + rickshaw to Delhousie – Adam's Peak – Hatton: 2 days
• Hatton – Haputale (train) + rickshaw to Lipton's Seat: 3 days
• Haputale – Ella (train): 3 days
• Ella – Colombo (train): 2 days
• Note: Dan's beach segment took him from Colombo by train to Galle and then a bus onto the southern beaches between Godellawela and Goyambokka.

The days for each itinerary segment listed above and below include travel times between destinations. Moving between destinations can often take most to all of a day when you take into consideration time on the train (or bus) and rickshaw transfers needed. However, these journeys are also experiences in and of themselves to meet locals and enjoy the changing landscapes and lush tea plantations.

Sri Lanka Travel Guide: 19 Things to Do and Places to Visit

1. Take the train in Sri Lanka – again and again and again

Traveling by train in Sri Lanka, no matter which class carriage, is the best way to get around the country for views, hanging with locals, and budget minding. It’s more than just a transportation option to get you from point A to B; it's an experience. We traveled in every class, from third class to 1st class A/C (air-conditioned), and highly recommend trying it all if you can.

Sri Lankan trains don’t go everywhere, but they reach close to most places in Sri Lanka that you’d want to visit. Additionally, many train routes take you through gorgeous scenery and landscapes — tea gardens, forests, villages, coasts — often where there are no roads.

The fresh air and meditative slow movement and sound of the train is so much more enjoyable than diesel-filled roads and the jerky movements of bus transport. We traveled by train from: Colombo – Kandy – Hatton – Haputale – Ella – Colombo.

No matter which train journey you choose, you won’t be disappointed. Although the train route to Ella gets most of the press and hype, we actually felt that the segment from Hatton to Haputale was the most spectacular.

Given the popularity of train travel with locals and travelers it can be challenging to secure tickets for reserved seats. Read below for advice on buying tickets and traveling by train in Sri Lanka without a reservation.

What to do in and near Kandy: 3 days

2. Admire the murals and gilded Buddha statues at Dambulla Cave Temple

We can develop “temple fatigue” quickly. As such, and based on our research, we arrived at Dambulla Cave Temple with managed expectations. But as it was only a couple hours north (72km) of Kandy and en route to Sigiriya Rock Fortress, we opted to stop off and check it out.

We’re so glad we did.

These Buddhist cave temples, also a UNESCO site, date back to around 1st century BC. The complex includes five caves open to the public, each a bit different from the next in terms of its size, and its style and range of paintings and Buddha statues. Of course, the paintings and statues have been renovated and brushed up over time. However, it’s still impressive to take in Buddhist religious art spanning 22 centuries and to witness the living history of how local people still use these caves today for religious purposes.

This is a popular site for both Sri Lankans and travelers, so if you find that one cave is crowded, just move to the next one until the crowds dissipate and move on. It’s worth the additional effort to be able to enjoy each of the caves with some quiet and stillness.

3. Climb to the top of Sigiriya (Lion Rock) Citadel before the crowds arrive

The story goes that in the 5th century King Kasyapa needed to build a new, secure capital after usurping the throne. He brutally murdered his father and scared off his brother, the rightful heir to the throne.

After this Game of Thrones-style move, he headed just north of Dambulla and built his palace atop a massive 180-meter high rock – Sigiriya, or Lion Rock – giving him a vantage point from which to see any armies coming from miles away. His palace served him well and protected him during his reign. After he died, it was used as a Buddhist monastery until the 14th century.

Most travelers visit Sigiriya, another UNESCO site and one of the most visited places in Sri Lanka, as a day trip from Kandy. Our advice is to spend the night in one of the family-run guest houses close to the site and take a tuk-tuk early in the morning so you arrive at 7AM when the ticket office and gates open.

This will allow you to walk through the gardens, enjoy the frescoes — including the famous Sigiriya Maidens — in the caves along the rock face (cool, but you can’t touch!), climb to the top of the rock, walk around the palace ruins, enjoy the views from up high, and head back down. And to do all this before the hordes of tourists on bus tours from Kandy arrive. On our way down from the top of the rock, we saw hundreds of visitors lining up.

Another benefit to this approach is that you’ll be able to explore Sigiriya in the early morning coolness before the day warms up and views become hazy.

NOTE: If you are short on time you can also book a day trip to Sigiriya and the Dambulla Caves from Colombo.

4. Eat your weight in Sri Lankan rice and curry.

The basic Sri Lankan meal, whether at a hole-in-the-wall or high-end restaurant, is rice and curry. Often, you’ll get a big plate or bowl of rice and then a selection of several different curries to go with it. In many simple cafeteria-style places the curries will be laid out buffet-style and you’ll point the server to which ones you want. It’s best to eat during local meal hours so that the food is freshly cooked and not sitting out for hours in the heat.

Vegetarians should rejoice at Sri Lankan food. There are usually several types of daal (lentils), sabjis (mixed vegetables), beet root, eggplant and other vegetarian curry options on offer. For meat eaters, you’ll find different types of chicken, meat or fish curry options with various levels of heat and spice. In more formal restaurants you’ll have the option to choose how many curries — and which ones — you want served with your pile of rice.

Don’t forget to seek out or ask for the different types of sambols (salads), chutneys or hot sauces available. Some of our favorites included pennywort salad (gotukola sambol), spicy coconut chutney (pol sambola), and spicy onion sambol (lunu miris). When you do, you’ll often get a nod of approval and smile from your waiter as well. For more information on Sri Lankan food, check out this article from our friend Mark.

5. Pay a visit to the Temple of the Sacred Tooth Relic in Kandy.

Inside the former royal palace complex in Kandy, Sri Dalada Maligawa (aka, Temple of the Sacred Tooth Relic) is what is believed to be the relic of the tooth of Gautama Buddha, rescued from his funeral pyre in 543 BC. Almost 800 years later, the story continues with the tooth having been smuggled to Sri Lanka from India in the early 4th century.

In addition to its religious value, the relic of the tooth introduces another Game of Thrones-like twist: it is believed that whoever holds the relic also rules the country. So it became a prized possession and political tool of monarchs over the centuries. Its final resting place is now in Kandy where it is said to be secure inside the palace's main shrine.

Although it's not possible for visitors today to see the actual tooth relic, it is still worth visiting the palace and temple if you are in Kandy. The procession of pilgrims, devotees and rituals surrounding this sacred relic offer a bit of active devotion, of living history. You'll notice lotus blossoms and frangipani offerings heaped throughout the different temples, tucked into sacred nooks. The palace and temples grounds — with their elaborate wood carvings, gilded statues and paintings, and manicured gardens — serve up a bit of visual overload.

Note: If you happen to visit Kandy during July or August ask about the dates for that year's Esala Perahera (Festival of the Tooth), a two week interlude when the town fills with decorated elephants, dancers, ceremonies, and more.

6. Buy some creative, colorful and eco-friendly souvenirs in Kandy.

We weren’t looking for souvenirs or to buy anything when we stumbled upon EarthBound Creations (28 Yatinuwara Veediya, Kandy) as we wandered the streets of Kandy. However, the colorfully creative use of recycled materials (recycled newsprint, plastics, etc.) changed that. In addition to the environmentally sensitive use of recycled materials, this social enterprise also works with women who were affected by or displaced by the tsunami in 2004.

This means when you buy cool souvenirs and gifts here — we bought a basket and an old bi-plane made, both made of recycled cardboard and newsprint — it helps provide income and training to this disadvantaged group of women. Inventory there is cool, visually appealing, reasonably priced and feel-good.

What to do in Hatton and Adam's Peak: 2 days

7. Wake up at 2AM to climb Adam’s Peak (Sri Padaya) and enjoy sunrise at the top

This mountain is considered sacred by several religions, including all the prominent ones practiced in Sri Lanka. Sri Pada (“Sacred Footprint”), a rock formation near the peak, is considered to be the footprint of Buddha for Buddhists, of Adam for Christians and Muslims, and of Shiva for Hindus.

During your walk up, you’ll find plenty of local pilgrims of different religions and travelers along the way. You'll find even more gathered in large numbers at the top near the temples waiting for the sun to rise.

The idea is to hike up Adam's Peak in the dark so you can enjoy sunrise at the top, followed by views from the mountain in the early morning light on the way down. We set our alarms for the ungodly hour of 2AM, bundled up in multiple layers of clothing against the morning chill, got a tuk-tuk ride to the base of the mountain, and set off for the peak (2,243 m / 7,359 ft).

Although we enjoyed the anticipation of sunrise next to the Hindu and Buddhist temples at the peak while we watched them perform different ceremonies and prayers, we found the crowds and all of the cameras and selfie-sticks a bit much after a while. We headed down before the sun was fully up and left the crowds behind us.

This was such a good decision.

We had views of the nearby mountains and hills almost all to ourselves in a perfect early-morning light which lasts only a few minutes at best. It’s magical.

8. Rickshaw ride the hill country and tea plantations

Sometimes it’s worth the splurge of a few dollars to take your own rickshaw rather than the public bus. It's definitely a wise idea when you’re in the middle of hill country surrounded by tea plantations and you wish to take it all in a bit more slowly and to take photos along the way.

The two routes we recommend for taking your own rickshaw: from Delhousie to Hatton (or the opposite direction) and from Haputale to Dambethenna Tea Estate (also the starting point for the hike to Lipton’s Seat). Don’t be afraid to ask your driver to stop for photo opportunities and just to enjoy the views. We found that our drivers snapped photos of the tea plantations and views with their mobile phones, just like us.

9. Take a break from Sri Lankan rice with some roti (flat bread)

Although the standard Sri Lankan fare of rice and curry is tasty, you may find yourself reaching a point of rice fatigue. That’s where roti (fried flat bread) or kottu roti (diced roti which is mixed with vegetables like a fried rice) come to the rescue.

If you still have a hankering for curries, consider switching out the rice for a stack of freshly made roti to go with your daal (lentils) and other curries. One of our favorite places for this was Malabar Restaurant and Bakers in Hatton. It was so good we ate here two days in a row as we transited through town on the way to and from Adam’s Peak.

Another alternative to rice and curry is kotti roti, which essentially looks like fried rice made with vegetables and different meats, but where diced roti replaces the rice. You always know when this is being made as you can hear the kottu roti master clanging away with his knives to cut the roti super fine. The flavor is hearty and the sound satisfying. And the whole experience offers a welcome break from the rice and curry routine.

What to do near Haputale + Tea Plantations: 3 days

10. Find a room with a view in a hill station

Although Nuwara Eliya and Ella might be the more popular and sophisticated hill stations in Sri Lanka’s tea country, we decided to try less-visited Haputale for a couple of days based on the recommendation of friends who lived in Sri Lanka for several years. Most of the guest houses and inns in this area are in the countryside outside of town, but we got lucky with this room and view in town.

To be honest, there’s not a lot going on in the town of Haputale and not many tourist services. But, it’s a good base if you want to visit nearby tea plantations, go on some hikes in the area (e.g., Lipton’s Seat), witness local life, and just chill with a nice view for a few days.

11. Hike up to Lipton’s Seat and have a cup of tea

Mr. Lipton of Lipton Tea really did exist. He’s not just a marketing persona. He is credited with transforming Sri Lanka into a one of the world’s biggest tea producers after a disease wiped out much of the country's coffee bushes in the late 19th century.

Today, you can hike up through the tea plantations to the place on a hill where he used to supposedly look out over his various tea plantations to take stock and ensure everything was in order. A little make-shift hut has been set up there so you can have a cup of tea as you enjoy the views of the tea gardens below. How appropriate.

The walk takes a couple of hours along winding plantation roads and through the different segments of Dambethenna Tea Estate tea gardens to arrive at Lipton’s Seat. Depending upon the time of day and season you might also catch the tea pickers at work at they methodically make their way through the narrow rows of tea bushes and pick only their top, green leaves.

What to do in Ella and Nearby: 3 days

12. Enjoy sunset atop Little Adam’s Peak near Ella

In full disclosure, we hadn’t actually planned to be on the top of Little Adam’s Peak at sunset. We decided to take the “scenic route” suggested by our guesthouse owner in Ella and as is typical for us, we got a little turned around along the way. So there we were at the golden hour hiking the last leg of what is affectionately known as Little Adam’s Peak. Turns out, in the end, that our timing was just about perfect.

13. Take a cooking course in Ella and learn the secrets of Sri Lankan food

Because Sri Lanka is so close to India one might assume that the cuisines are the same. While there are some surface similarities between the two countries' collection of cuisines, Sri Lankan food is unique and employs different spice combinations in its masalas, lots of coconut milk, ample amounts of fresh curry and pandan leaves, spicy sides called sambols, and cinnamon.

To understand the basics of Sri Lankan food and how we could replicate some dishes at home, we took a cooking class with Lanka in Ella. Over the course of several hours we learned how to cook five different curries (carrot, beet, green bean, eggplant, and chicken), plus a sambol and salad. It was excellent.

Not only did we learn the fundamentals, but Lanka was open to answering the slew of questions we had, including those related to Sri Lankan food, what life was like during the civil war, the tourism growth spurt (or overtourism) in Ella, and just about anything else.

We highly recommended this experience. It's also a great value at around 2000 rupees ($12). There are other cooking courses in town, but be sure to ask how many dishes you’ll actually make since some of the other options only offer 2-3 curries for a similar price.

14. Hike Ella Rock in the morning sunshine

Although we didn’t get up before dawn to climb up to Ella Rock for sunrise as many advised (yes, we do enjoy our sleep), we made it up there for mid-morning. This still allowed us to enjoy some of the morning light, coolish weather, views of Little Adam’s Peak and the hill country, before the haze settled in with the afternoon heat.

Although Ella Rock proper gets all the limelight, we enjoyed the other overlook, one about five minutes away featuring a small Buddhist temple in a cave. There are almost no people there and it’s a good place to breathe deeply and take in the beauty around you.

NOTE: If you are short on time, consider taking this day trip around Ella that includes a hike up to Ella Peak in the morning, visit to Nine Arches Bridge and a hike up to Little Adam's Peak.

What to do and eat in Colombo: 1-2 Days

15. Get your Sri Lankan street food fix at Galle Face Green in Colombo

For the combination of street food, ocean views, and a great place to watch the sunset, head to Galle Face Green in late afternoon. Although much of the street food here can be a bit on the fried side, there are some tasty crab and shrimp bites that you can find at select food stalls along the walkway.

For a meal with an actual seat, take your pick of one of the restaurant stalls whose menus are full of deviled and grilled seafood or chicken. It you order a beer, it's likely they'll serve the can in a bag so as to avoid their running afoul of liquor license authorities.

To see more of Colombo and learn about its history, consider taking a half-day city tour to see the main sights of the city.

16. Find the Hopper master in the Colombo Old Fort area

Hoppers is a typical Sri Lankan dish featuring a bowl-shaped pancake made from rice flour and coconut milk, often with the option of a fried egg inside, which is served with a simple curry. Almost as fun as eating hoppers is watching the masters at work on the street with their hopper pans churning out perfectly formed hoppers by the hundreds.

If you’re in Colombo look for this guy on York street in the Old Fort area. Hoppers with a smile!

If you really want to go deep into Sri Lankan street food in Colombo, consider taking this Colombo street food tour.

17. Stock up on spices at the market to take home

After our Sri Lankan cooking class in Ella we were armed with a list of Sri Lankan spices, sauces and other foodstuffs we wanted to bring back home. If you are similar to us and opt for food souvenirs rather than typical souvenir tchotchkes, make a stop at the fresh market behind the Colombo bus station to stock up on all your Sri Lankan spice needs.

Not only is it fun to enter a market with a shopping list (of course, we bought more than we expected), but the quality and price of spices in Sri Lanka is hard to beat. The fragrance from the cinnamon sticks and cinnamon bark is something magical. Interaction with local vendors and asking questions about different spice qualities and options is fun, too.

Recommendations for a 3rd Week in Sri Lanka

18. Disconnect and decompress in a small Sri Lankan beach village

We didn’t do a lot of beach hopping to be able to give you a definitive “best beaches in Sri Lanka” list. The reason? Once Dan found this beach and family-run guesthouse near Tangalle in the south, he decided not to leave for ten days.

So while I was at my Vipassana meditation course, Dan created his own retreat on the beach. For him, mornings were about meditation, reading and a leisurely breakfast with the guest house family.

Days were about more reading on the beach, exploration of nearby towns and villages, and impromptu Sri Lankan cuisine lessons at local restaurants. And late afternoons featured more beach time and sunset with a beer under a palm swooping into a strip of sand carved by the day's waves. Sunsets, like snowflakes, no two were the same.

The long, empty beach and wide horizons combined with being disconnected and the laid back pace and limited movement were exactly what he needed to relax, read, and recharge.

19. Take a Vipassana 10-day silent meditation course

If you really want to disconnect from the world to reconnect with and dig deep within yourself, there’s no better way to accomplish that than by taking a Vipassana silent meditation course for ten days. Now, this is not a luxury, laid-back meditation retreat with optional massages on the side. Instead, it’s more like meditation boot camp with the morning bell at 4AM, around 10 hours of meditation each day and almost nothing for dinner.

But doing a Vipassana course is SO worth any temporary feeling of discomfort or lack of luxury, and will likely be one of the most rewarding and memorable experiences of your life. I won’t go into all the details as to why, and the mental and physical benefits. Dan already did an incredible job doing that in his Vipassana course article. I should note, however, that each Vipassana experience is different and unique.

Essential Sri Lanka Travel Information

The following practical travel information is aimed to help you plan your trip to Sri Lanka, from visas to flights to train tickets, so that it all goes smoothly without any unpleasant surprises.

Day Trips and Other Tours in Sri Lanka

Although two weeks in Sri Lanka isn't a ton of time, we did have enough flexibility in our schedule to organize things last minute and piece things together on the spot. However, if you have a tighter schedule or want to book day trips, transfers and other activities in advance (recommended for high season) we can suggest using our partner, Get Your Guide. It offers many different day trips and other tours in Sri Lanka with no booking fees and free cancellation up to 24 hours before.

In addition to the recommendations above, here are a few other day trips and tours that you might consider doing in Sri Lanka.

• Day Trip to the UNESCO City of Anuradhapura: Unfortunately, we did not have time to visit Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka's first capital and an important Buddhist religious site. However, it's on our list for our next visit as friends of ours who used to live in Sri Lanka recommended it.
• Minneriya National Park Day Trip:  Seeing elephants in the wild is pretty remarkable, and Sri Lanka has one of the highest populations of wild Asian elephants. On this day trip to Minneriya National Park from Colombo you'll have a chance to see elephants in the wild (MUCH better than seeing them at a center). This is a long day, but all the transport is taken care of for you so you can relax and enjoy.
• Colombo City Tour by Tuk Tuk: We went through Colombo very quickly on our way in and out of the country and wish we had spent more time there. Given the size of the city, a tuk tuk city tour like this would allow you to see the main highlights of the city within a short period of time with all the history, stories and context that only a local guide can bring.

Best time to visit Sri Lanka

The country has multiple monsoon seasons so “best time to visit Sri Lanka” depends much on where you want to go. For the southern, central and western parts of the country (i.e., where we were) December – May is considered the best time. In the eastern part of the country, April or May to September is considered best. Weather is changing everywhere and monsoons seem to come and go at different times each year.

How to Get a Sri Lanka Visa

Most nationalities need a visa to Sri Lanka. One can be obtained online easily and quickly. Just fill out the e-visa to Sri Lanka application and pay $30 needed for a 30-day visa. Our applications were approved within 24-hours. Although we carried a copy of our visa approval, the immigration officer did not ask for it.

Flights to Sri Lanka

Flying from Europe we had quite a few connection options to Colombo, Sri Lanka (CMB). Many of the European flights do land very late at night or early morning so we booked a hotel near the airport for that first night. You can also pre-book your airport transfer to make it less stressful when you arrive.

We often use Skyscanner to check availability and price of flights as its database includes all low-cost airlines. Once you find your best route or price then you can book directly through the airline with no extra fees.

How to Book Train Tickets in Sri Lanka

Many reserved seats on popular train routes sell out early. Don’t be deterred, though. You can always get on the train you want with a 2nd or 3rd class ticket purchased the same day, without a seat assignment.

To get a feel for the train routes and how you might want to plan your own train journey through the country check out this train route map on the official Sri Lanka Railways website. You can also find schedules and prices for trains there as well.

Traveling by train without a reservation: Many of the local trains don’t have reserved seating so you just need to show up 30-60 minutes before the train to buy a 2nd or 3rd-class ticket (usually very cheap). Then, it’s a matter of waiting on the platform for the train to arrive, and positioning yourself close to the doors so you can be one of the first to enter and snag a seat. Even if you don’t end up with a seat, don’t worry. One is likely to come available at another station.

Buying train reservations: If you want a bit of comfort on the train with an actual assigned seat then you’ll need to do a bit of advance planning to figure out your route and dates of travel. We went straight to the main train station (Colombo Fort Railway Station) when we arrived in Colombo and bought as many reserved seats as we could for the train routes we knew we wanted to take. Despite this being 10 to 14 days in advance of the actual travel dates, some routes were already booked full.

We have heard, but have not tried ourselves, that it's possible to work with local travel agents to buy reserved train tickets in advance. Seat 61, the website of all things train travel, has advice on how to do that here.

Finding and Booking Hotels in Sri Lanka

Although we traveled during the high season we were able to make most of our hotel bookings in Sri Lanka just a couple of days before — or even the day of — our arrival without any problem. We mostly stayed at small, family-run guesthouses and used Booking.com to find and book accommodation.

English is spoken at varying levels in smaller guesthouses so we found booking accommodation through Booking.com was easier, immediate and more secure than trying to call and make a reservation over the phone or by email.

Buying a SIM card in Sri Lanka

When you arrive at Bandaranaike International Airport airport in Sri Lanka you’ll find several mobile phone operators offering different “tourist plans” SIM card for mobile calling and internet. We ended up choosing Mobitel SIM cards with several gigabytes of mobile data and a chunk of SMS and calling minutes for around $10. It was easy to set up and we had pretty good coverage throughout Sri Lanka during our trip.

The post An Experiential Travel Guide to Sri Lanka: 19 Ideas to Get You Started appeared first on Uncornered Market.

Should I travel to India on an organized tour? Or should I travel India independently or solo? We’ve experienced India both ways – the first couple trips on our own and our most recent trip on a small group tour. Recent conversations with our audience, especially solo female travelers, told us a look at the benefits and downsides of small group travel and tours in India was in order.

India is one of our favorite countries. At turns it is complicated yet simple, beautiful and tragic. It overwhelms the senses and is chock full of history, culture and humanity. This is one of the reasons why Dan chose it as his first trip abroad outside North America. It's why we’ve visited four times and why we have plans to return. However, the same features can make India a challenging and overwhelming independent travel destination.

During our most recent visit to India, we traveled to northern India on a tour book-ended by two train trips. Considering our previous travels there – independent, to offbeat locations, plenty of train journeys – a reader asked why we chose a tour and didn't organize train tickets and all else ourselves.

A good question.

In truth, we didn’t need to take a tour in India. However, when we had the opportunity to choose a G Adventures trip (sponsored) as part of our Wanderers partnership we chose this Northern India by Rail tour. Why?

We wanted to experience traveling on a small group tour in India and compare it to our independent travels there. What would we like, what we wouldn’t like, and what we would recommend to others.

Here’s what we found. To us, the pros and cons of traveling in India with a small group tour.

Pros: The benefits of taking a tour in India

India can feel overwhelming and challenging navigate no matter what, but especially if it’s your first visit to the country, and even more so if you are new to international travel. In these circumstances, an organized tour handles the general structure and logistics of the trip and supplies a tour leader to give continual local context and help make sense of the often disorienting commotion so can focus yourself on a deeper understanding and appreciation of the place you’re visiting.

An organized tour in India isn’t only for newbie travelers. For example, my aunt who went to school in India and lived there for many years mentioned taking a similar tour as ours so as to enjoy a “hassle-free trip.”

This got us to thinking. What are some of the other benefits of an organized tour in India?

• Expertise of local tour leaders and guides: When I travel, I’m the — sometimes annoying — one asking the guide endless questions. It’s my job, but I’m also just curious. Access to local expert guides enhances my learning and understanding of a place, of its history and culture. The best local guides also provide their own personal stories which provide color and texture to a travel experience. The most curious traveler wants to know: What is life really like here? My return often features reflection upon anecdotes and personal stories conveyed by tour leaders and guides. These stories add shape to my travel memories. (Note: If you’re new to organized tours, or you already take them and want to make the most of them, read our article on how to make the most of an organized tour.
• Hassle-free logistics and organization: On average people visit a minimum of four websites – and spend endless hours researching — before booking a trip and its various components. Furthermore, making travel arrangements in country can absorb precious hours as you visit multiple offices — especially in India. When your logistics (train tickets, accommodation) are organized by someone else, it frees you to focus on the experience.
• Do more with limited time: Travel only by public transport and you’ll experience lag time between buses, trains and other transfers. With a private bus or transfer waiting for you, you can see more in a limited amount of time. This mode of travel also features the built-in opportunity to experience smaller destinations along the way.
• Itineraries: We enjoy the sort of itinerary where marquee sites form the anchors of an itinerary, while community-based experiences and interactions are skillfully interspersed, again to provide context, depth and texture to an experience or destination. Some of our G Adventures itineraries have featured access to activities and destinations in select local communities, something that would have been difficult and time-consuming for us to have sourced and arranged ourselves.
• Free time and optional activities: Even though we enjoy traveling with a group, we also like to explore on our own and have free time in our schedule. For example, in Dharamshala while the majority of our group visited a Tibetan Institute, we opted to day-hike Triund Hill. Take advantage of flexibility when it presents itself.
• Cost: Traveling in a small group tour typically costs less per person than an equivalent private tour as costs are distributed across the group.
• Medical support: Fortunately, this wasn’t an issue during our tour of northern India. But it’s a wildcard to note. We’ve witnessed passengers falling sick, and we’ve taken note of their comfort in having a trusted, local guide on the visit to the pharmacy or doctor for language interpretation, support and guidance. This is particularly important to note for destinations one might consider gastro-intestinally challenging.

Benefits of an India tour for young female travelers

Traveling in India can be a challenge for young women, especially those who stand out with light hair and fair skin. Although encounters with men are not on the whole physically dangerous, the intensity of attention afforded to young women in India can be unpleasant or even feel invasive. To prepare, here are some travel safety tips for women traveling in India.

Traveling in a group tour helps offers a bit of a shield from some of that attention. It offers the guide and other passengers an opportunity to step in during uncomfortable situations. Having a local tour leader and guide also provides an additional level of protection.

For example, we traveled with four young blonde women on our northern India itinerary. Their appearance literally stopped traffic. Cars pulled over, disgorging local passengers eager to take selfies with them. In circumstances where crowds of people gathered around them, the intensity bumped up a notch. If each woman had been traveling independently — without the buffer of our group and the watchful eye of our local tour leader — the feeling could become more overwhelming, turning to something frightening or even violating.

One woman in our group, Ellie, summed it up well: “It [the attention] is definitely something that young women especially need to take into consideration before visiting [India] for the first time. It can be quite a shock if you're not prepared!”

We've traveled enough in India and spoken to countless young solo female travelers about their experiences in the country. On this account, our case is not overstated. Here's

Benefits for solo travelers

Regardless of whether you are male or female, traveling solo to India for the first time can feel daunting and disorienting. There are also endless stories of scams to which travelers have fallen prey in India. Having a local guide to ask about things and the support of a group of fellow passengers can help mitigate some of those risks and smooth the travel experience.

For example, one of the people in our group had always traveled with his wife. She didn't have any interest in traveling to India, but he really did. However, he didn’t want to do it entirely on his own. Our tour offered him the itinerary he wanted (he was a train buff), the structure and support of the tour to handle logistics and itinerary, and a group of fellow travelers to hang out with if he wanted to.

Upshot of the story: he — and we — all really had a great time, not only with the experience, but spending time with one another. After this trip, he’s begun to consider taking small group tours to other destinations, especially to those places that don’t interest his wife or include activities she wouldn't enjoy.

Cons: The down side of taking a tour in India

An organized tour may not be the best option for every traveler, or for every situation. Here are some of the potential downsides of taking a group trip in India:

• Too fast paced: A fixed itinerary can feel as though you’re moving quickly with early mornings and long days packed with lots to see and do. This is true anywhere, but especially in India where sensory overload combined with limited rest can take its toll.
• Not as much time to explore independently: We find that some experiences, particularly interactions with locals, happen more naturally when we’re on our own, rather than in a group. For example, chatting with market vendors, being invited for tea, random conversations with people on the street, or just getting lost and discovering something unexpected. Solo or independent travelers can appear more approachable to locals than a large group might.
• Cost: Organized tours can be more expensive than choosing to arrange everything yourself, taking public transport everywhere and traveling without a guide. Those are also the same reasons that many prefer to pay a little extra for a tour.
• Less street food exploration: Although all the meals on our tour were optional, we opted often to join the group as they were a fun group of people and we enjoyed their company. Because of this, we found that we ate street food or cafeteria food less often than we might have if we were traveling independently. For good reason and hygiene concerns, our tour guide tended to be more conservative with restaurant choices. The upside was that everyone in our group usually ordered different dishes and was open to sharing so we could sample different flavors and curries. And, no one in our group got sick during the trip.
• Not getting along with other people in group: There’s always a risk that you’ll have “that traveler” in your group and he or she won't click with others. Fortunately, in the 14 G Adventures trips we've taken, we’ve encountered this only once – a traveler whose emotional problems were made worse by alcohol abuse. We steered clear and it was fine. Usually, the tour leader will address these issues early on so it doesn’t impact other passengers and the rest of the trip.

What to look for in an India tour

Sometimes when I mention taking a group tour I get a confused look: “You guys don’t look like tour people.”

We understand. We began as independent travelers. But our work, as well as our partnership with G Adventures, has exposed us to group travel, which we’ve enjoyed for the experiences we've had and the people we've met along the way. For us, this has also built a bit of travel empathy, whereby we appreciate an array of travel styles, preferences and personalities beyond our own.

I should also note that there's a stereotype of organized tours, based on a very particular type of organized tour: dozens of passengers, all the same age and nationality, traveling in an oversized bus, following a guide waving a flag or umbrella, looking disconnected as they’re shepherded from A to B, squeezing in as many tourist sites as possible into one day, punctuated by all-inclusive forgettable meals and unpunctuated by free moments to explore on one’s own.

We acknowledge this style may be preferable for some people. We wouldn’t recommend it though. And this style is vastly different from the one that we have written about above and elsewhere as we've reflected on our own personal experience.

Point is: regarding organized tours, there are many options these days. Know what they are and choose wisely to align with your preferences.

Here’s what we recommend for an organized tour of India:

We offer some general recommendations as you consider your own trip to India, especially one based in part or whole on a tour:

• Small group: For us, the ideal group size is 16 persons or less.
• Varied Itineraries: Keep a look out for routes and itineraries that not only include the usual suspects (major sites and destinations), but also smaller and lesser-known destinations not offered by all tour operators. The lesser-known destinations provide texture and often feature the stories you’ll remember most.
• Inclusion of a community project or social enterprise experience: these community visits often provide travelers with a deeper, more connected experience, while the money from the tour benefits a local organization or community. If you’re going on a G Adventures tour, search for tours that integrate a Planeterra Foundation project experience in the itinerary (hint: it's one of the filters now on their search page).
• Some free time: Make sure your itinerary offers some free time so you can explore on your own, engage in an optional activity with the group or just unwind and rest. No matter where and how you travel, it's unlikely that you'll want to be on the go all the time.
• Combination of train and private transport: If you’re traveling in India, choose itineraries which include some train travel. For us, it’s the most rewarding way to travel India.
• Non-inclusive meals: One of the highlights of traveling in India is the food. We suggest choosing a tour where meals and dishes are your choice, not pre-determined, all-inclusive or buffet oriented.
• Local tour leaders and guides: It may seem obvious that you ought to seek tours featuring guides from the country in which you're traveling. Yet, we've found that's not always the case.

Recommended Small Group Tours in India

G Adventures India and Rail Tours

Here is the small group tour we took in northern India that had a train focus. Plus, we share other options if you have more time to explore India and want to combine different regions by rail. These G Adventures tours all include a local guide, stays at local accommodation, eating out at local restaurants and many also include a Planeterra Foundation community organization experience.

Northern India by Rail

Photo Credit: www.gadventures.com

This is the northern India tour that we did and that is highlighted above. A full and fulfilling week exploring the lesser-visited areas in Punjab and Himachal Pradesh, including Amritsar, Dharamshala/McLeod Ganj, and Shimla.

Continue Reading

Northeast India & Darjeeling by Rail

Photo Credit: www.gadventures.com

A two-week journey beginning in Kolkata (our favorite Indian big city) going by train and van into Sikkim and Darjeeling. This tour also stops by the fascinating holy city of Varanasi en route to its end point in Delhi.

Continue Reading

Kolkata to Kochi by Rail

Photo Credit: www.gadventures.com

The ultimate train journey through India, from Kolkata in the northeast to Kochi in the south. We did a similar journey years ago, but the opposite direction, and loved it. If you have a month to spend in India and love rail travel, consider this tour.

Continue Reading

The post Taking a Tour in India: Pros and Cons appeared first on Uncornered Market.

Having fielded numerous questions about trekking in Ladakh — which trek to choose, how to find a trekking agency, when to go, how to get there, what to pack, and more — we’ve created this Ladakh Trekking Beginner’s Guide. We hope it encourages you to make the long journey to Ladakh and explore its stunning mountain landscapes and fascinating Ladahki and Tibetan Buddhist culture and people. You won't be sorry.

Every year we try to go on a big trek, one that takes us far far away and high into the mountains. For us, it's not only a way to exercise our bodies, but to clear and challenge our minds. It’s a way to disconnect from all that is part of our daily life — technology, social media, blogging — and reconnect with nature and ourselves.

Our trek of the Markha Valley in Ladakh in India’s high Himalayas was one of our favorite treks of all time. We had dangerously high expectations, having dreamed of this region for over a decade. Fortunately, what we found in Ladakh and on our trek far exceeded what we had imagined, not only in terms of the stunning landscape but also the Ladakhi people.

Update: This article was originally published in January 2014 and updated in July 2019 with current 2019 prices, a Ladakh trekking packing list and other information.

Update: You can now buy the Ladakh Trekking: A Beginner’s Guide with all the information from this site plus lots of extra details and other goodies (like packing and other preparation) in an easy ebook that you can download and take with you.

Choosing a trek in Ladakh

There are loads of trekking choices in Ladakh. Your choice will depend on the amount of time you have, how remote you'd like to go, and the difficultly level you seek. Some of the more remote treks require special permits as they may go into sensitive border areas, but trekking agencies can easily take care of this for you within a day or two.

There are endless variations of treks you can take in Ladakh, with many taking you to remote areas and can go up to three weeks. You can find a full list of Ladakh trekking options here.

Some of the more popular treks in Ladakh include:

• Markha Valley Trek (6-7 days): This is the one that we chose because it combined hiking and landscapes with people and culture by incorporating homestays with families in villages along the way. For us, this combination is ideal and resulted in a trekking experience that exceeded our expectations. The Markha Valley Trek is also the most popular Ladakh trek and we’re told it can get crowded in the high season (July and August). If you travel to Ladakh during high season, take this into consideration and perhaps choose a less popular trek to avoid crowded trails and home accommodations.
• Hidden Valleys of Ladakh, Zanskar Range (9-10 days): This trek takes you into the Zanskar range and through small villages throughout the valley area. Camping gear is required as it’s not possible to do homestays for the entire trek.
• Nubra Valley (5-6 days): This can either be done without much trekking for 2-3 days, or it can be a fuller trekking experience with camping, camel rides and more. We’ve heard the area is quite beautiful.
• Kharnak trek (15 days): Begins like the Markha Valley trek but continues further south for another week. A Ladakhi trekking guide told us this is one of his favorite treks.
• Rumtse to Tsomoriri (8-9 days): This was another favorite trek from a guide we spoke to because of the beauty of the lakes and the joy of interaction with shepherds along the way. This trek is on the short list for when we return.

To trek independently or with a guide?

Some treks require a guide due to the difficulty of the trail or local regulations. Other routes like the Markha Valley Trek can be done independently (e.g., without a guide) because the trail is pretty well marked and there are villages to stay in throughout the way. You then have the decision of whether to go on your own or hire a guide. Factors include: budget, your trekking experience, skill at reading trekking maps, and weather. Let's examine these.

Although our Markha Valley trek could have been done without a guide, we were thankful to have one. Having a local guide provided us with the peace of mind that we were always on the right path (as some of you may remember, we have a history of getting lost in mountains).

As luck would have it, we crossed our first Markha Valley trek mountain pass in the middle of a snow storm. Without our guide, we never would have found the correct approach. Two guys trekking independently with us said they would have turned back that day if it weren’t for our guide to help them find the path. Word to the wise: It pays to hitch a ride with Dan and Audrey…if they have a guide!

Our local guide also provided local context and culture (e.g., Ladakhi Buddhist) to the experience. We asked him many questions about his life growing up in a remote village in Ladakh and the changes he’d seen in his short lifetime. He served as an interpreter, providing us the flexibility to have conversations with families we stayed with or ask questions of people we'd met along the way.

So while trekking Ladakh independently may save you some money and perhaps allow you a little more flexibility, our experience proved to us beyond a doubt that the benefits of having a guide in this region far outweighs the costs.

Ladakh Accommodation and Sleeping Options: Camping or Homestay?

Some treks will give you the option of either camping or homestays (staying with Ladakhi families in villages). Here are the advantages and disadvantages of both.

Camping: The primary advantage of camping (if you are going with an agency) is that it includes a horse to carry your bags so you don’t have to haul your stuff on your back up to 5,000+ meters and back down again. Another bonus: you can sometimes camp closer to passes, making for easier ascents. A perhaps obvious disadvantage of camping: sleeping in a tent when it’s rainy and cold or blowing snow can be unpleasant. In addition, this option is usually more expensive as you'll need your own cook and horse guide in addition to your trekking guide.

Homestays: If the trek you choose offers the option of homestays, we suggest taking it. Staying with Ladakhi families in villages throughout our Markha Valley trek was absolutely one of the highlights and delights of the experience. The people, culture and tradition ground you. Food (see below) is also a fun facet. Not to mention, homestays are typically less expensive than camping.

Note: We recently met the founder of Mountain Homestays, a social enterprise working to empower rural communities through the development of homestays together with local people and families. You can search for unique Ladakh homestays here, including those focused on astronomy where you have access to a powerful telescope to explore the sky in almost perfect high altitude and remote conditions.

What to expect in a Ladakhi homestay:

• Home-cooked meals: All food is vegetarian, which is better and safer for the digestive system, particularly at altitude. Alert the trekking agency, your guide and host families in advance if you have any food allergies. Dinner is often quite hearty and is either a traditional Tibetan/Ladakhi meal like momos (Tibetan dumplings) or temo (twisted bread dumplings) with daal (lentils) or greens from the garden. All our dinners were made freshly for us and were very tasty. Breakfast, a little less remarkable, usually consists of Indian flat bread (chapatis) with butter and jelly, while lunch is some sort of bread with packaged sliced cheese, hard boiled egg and some snacks.
• Sleeping area: Sleeping in homestays usually consists of mattresses on the ground with lots of blankets piled on top. If you’re trekking in the high season you might need to share your room with other trekkers. For us, we had our own room most nights. Take a sleep sack with you. Sheets looked pretty clean, but it was unclear when the last time blankets were cleaned.
• Toilets: Expect bleak. Outhouses or compost toilets are usually attached to the house or just outside. They do the trick, but don’t expect any luxury here. Bring a headlamp so you don't, um, accidentally slip and fall.
• Common room: Some of the best memories at the homestays come from hanging around drinking tea around the traditional stove in the big common room. The bedroom is for sleeping, but this common room is where you should spend most of your time during a homestay.

What to look for in a Ladakhi trekking agency and guide.

Book a tour in advance or on the ground?

We did not make any bookings or inquiries for treks before arriving in Leh. We figured that we would use the two to three days acclimatizing in Leh (absolutely required if you plan to enjoy your trek) to research all our options and book our trek. Since we traveled in shoulder season, this provided plenty of time to make our arrangements.

If you decide to travel during high season (July-August), you may not have the same flexibility. Consider sending a few email inquiries in advance to be certain that agencies are not already at capacity with their guides and tours.

Update: If you are looking for a trek in Ladakh with social impact and purpose we recommend you check out Global Himalayan Expedition (GHE). We recently met the founder, Paras Loomba, and were impressed by him and the work of this social enterprise. Its mission is to electrify villages through solar energy, and one of the ways it does so is through trekking and travel experiences in Ladakh.

This means that its trekking expeditions not only provide travelers with an incredible trekking experience in Ladakh, but they also provide the opportunity to help bring electricity and solar energy to a remote mountain village. GHE also trains local families in hospitality and helps them set up homestays so that they have additional sources of income and employment that help keep people in these remote, rural areas. This not only preserves these villages, but also the unique culture in them that would otherwise die out with migration to bigger towns and cities.

Choosing a trekking agency in Leh

You will see trekking agents everywhere in Leh. Many of them will have signs outside advertising their treks, as well as notices if they are looking for more people to fill treks with specific departure dates. The idea here is that the more people who trek together and share a guide, the lower the per-person cost should be. We originally hoped to join one of these treks, but the timing didn’t work out with our schedule.

We walked around Leh for an afternoon visiting various agencies asking questions about trek options, costs, departure dates and flexibility to add on stops. Most of the trekking agencies gave us a similar price range so our decision was made based on the feeling we got from the agency (e.g., did the agency feel like a middleman or were they actually responsible for their own guides and tours), their patience, and their flexibility to accommodate special requests.

We chose Ecological Footprint in the end because we liked how the owner, Stanzin, explained all our options and was flexible to work with us to create a trek that met our needs, not just one that fit into a prepackaged box. In addition, Stanzin is Ladakhi and know the community well. All the tours he operates use local people and aim to invest back into the communities. So while the tour was slightly more expensive than what some of the other tour agencies were offering, we felt that the price was worth it for the quality of the experience. We believed that our money was well spent.

We can also highly recommend our guide from Ecological Footprint, Dorjee Tondup. He is young but wise beyond his years and dispenses bits of perspective and peace everywhere he goes. His respectful approach to local people opened doors for us everywhere. His approach to everyone he met served as a lesson for life. He guides on all the major Ladakh trekking routes.

Choosing a guide

Although you may or may not have the option to choose a specific Ladakh trekking guide, we offer a few questions and suggestions to help you find a good match.

Ask to meet the guide before you leave on your trek.

This is something we usually do before any trek to give us peace of mind that we’ll get along well with our guide. We’ve never had to change guides, but if you do think that the guide assigned to you will be problematic then ask for a change. Remember, it’s a long journey. It will be particularly long if you must spend it with someone who rubs you the wrong way. Not to mention, you'll want someone you feel comfortable with and trust in the case that weather or health turn south. We know this firsthand because a guide from another agency who trekked alongside us in Ladakh annoyed absolutely everyone, including his own client. We spent energy trying to avoid him.

Ask for a Ladakhi guide.

During high season in Ladakh, demand for guides is high and so people come from all over India to guide for the summer. We don’t want to discriminate, but we feel that you'll have a better experience with someone who is a Ladakhi guide because of the knowledge of local culture and language. Our trekking companions had an Indian guide, and while he knew the mountain trails, he didn't know the families running the homestays or the Ladakhi language and culture.

Explain any special needs to the guide.

This goes for medical needs, as well as any other idiosyncrasies you might have. For example, we take a lot of photos so we stop a lot on the trail and slow things down. Alerting the guide in advance of this behavior lets the guide know not to worry when it takes us a while to go from point A to B. He can adjust his pace accordingly. One of the women trekking at the same time as us had back issues, so her guide would often carry one of her bags for her when her back ached. The idea: help your guide help you.

Estimated Costs for Markha Valley Trek

The updated price for our Markha Valley Trek (6 nights/7 days) including a guide, accommodation (homestay), food and transport to/from the trek is around 20,000 rupees per person. This also included a stop at Hemis Monastery on the way back to Leh. (Not all trekking agencies offer this, so ask about it. We really enjoyed the additional stop on the return and recommend it.)

This was slightly cheaper than some of the other trekking agencies while others offered bare bone prices at 1,600-2,000 rupees per person per day. Understand that you typically get what you pay for.

Homestay costs on Markha Valley Trek (Updated 2019)

If you do decide to do the Markha Valley Trek independently, find out in Leh what the official rate is for homestays that year. The official rate is a standard amount set every year by the homestay association so that the families all charge the same amount and don’t try to underbid each other (thereby causing tensions in the community).

Updated homestay prices, July 2019: The the standard Markha Valley homestay rate is 1,200 Rs ($17.50) per night per person. This includes dinner, breakfast and a packed lunch. A tent at Nimiling is 1,400 Rs ($20.50).

When to Trek in Ladakh?

The trekking season in Ladakh really begins to take off early-to-mid June and runs until September. The high season is July and August with August being the busiest month. Rains usually start late August to September. If you can time it, we recommend going early in the shoulder season in June. Note that weather is always the wild card, however.

Our trek was mid-June and there was hardly anyone (6 people) along our entire Markha Valley route. This meant that the homestays were not crowded and there were no traffic jams on the paths. We experienced a surprise snowstorm on our second morning at the first pass, but that just added to the excitement and meant that all the mountains around us sported a beautiful covering of snow.

Acclimatization and Accommodation in Leh before Trekking

No matter which trek you choose, be sure to spend at least two days acclimatizing in Leh (or wherever the setting off point of your Ladakh trek happens to be). Take a walk through the old town up to Leh Palace and Namgyal Tsemo Gompa. This helps get the blood pumping and the legs moving. It also gives you some experience climbing hills at altitude.

If you are susceptible to altitude sickness, consider taking even more time to acclimatize in Leh. Your hike will be more enjoyable and successful for it.

As for where to stay in Leh, there are a lot of guesthouses and hotels for every budget. You can search here to see which hotels are available during your visit and compare prices.

The owner of Ecological Footprints, the trekking agency we used, has recently opened up a guesthouse called EcoResidency. We haven't stayed there yet, but it looks quite nice and quiet.

Food recommendations in Leh

Summer Harvest: Best momos in town. We feel confident in this statement as we sampled momos in four different restaurants and kitchens in town. Be sure to ask for the homemade hot sauce. We never ventured beyond momos (they were that good), but other dishes emerging from the kitchen looked tasty as well.

German bakeries: Don’t ask me why, but Leh is bursting with German bakeries. They don’t all have their own ovens, so it seems like they get their baked goods from a central German bakery source. If you’re craving a cinnamon roll or some quasi European pastries, stop by one of these and enjoy with a chai. Quality is mixed, but when you consider how remote you are, you'll be grateful.

Lassi guy: In the alleyway just to the right of the mosque on Leh Bazaar is a tiny place with this friendly guy making and selling yogurt and paneer (Indian cheese). For a few rupees he’ll create a fresh sweet or salty lassi for you and invite you in to enjoy a seat while he explains how he makes it all. Highly recommended.

Monasteries and Other Sites in Ladakh

On our return journey from Leh to Srinigar we hired a driver from Leh to take us to visit a few monasteries on the way to Lamayuru, where we dropped us off and then picked up in the evening (pre-arranged) by a driver/shared jeep en route to Srinigar for the overnight drive.

Update: There is now an online shared taxi service in Ladakh to find other travelers going to the same monasteries, villages or trailheads. This not only shares the cost of the taxi or jeep, but more people in the same vehicle also reduces the carbon footprint of your travel and makes it more environmentally sound.

Likir Monastery

While traveling, we often find ourselves focused on the present. This is a good thing. Then, something helps us appreciate the history, the roots of where we happen to be. This too, is useful because it provides perspective.

Likir Buddhist Monastery in Ladakh, at almost 1,000 years old, is one of those places.

For much of our visit to Likir Monastery we were alone, save a sole monk who tidied up and made sure visitors took their shoes off before entering the temples. We enjoyed it all in peace and found ourselves stepping back, literally and figuratively, just trying to imagine how monks had gathered in those spaces for centuries — chanting, meditating, praying.

Alchi Monastery

Built in the 10th to 11th century, Alchi Monastery is made up of three major shrines. It's located not far from Leh, so it's an easy to visit on a day trip or en route to Lamayuru (like we did).

Lamayuru Monastery

Lamayuru is one of the small towns in Ladakh, named after the famous Lamayuru Monastery perched high above the town. It's a nice walk up to the monastery with a view of the town below, interesting chortens in this high desert landscape, and intimate temples.

Transport: How to get to Ladakh

Unless you have your own set of wheels (or wings) there are three main routes to get to and from Ladakh.

By Bus or Shared Taxi to Leh:

Taking the public or regular bus is the cheapest option and certainly delivers an experience, but it is often the slowest option. To book a shared taxi or jeep to/from Ladakh consider using this newly developed Ladakh shared taxi booking system to help you find other travelers to share the cost and space. This not only saves you money, but with more people in each jeep it also reduces the environmental footprint.

Srinigar to Leh: You have the option to take a two-day “Super Deluxe” bus (overnight in Kargil) or a 12-hour shared ride in a private jeep (with 6 other passengers). Both leave from the same area in Srinagar. Please note that the roads are only open for a short period each year, usually from May – September.

We flew from Mumbai to Srinagar and then took the bus up to Leh and a shared jeep for the return leg to Srinagar. If you have more time, consider taking the train from wherever you are in India to Jammu and pepper in a few strategic visits and stops along the way to Srinagar.

There are, of course, advantages and disadvantages to the bus and jeep. While the bus ride from Srinagar to Leh is long and not particularly comfortable, you are able to take a lot of photos out the window, as the pace is glacial, snail-like for much of the way. It's also an experience to travel with locals (e.g., Buddhist monks hopping on and off) and fellow adventurous travelers. Suggestion: try not to focus on the missing guardrails along the way. A dose of fatalism may also help.

Bus and Shared Jeep Costs from Srinagar to Leh (Updated 2019): Bus tickets = 1,399 Rs/person. Jeep price depends on your negotiation skills, but usually costs between 2,300-2,700 Rs/person depending upon which seat you have (i.e., back seats are cheaper).

Manali to Leh: This route from the south also features the option of a 2-day bus trip vs. 16-20 hours in a shared jeep. We didn’t take this route so can’t speak to it firsthand, but we met several people who did. The roads seem to be in worse shape than the Srinagar route, but you go over four large mountain passes which are supposed to be stunning. If you’re coming from Delhi, this is the more direct route. The roads are usually open for a few months of the year, again from June – September.

Bus and Shared Jeep Costs from Manali to Leh (Updated 2019): Bus tickets = from 900 Rs/person for the standard HRTC bus to 2,700 Rs/person for the more comfortable Volvo Bus. Jeep price between 3,700 – 4,100 Rs/person depending upon which seat you have (i.e., back seats are cheaper).

Update: We have heard that recent road improvements have shortened the length of this journey and have made it more safe.

By Plane to Ladakh

Flying into Leh is certainly more expedient, but you'll miss the beauty and adventure of the roads. The views from the skies in the mountains are supposed to pretty spectacular, however. Be sure to leave buffer days in your travel schedule if you fly as flights are frequently canceled due to bad weather.

Most planes fly from either Delhi, Srinagar and Mumbai (new in 2016). Try to book your tickets early as prices go up very quickly. Begin your flight search with Skyscanner as it includes all low-cost airlines in its listings.

Ladakh Trekking Packing List

Much of what we include in our How to Pack for a Trek article applies to trekking in Ladakh. However, we offer a customized Markha Valley trek packing list to ensure you have all you need to enjoy the mountains yet don’t overpack.

Since we chose the Markha Valley trek with homestays this meant that we didn't need to worry about tents, sleeping gear or food. We carried our own gear (mostly clothes) in a small backpack. The goal is to be sure you have all the layers you need to be comfortable in Ladakh's varied weather, but to not carry too much so as to struggle with your backpack's weight on the high mountain passes.

If you are doing another trek in Ladakh that includes camping instead of homestays then you'll need to bring (or rent) sleeping bags, sleeping mats, and other camping gear.

Trekking Backpack

Recommended women's backpack: Deuter ACT Trail Pro 32 SL Backpack – Very light and comfortable to carry. Includes all sorts of great functionality like a built-in rain cover, water bladder compatibility, wide waist belt for stability, and more. Love this backpack. Buy on Amazon | Buy on REI (28-liter)

Recommended men's hiking backpack: Osprey Packs Exos 38 Backpack – This backpack comes in several sizes, and the Large version is well-suited for tall people. Light, comfortable, and durable. The walking stick holder is a little janky, but the rest of the backpack is well-designed. Buy on Amazon | Buy on REI (48-liter)

Trekking Clothes and Shoes

You don’t need a lot of different clothes. Don’t worry about wearing the same thing every day. Everyone does it. It's more about having the proper layers since temperatures may rise and fall dramatically between day and night as Ladakh is a high desert. Here are the trekking clothes we suggest for a Ladakh trek.

• 1 set of hiking clothes: T-shirt (preferably quick dry), long-sleeved hiking shirt (his and hers)) or pullover, shorts or trekking pants, hiking socks.
• 1 set of sleeping clothes: T-shirt, pajama bottoms (or yoga pants), socks. To ensure these remain dry, pack them in a plastic bag or other impermeable container inside your backpack.
• Ski hat and gloves: This may not be necessary later in the season, but by early to mid-June we were very thankful to have these as we were stuck in a snowstorm on our 2nd day.
• Hat and sunglasses: The sun's rays are exceptionally powerful at this altitude and you'll find yourself especially exposed when there isn't a cloud in the sky. Be sure to wear a hat at all times to protect your face and sunglasses to protect your eyes.
• Hiking shoes: Low-rise hiking shoes are fine, but if you have weak ankles consider bringing full support shoes. We both recently shifted to wearing Oboz Sawtooth hiking boots. The insoles and support for your feet are really good, and the shoes are sturdy and can stand up to some tough terrain. In addition, Oboz plants a tree for every pair of shoes sold so you can feel good that your purchase is going towards reforestation and environmental projects.Men's Obuz Sawtooth Hiking Shoes: Buy at REI | Buy on Amazon. Women's Obuz Sawtooth Hiking Shoes: Buy at REI | Buy on Amazon
• Extra t-shirt: Just in case.
• Underwear for every day of your trek: With an extra pair thrown in for good measure, if you like. Recommended his and hers
• Extra pair of socks: Just in case you want to switch out or it's freezing and you need an extra layer to stay warm in your sleeping bag.
• Fleece or other shell jacket: For cool nights or sleeping.
• Rain jacket (optional): Just in case it rains. We used ours as an extra layer to stay warm at night. I recently upgraded to a NorthFace Climatech technology waterproof jacket and I love it. It not only provided protection against the rain and cold, but the jacket material is very breathable so it didn't feel like a sauna inside when trekking in it. Highly recommended. Buy at REI | Buy on Amazon.
• Thermal underwear (top/bottom): If you're trekking either early or late in the season, consider bringing along some silk long johns as they are warm, comfy and take up almost no room at all.
• River shoes or flip flops: At the end of a long day of walking you may want to take off your hiking shoes and give your feet a rest. But you'll still need something on your feet to go to and from the outhouse or nearest bush. That's where flip flops or river shoes worn with socks (yes, ignore the fashion police) are perfect.Buy on Amazon (Women's) | Men's River Shoes

Other Recommended Trekking Gear

• Waterproof backpack cover: You never know when a rainstorm will hit, so it’s essential to keep a rain cover for your backpack close at hand.
• Camera bag: If you are carrying a separate DSLR or mirrorless camera I suggest a camera bag that you can wear on your waist so that your trekking backpack rests on top. I really like the ThinkTank Sling Camera Bag which fits a mirrorless camera body and two lenses. It is comfortable for hiking as it sits right on my hips and I can still wear a backpack or daypack that rests on top of it.
• Reusable water bottle: We carry a reusable liter water bottle on us and refill along the way. A CamelBak water bladder in the backpack also works really well. Homestays (and some tea houses) will be able to provide you with purified water so just refill your bottle each time you have access to clean water. Even if the trek does sell bottled water, please don't purchase it. Plastic bottle waste is an enormous problem at elevation and in villages that have no options for garbage disposal.
• Water Purification: Although the homestays will provide you with clean water it's good to carry some purification or sterilization drops in case you need additional water from
  a mountain stream or non-purified village tap.
• Walking stick: Highly recommended, especially for downhill sections to help with balance and to take some of the pressure off your joints. Two walking sticks or one, you ask? That's a personal preference. We usually share a walking stick set of two so each of us uses one stick.
• Quick-dry travel towel: To dry off your hands or face.
• Sleep sack: To provide a clean layer between you and blankets provided at the homestays.
• Headlamp: Some of the homestays do not have electricity or lights. Carry your own headlamp to find your way to the outhouse or to sort through your stuff at night.

Toiletries and Health Kit

• Soap, toothbrush, toothpaste, dental floss: You know, the basics. And don't laugh at us that we put dental floss as a basic.
• Sunscreen: The higher the SPF of the sunscreen, the better. The sun is very powerful at this high altitude.
• Sunglasses: Necessary. That sun is darn strong.
• Hand sanitizer: To be on the safe side.
• Pack of tissues or roll of toilet paper: Always a good idea to carry your own, just in case.
• Blister care: Duct tape is remarkably effective for hot spots and blisters on your feet if you address them when you first feel them. Compeed is magic when you already have blisters as it essentially covers your blisters with a protective later which allows them to heal below.
• Medical Kit (for emergencies): Band-Aids, anti-bacterial gel (for cuts), rehydration packets, ciprofloxacin/azithromycin (or another medication against stomach bacteria), Tylenol (anti-headache/aches), Immodium (or some sort of “stopper” if you get diarrhea). Note: All this can be easily and inexpensively purchased at local pharmacies, including in Leh.

Electricity and Charging Batteries

Although some homestays may have solar energy that you can use to charge your smartphone it's best to be prepared in case you don't have any access to electricity during your trek. Some tips to handle this and further your battery power.

• Put your smartphone on airplane mode. There is no connectivity along the trek anyhow, so don't waste your phone’s battery power trying to find a network.
• Consider buying a phone case that doubles as an extra battery. Here’s an example for our iPhone X battery case. Alternatively, you could carry a Mophie charger. They all provide another 1-1.5 charges.
• Take an extra camera battery or two.
• Don’t spend time reviewing your images on your phone or in the camera viewfinder, as this will quickly consume battery power. Unless you are reviewing images to determine whether you’ve captured a specific shot, there will be time enough for photo review when your trek is finished.
• Solar-Powered Energy Bank: If you really are concerned about charging your phone and gear along the way, consider bringing a solar powered power bank.

Still have questions about Ladakh and trekking there? Ask away in the comments below!

Update: You can now buy the Ladakh Trekking: A Beginner’s Guide with all the information from this site plus extra details and other goodies (like packing and other preparation) in an easy ebook that you can download and take with you.

The post Ladakh Trekking: A Beginner’s Guide appeared first on Uncornered Market.

When travelers consider northern India, thoughts run to the Golden Triangle, the popular India tourist circuit of Delhi, Agra and Jaipur. While we appreciate the appeal of sights like the Taj Mahal, there is much more to experience in northern India — without the crowds, scams and hustle of being on the tourist path.

That’s where some of the lesser known places in northern India like Amritsar, Dharamshala and McLeod Ganj, and Shimla come in. These destinations fall outside the popular and traditional India tourist itineraries and feature smaller towns with fewer foreign visitors (we were often the only ones), cooler temperatures, beautiful temples, a diversity of religions, a toy train that features one of the most picturesque train journeys in the country, and opening vistas to the edge of the snow-covered Himalayas.

This Experiential Guide offers 20 ideas and inspiration on what to do and places to visit in northern India outside the Golden Triangle, focusing instead on Amritsar, Dharamshala/McLeod Ganj, and Shimla. There is good reason why these areas of Punjab and Himachal Pradesh have been our travel wish list for over a decade.

Northern India (Beyond the Golden Triangle): 20 Things to Do, Places to Visit, and Dishes to Eat

For those of you who love maps — as we do — here is a visual of our 7-9 day route through northern India on our G Adventures tour.

1. Catch a ride from Delhi airport with a women only taxi company

Here’s something you don’t see every day: an all-women driver taxi service. Unusual in any destination, but especially so in India. As we exited Delhi airport all the drivers waiting to collect passengers were men, except for our driver, Reena.

Here’s why.

Women with Wheels is a Planeterra Foundation project which partners with the Azad Foundation and the Sakha organization as they provide training and employment to disadvantaged women in Delhi. All G Adventures travelers arriving at Delhi airport have a Women on Wheels pickup included in their tour. This not only provides travelers a safe and comfortable ride to their accommodation in town, but it also means a steady source of income for the women drivers.

Reena, our driver, possessed the requisite nerves of steel and calm required to drive in Delhi, especially during its morning rush hour traffic.

Note: In addition to Delhi, Sakha also operates similar women-only taxi services in Kolkata and Jaipur. You can book your taxi online here.

2. Sit back and enjoy tea on the Delhi to Amritsar Shatabdi Express train

One of the reasons we chose this particular G Adventures tour in northern India: trains. We are train junkies. It’s our favorite way to travel, especially in India where the experience is more than just getting from A to B. It’s about the movement of the train, the flow of landscapes from urban to rural, the people you meet, and the melodic rhythm of life on an Indian train.

Even tea time on the train is special.

3. Admire the high kicks, posturing and mustache competition at the Wagah India-Pakistan border ceremony

Although we’ve experienced our share of bizarre land borders as we’ve crossed from one country to the next, we’ve never encountered anything like the Wagah border ceremony between India and Pakistan. The ceremony takes place daily in the late afternoon as the gates between the two countries prepare to close for the evening.

Imagine a stadium that seats 30,000 fans (on the Indian side), a military officer emcee who riles up the audience to cheer as loudly as possible to drown out the Pakistani crowds on the other side, an Indian flag waving parade of young women and girls, and a mosh pit where riled hordes dance to their favorite Bollywood songs.

And this all goes down before the actual ceremony even begins. Bollywood couldn’t script it any better. Here’s a video taste of what you get:

Don’t worry though. At the end of all this machismo and power posturing, the sides shake hands, indicating peace holds for yet another day.

Visiting the Wagah border ceremony: Foreigners are separated from Indians as they enter the stadium, then seated in a separate section. It can get very hot waiting for the festivities to begin. Consider choosing a seat in the shade up top before making your way down later. Security is tight. Leave all belongings in your vehicle, except the basics: passport, wallet, phone, and camera. Although small purses are usually allowed, camera bags are not.

4. Enjoy the Golden Temple at night

The Golden Temple in Amritsar by night: stunning. Not only does the physical beauty of this place make it so. The atmosphere — welcoming, peaceful and inclusive — does, too.

As the preeminent pilgrimage site of Sikhism, the temple complex courses around the clock with visitors. Despite the constant flow of people, a calm, quiet and meditative feeling prevails. All are welcome, respected and even cared for, no matter their circumstances. ⠀

Even though we’d had the Golden Temple in Amritsar on our minds for years, the nuanced sort of wonder that defined our experience exceeded expectations.

Our suggestion: after taking a walk around the temple complex, find a quiet place to sit and simply be present.

5. Admire how a team of volunteers feeds 60-100k people each day at the Golden Temple langar (kitchen)

One of the most remarkable features of the Golden Temple at Amritsar is its langar, a sprawling kitchen serving free hot meals to 60,000-100,000 people each day. Just try to get your head around that. The scale of food service here boggles the mind.⠀

Also remarkable is that food preparation and service is accomplished mainly by volunteers, with ingredients and money donated by members of the community. Seva, or “selfless service,” is a key precept of the Sikh religion. The Golden Temple attracts volunteers from all over India, and the world.

⠀⠀
During our morning tour, our local guide took us through the kitchen area to witness volunteers preparing for the breakfast shift. Everyone worked side by side — from fire-stoking to chapati-making to dish washing — focused solely on serving others. The atmosphere, humbling. The rhythm, meditative.

6. Enjoy winding views of the Himalayan foothills in Himachal Pradesh

As you depart the lowland plains of Amritsar and head into the hills of the Indian state of Himachal Pradesh, the journey begins to switchback wind its way up into mid-mountain territory. Temperatures dip a bit, air freshens.

And the snow-covered peaks of the Himalayas and Ladakh begin to reveal themselves in the distance, just as they accompany us on our drive to the towns of Dharamshala and McLeod Ganj.⠀

When you look at a map and consider distances in northern India it’s easy to think, “Oh, those distances aren’t so great. It won’t take long.”

No.

What you’re not taking into consideration: the small 2-lane winding mountain roads. Yes, it can take 5-7 hours to go 140-150 km.

The upside? All the views. Lush terraced fields, little villages, endless hills, and snow-covered mountains peaking in the distance. As a bonus, if you have a driver like ours you also get some Punjabi hits to accompany the Himachal Pradesh landscapes and 10 different horn melodies he uses to blast warnings to others on the road.

7. Turn the prayer wheels – and keep your eye out for the Dalai Lama — at Tsuglagkhang Buddhist Temple at McLeod Ganj

McLeod Ganj, a once-sleepy town just up the hill from Dharamshala, is now the home of the Dalai Lama and the headquarters of the Tibetan government in exile. Since the Dalai Lama fled to India in 1959, it has become home to tens of thousands of Tibetan refugees, lending the town a strong Tibetan cultural feel.

Although the Tsuglagkhang Temple Complex is where the Dalai Lama resides today, don’t expect to just run into him in passing. He’s busy about the world. But you can enjoy a peaceful walk around the temple – and enjoy its impressive collection of murals, statues and prayer wheels.

Turn each mani prayer wheel clock-wise. Or just be present in the moment.

Note: If you want to learn more about Tibetan culture, arts and religion, be sure to check out the Norbulingka Institute near Dharamshala. The rest of our G Adventures group visited and said that the grounds and gardens were incredibly peaceful and pleasant.

8. Hit the hills outside of Dharamshala for a day hike to Triund Hill

We couldn’t resist getting closer to the mountains outside of Dharamshala. So we hiked up to Triund Hill (2,800 meters / 9,200 feet). The view from the top includes sweeping looks of the Dhauladhar Range. This is the reward for a day hike up a fairly well-defined but rocky path from McLeod Ganj through the village of Dharamkot. It's definitely worth the steep climb and the 20km round trip of hiking.

Note: The hike from McLeod Ganj is around 9km one way, and 7 km from Dharamkot. We began our day further down the hill. That's why our walk turned out to be 20km. We were tired by day's end, but it’s easily accomplished as a day hike.

9. Get your momo fix in McLeod Ganj

I have a bit of a dumpling obsession, no matter the variety or origin. After our descent from Triund Hill, the first thing on my mind were momos, Tibetan dumplings filled with vegetables or meat, served either steamed or fried. They are usually served with a roasted chili hot sauce. Delicious at any time, but especially so after hiking 20km.

The steamed veggie momos are my favorite. If you’re sharing with a group, you can sample fried and steamed and come to your own conclusion. Although we enjoyed the fried greens at Tibet Kitchen and believe that their momo skins are ideal, we actually enjoyed the flavor and filling of the veg steamed momos at United Restaurant and Café, just down and across the street.

10. Hang with the pilgrims at Rewalsar Lake

Rewalsar Lake near the town of Mandi is perhaps an unlikely stop, but it's one which helps break up the long journey from Dharamshala to Shimla. It's a peaceful and welcoming one, too.

Legend has it that the great Buddhist teacher Padmasambhava (Guru Rinpoche) took flight from Rewalsar to Tibet and spread Mahayana Buddhism there. Today, Rewalsar is a sacred destination for Hindus, Sikhs and Buddhists; temples from each religion ring the water. Pilgrims circle around the lake with Mani prayer wheels in hand and prayers on their lips.

Given the surprised looks our group received, foreign travelers – as yet, anyhow – typically don’t visit this sleepy pilgrimage town. However, that didn’t stop locals and visiting pilgrims from flashing smiles and engaging with us as they gathered with friends on park benches at the end of the day.

11. Walk The Ridge in Shimla and feel transported to England…and another era

The British chose the once sleepy hill station of forested Shimla as their summer capital (1864 – 1947) so as to escape the heat and crush of Delhi. You can still see the surprisingly well-maintained remnants of this today. Shimla is now a bustling and not-so-little hill town filled with pedestrian-only promenades, churches, and British mock Tudor and colonial architecture.

With its cooler temperatures and views of the Himalayas, Shimla is a fun place to wander, enjoy the hillside perspective and take in some easy-going shopping. It’s easy to see why this is such a popular destination for both Indian and foreign visitors.

12. Lose yourself in Shimla's Lower Bazaar

Just down the street from what feels like little England, bustling Indian markets burst with spices, color, and tons of activity. Our suggestion: just walk, poke your head into stalls, take a turn or two on the laneways, and enjoy some sensory overload.

The spread of spice stalls across Shimla’s Lower Bazaar features sacks and tins, and ancient wooden racks, drawers and dividers that ought to have a voice so that they might tell us their stories. Colors are earthy and bright, chili peppers of the deepest red, turmeric of an otherworldly yellow. Scents waft among it all. The whole and the ground; the sweet and the pungent; the blended and the masala’d all help make Indian food so delicious and complex.⠀

Wander, question, show curiosity, and perhaps add something familiar and needed, or unfamiliar and unknown to one’s spice rack back home. For as many times as we’ve been to India, we always discover something new or encounter something unusual. And, we always meet someone interesting along the way.

13. Explore the grounds and gardens of the Viceregal Lodge (Rashtrapati Niwas)

Not far from central Shimla on Observatory Hill is the grand and impressive Viceregal Lodge, the former residence of the British Viceroyal of India from 1888 to India’s independence in 1947. As you take a guided tour of the interior you also hear the story of how the lodge played an important role in negotiating India’s independence. Black and white photos tell the story of the major players of Indian independence and Partition, its split with Pakistan.

The lodge that once served as a symbol of British colonial power is today the Indian Institute of Advanced Study, considered the top academic and research center in the country for the humanities and social sciences. What were once grand dining halls and ballrooms now serve as libraries and areas of research and academic thought. A rather apt twist of history.

After your tour of the lodge’s interior be sure to take some time to explore the surrounding gardens.

14. Enjoy the breakfast of champions — masala dosa and coffee — at the Indian Coffee House in Shimla

The India Coffee House on Mall Road in Shimla is more than just a cafe or restaurant; it's an institution. It was established in 1957 as part of a program to allow coffee workers to set up, run and manage coffee houses, and to generate additional income. Over 50 years later the oldest cafe in Shimla is still going strong.

To our sense, not much has changed — in a good way.

A masala dosa and a strong cup of filtered coffee — the real stuff, not instant — is one of our favorite ways to start the day. Although I'm sure all their food is good, we heard from our guide that they are best known for their southern Indian dishes (e.g., dosa, idli, etc.). Visit to the Indian Coffee House not only for the food. It's the atmosphere of the place, including the professional waiters (see the photo above), that really make for a fun and engaging experience. Not to mention, because its run by coffee workers, the coffee is actually quite good.

On a practical note, the Indian Coffee House seems to be the only cafe open in Shimla before 9AM. If you're an early riser or have an early morning train to catch, this is the place to go.

15. Take the ropeway down from Hanuman statue for views of Shimla

If you really want to get above it all in Shimla take a walk up to the giant Hanuman statue at the top of the hill. It’s not a long walk, but it is steep and you need to beware the pesky and aggressive monkeys that want to take your sunglasses, water bottles, and snacks.

Take note of the sign at the bottom which indicates the average amount of time to walk to the top, according to one’s age and relative fitness. Then compare your results!

On the return, however, we suggest you take a relaxing ride on the ropeway, or gondola. You get a beautiful view of the town below and of the expanse of hills surrounding Shimla. The clearest days yield views of the snow-covered Himalayas.

16. Pair an Indian craft beer with some pani puri

One thing we were not expecting to find in Shimla: a craft beer brewpub. We enjoyed a pale ale and shared fusion-inspired snacks at Brew Estate. Though it doesn’t fall into the category of “traditional Indian,” it does reflect a segment of modern India. It also makes for a delightful and safe way to order several small plates and share some Indian street food favorites. You can also order a full proper dinner here, too.

If you’ve had your fill of high-octane “strong” Indian beer, then enjoy a flavorful citric pale ale, red ale, or hefeweizen wheat ale in Shimla. Then, order several rounds of pani puri for your group to enjoy.

Pani puri is common street food snack made of puffed balls filled with potato and topped with tamarind juice, plain yogurt and coriander sauce. Delicious, but often the various liquids, herbs and ingredients can leave a traveler with Delhi belly.

That’s why the pani puri at Brew Estate was perfect. Everyone in our group tried this unique and fun combination of flavors, but in a safe and perfectly hygienic setting. Everyone loved it, so several orders circulated the table.

17. Take the Toy Train from Shimla to Kalka and Count the Tunnels (Hint: 103)

Built in the late 19th century, this narrow gauge railway winds itself through the hills of Himachal Pradesh, often twisting and turning back on itself in feats of navigation and engineering. At almost 100 km, this 5 hour train ride is one of the most scenic, ambling and pleasant in India. Stops in several stations offer ample opportunities for milk tea and snack breaks along the way.

18. Take a city walking tour in Delhi led by former street kids

Although this experience isn’t included as part of the G Adventures Northern India by Rail tour, it is offered as an optional activity. If you have a free day in Delhi before or after your tour begins, we recommend you seek it out. Just ask your G Adventures tour leader (CEO) to help organize it. If you’re not on a G Adventures tour, then you can inquire here.

This tour is like no other typical city walking tour — in a good way. Here’s why.

Anny, pictured above, guides us through a narrow alley near Delhi railway station. Her personal story is one of having been orphaned at five years old. For the last ten years she has lived in a shelter run by Salaam Balaak Trust, a local organization providing support, education and training to children who once lived their lives day and night on the street.

Besides sharing her knowledge of Delhi, Anny gave us some more background on the street children in India – the various ways many of them end up on the street, their survival tactics, and the ways they spend the money they make and steal. Their dreams, too.

This Planeterra Foundation project together with Salaam Baalak Trust offers youth the opportunity for English language courses and training in guiding and tourism. The goal: to build new confidence and give the children practical skills and experience in preparation for the time they must leave the shelters (at 18 years old) and they begin seeking employment. Social impact travel in action.

19. Savor the charcoal dal makhani at Kitchen with a Cause and support disadvantaged youth

We consider ourselves pretty savvy and knowledgeable when it comes to Indian food, but we'd never had dal makhani served to us stewed with a smoldering piece of charcoal.

Smoke-infused creamy lentils equals amazing.

This social enterprise restaurant provides hospitality and restaurant training to former street kids and disadvantaged youth. Completion of a minimum 6-month training period also helps them find full-time employment in restaurants or hotels afterwards. To eat well and support disadvantaged youth: satisfying.

Address: 15A/63, Ajmal Khan Rd, Block 15A, WEA, Karol Bagh, New Delhi. It's about a 5-10 minute walk from the Karol Bagh metro station.

20. Deck yourself out in Indian clothes and colors at Fabindia

On our first trip to India together over ten years ago I discovered Fabindia, an Indian clothing shop that uses high quality natural cottons and materials and works with rural communities so as to provide local opportunities for employment. The colors, designs, and cuts for both traditional Indian clothing (e.g., kurtas, tunics, dupattas, saris) — as well as more western-style items — are beautiful, unusual and high quality.

In other words, it’s the perfect place to get yourself outfitted with some traditional Indian clothes for your travels in India. This not only helps you fit in and shows respectful dress, but the clothes are loose and comfortable for the local climate. For women I recommend picking up a couple of tunics and kurtas that you can wear either with jeans, light walking trousers or as a set with a pair of their colorful matching trousers. All the choices, sizes and colors are a bit overwhelming at first, so don’t be afraid to ask for help from the local staff. Or from your husband.

There are several Fabindia locations in Delhi. I had especially good luck at Connaught Place.

The post Northern India Beyond the Golden Triangle: A Travel Guide appeared first on Uncornered Market.

How a two-day 258 miles bus ride through Kashmir served as my price of entry to Ladakh.

Each time he coughed, a fog of rancid death gripped my seat. From the vapors, I imagined blackened teeth and gray tongue and was reminded that the mouth is purportedly a much dirtier place than the anus.

As I turned an eye back behind me, I noted the culprit, a man sitting behind me wrapped in a pheran, scarf and other bits of South Asian alpine exotica apparel that appeared not to have been washed in their several decades of existence. I wondered where he’d come from, where he was going. And Why? What was his story?

Then, I smelled his breath again. And I wondered, “Why am I here?”

The Super Deluxe Bus

“It’s a difficult journey. You must have Super Deluxe,” the attendant urged. According to the signs behind the ticket desk at the Srinagar bus station in Kashmir, there were three distinct levels of service to Leh, the provincial capital of Ladakh: Super Deluxe, Deluxe and — by process of elimination yet not explicitly offered — Squalid. The Super Deluxe two-day journey cost 1050 rupees ($17) each. At a premium of only a few dollars, this seemed the wise option. In these parts, a little luxury and deluxe-ness can sometimes go a long way.

“It’s a very good bus.” Given that we were not only in India, the land of dubious bus journeys, but further still in Kashmir, the only word of his I trusted was “bus.” We had a ticket with a seat number and this alone constituted victory as we imagined what the scrum would look like the following morning as the bus doors were flung open.

But our ticket read a foreboding seat assignment: #13.

The following morning at the bus stand a young middle-class Indian couple from Mumbai, also on their way to Ladakh, stood waiting. “Do you know which is our bus?” they asked, pointing to a collection of ramshackle, wheeled heaps strewn amidst a sea of passengers, hawkers, bystanders, and passers-by.

“That one, I think,” Audrey pointed to the bus marked “Super Deluxe” whose appearance was neither super nor deluxe. But it was the only one headed to where we wished to go, Ladakh.

“But they told us it would be super deluxe,” our young Indian friends echoed a sentiment we’d held fast to only 30 minutes earlier. We’d since moved on, accepting our fortune and embracing that it was now our turn to help others — even Indian tourists who ought to know better — to accept their fate.

I almost hugged them and said, “It’s OK. We’ll get through this together.”

Flat Tires and Samosas

In the world of transport, troubling is no better defined than by a stop ten minutes into a two-day journey in order to hammer a shabby panel of sheet metal onto the undercarriage of one’s vehicle. As our co-pilot banged away in the dirt outside of a dilapidated service station, I noticed that our bus was precariously perched atop a small rock at an angle, leaving him one slight wrong move or one good gust of wind away from being flattened under the weight of our bus.

What is life if you refuse to live it on the edge? I imagined a t-shirt sporting such inspirational words. I turned away and noticed one of the passers-by from a local village wearing instead a shirt that read, “If you’re bad, I’m your dad.”

After all the passengers, men and women, peed at the edge of the irrigation canal along the rice fields out behind the garage, it was time to hit the road anew.

Thirty minutes later, we paused again, this time to fix a flat tire or perhaps to reinforce the spare.

Either way, I bore the pause no ill will as this service station included two young men hovering over a wok encrusted with ancient mustard oil. They dished out samosas and offered us bottles of cake-grit, windblown hot sauces.

We ordered two samosas, drowned them in red and green hot sauce, knowing full well this would set us either on the path to digestive hell via the bacteria inside, or digestive heaven due to the prophylactic effects of hot peppers and spice that would annihilate anything inside of us.

Then we ordered two more.

I could feel the fresh little microbes cruising around my guts. They would have to do battle with the guys that had just entered from Mumbai. I pitied the ones from the sushi we’d eaten in Japan only days before. They didn’t stand a chance.

Pakistan is Near

After meadows and green fields rapidly yielded to ever-growing mountains, that’s when the hills came alive — alive with men, men in fatigues and big automatic weapons creeping and lurking in the shadows of trees. While crouched Indian soldiers in the hills left me vaguely unsettled, the other passengers appeared totally unfazed.

I looked down at my map; we were right next door to Pakistan. Places like Skardu made famous as a site of a school (and a bridge) in Greg Mortenson’s now somewhat disgraced fictive memoir Three Cups of Tea were only some 110km away as the crow flies. Meanwhile, towering peaks and unrelenting landscape placed it more than six times further away, 725km by passable road.

The song Kashmir by Led Zeppelin crept into my head. You know, it’s not a song at all about Kashmir, but rather about Morocco — or as many other Led Zeppelin songs probably are, about something we’ll never know.

As we approached the village of Sonamarg, mountains yielded to meadow and dried open plain. Dust kicked up and the number of vehicles grew around us like a crowd. We were no longer alone.

“Why do you think those shepherds have so many horses?“ Audrey asked pointing out the window at gatherings of scarf-bedecked gypsies leading their steeds in circles.

The horses, it turns out, are ready-made for leagues of Indian tourists who descend on the region in summer and like to ride out to the glaciers on horseback. The flocks are aided in part by an Indian government program that provides Indian military families and government workers all-expense paid trips to Kashmir as a benefit of their service.

A perfect conflict juggernaut, I thought. Kashmir, wrapped in beauty and insecurity, will likely prove to be one of the world’s key — yet forever geopolitically misunderstood — flash points.

Fear Boulevard and the Ice Penis

As much as our bus moved forward, it also lurched. Like a ship in a storm, it swayed to the road’s swells, axles bending but thankfully never snapping, much like you’d expect of a well-constructed building in an epic earthquake.

The road out of Sonamarg could for me be named Fear Boulevard and ascended quickly on the approach to Zoji-La pass.

The rapid elevation gains not only boggled the mind, but also deprived it of much-needed oxygen. That such a narrow road, scraped off a mountain face and in a seeming state of constant erosion and rubble could be engineered — should be engineered — gave me wonder. 3500-foot drops stagger the mind and challenge the photographer to communicate the extreme. You know you are in thin air. What you don’t know is exactly how to capture it. And the whole thing lasts for a slow drip of about 20-25 miles.

Not only was this road long, perched and precarious, but it was also packed with vehicles, sometimes three and four abreast, which through the winding was a cause for genuine concern. At one point, we found ourselves above the valley by what looked about 4,000 feet. No guardrails. The roads (a term of generosity) were in horrendous moon-like shape — boulders strewn, ditches cut, water running from one steep pitch over and through our path and off the cliff. I imagined our bus becoming one with those rivulets and sliding right off the mountain face.

Coincidentally, we would hear news days later that a six-person jeep fell off a similar road across the region, taking with it the lives of three people. Spine-tingling, yet thoroughly unsurprising and reasonable.

Jeeps sped around us, threading the needle-like chain of supremely colorful “Goods Carrier” trucks. Many of them featured Muslim prayers — prayers timely and ironic as death by accident feels fresh, close at hand. The so-called Border Roads Organization (BRO) responsible for maintaining these feats of man, placed signs along the way that imparted such wisdom as “Be Mr. Late, not Late Mr.” and “Darling I like you, but not so fast.” But no one heeded them much attention.

At one point, amidst stunning landscape, our bus pulled to a long halt behind a traffic jam. Audrey got out to enjoy an absurdly edge-loving closer view of the sheer drop, something she does not only because she enjoys it, but also because she secretly knows it terrifies me. Almost immediately, the co-pilot adhered himself to Audrey, as he did anytime when I was the safe distance away of more than one meter.

He explained that Armanath Cave, a holy Hindu place, was located in the valley below, just beyond the white speck tents in the distance. “In a couple of weeks there will be 10,000 or 15,000 Indians here each day for the pilgrimage. They go to the cave to see the ice lingam inside.”

I shook my head trying to imagine 15,000 people on these roads. Apocalypse.

Then, I imagined the ice lingam. Or, for the uninitiated, a penis-shaped ice stalagmite.

This is no ordinary ice phallus, however. It’s a supposed representation of Shiva, the Hindu god of destruction. And it’s one that attracts scores of pilgrims, to the tune of over 600,000 each July and August. But due to lack of preparedness and acclimatization and miserable road conditions, over 100 of them on average die annually along the way.

The entirety of what I’d just considered allowed me to reflect again: we humans are an interesting lot.

Now it was now our bus’ turn to thread the needle of traffic through the cargo trucks. As I admired the full motion video of peaks and drops, I realized that one of my internal organs had been shaken loose. Maybe it was my pancreas. My palms were sweating. Were it not for the beauty, I would damn my eyes. It is an astronomically long way down.

This, I tell myself, is the price of adventure, the price of passage through Kashmir, the price of entry to Ladakh.

Crossroads in the Middle of Nowhere

Drass is said to be the second coldest inhabited place on the planet. Regardless of the verity of this claim, bleakness and crispness of air seem to prevail, even in summer. Parachute tents stand nearby at the ready all year round. Drifting shepherds look as windblown from afar as they do windworn up close.

I feel slightly bad for people that live in Drass, not so much because it is cold, but because the name of their town expresses such grimness to me. Drass.

We stop for a tea break. The shops in Drass look like wooden boxes turned on their sides, strung with the latest produce from the last passing truck. Up here, this high, this cold, this remote, bananas seem a luxury. But everyone needs energy, especially the shepherds emerging from far-flung hills and gorges.

Drass is the sort of place that underscores that Kashmir is a crossroads culture. Traditional trading routes have split hither and yon; they invite the willing, the needy, and the courageous to enter this region and to cross its unforgiving landscape. From Persia, the Mughal Empire to Hindustan and Tibet, Kashmir has taken them all. You can see the net of this migration and interbreeding in some Kashmiris: the lightness of the color of their eyes, the shade of their skin and also the tint of their beards.

This place has seen its share of traffic.

Kargil: A Place to Stop for the Night?

Kargil is a way station, the likes of which I imagine will someday serve as backdrop for a space age film telling of the post-apocalypse. Kargil is gritty and basic; it looks like a trading post, bartering at the end of days.

We pass by all manner of shops. Pots and pans are well represented. The Kargilis liked to cook apparently. Either that, or Kargil serves as the Great Mall of Kashmir and Ladakh.

It was also our stop for the night.

The first item of business: to find a room. As a gaggle of men engulfed upon our exiting the bus, we defensively partnered with the young Indian couple from Mumbai. They could speak the language, and he offered to maneuver and negotiate for us. Secretly, I think they also felt safer with us. They were a long ways from home, too.

We headed up the hill into the streets of Kargil, backpack-laden, following a middle-aged local man who ran a cheap guesthouse. He led us into a courtyard and up the stairs of a building that seemed mid-construction, cinderblocks stacked up on the side of the second floor in lieu of a wall.

“It doesn’t look unhygienic,” Kiran, our friend from Mumbai, offered optimistically as he entered the first hotel room.

I had to laugh. It was possibly one of the most unhygienic holes I’d seen in seven years, maybe only outdistanced by the huts in the Sikkim hills where rats fell from the rafters onto our shoulders as we slept.

“Not unhygienic?!” But I was tired and feeling ill. Who was I to argue?

I can say with almost complete confidence that the bed sheets, in their uncountable years of service, were never once washed. In the bathroom, a painfully dim fluorescent bulb dangled from a ceiling wire and cast the place in the pall of a horror show sanatorium. Atmosphere teetered between bleak and grim. I’d have to go with grim on TripAdvisor.

The room next door was the same size, only it was home to about ten men, all lingering under one lone light bulb.

My imagination kicked in. This looked like the sort of place where outlaws gun-running for the mujahideen might hole up for the night before making their way eventually to the mules waiting at the Khyber Pass.

This was a smugglers hotel. A flophouse. The stuff of lore. And I was living it.

Of Bed Bugs and Morning Ablutions

I awoke the next morning to the unsettling beep-beep-beep of the alarm at 4AM. Instantly, I knew I’d been food; my waist and back were lined with bedbug bites. I know, I know: bedbugs are hygiene agnostic, they enjoy filth as much as they do luxury.

But I know: smugglers and gunrunners across the Himalaya and the Hindu Kush, they must all be bedbug infested.

Our bus was scheduled to leave at 4:30AM, but as all good schedules in this part of the world go, it was missed generously, offering us the opportunity to watch closely as the man with bad breath performed his morning ablutions in the bus parking lot. With the aid of a small tin of water, and an inventorying of his nostrils with blackened fingers, he expelled an astounding amount of sputum into a small puddle on the ground.

In Kashmir, the land of desiccation, it was the only moisture for miles. The ground devoured it almost instantly.

The Bend in the Road at Buddhism

Later that morning, we found inspiration in the village of Mulbekh, a crossroads within a crossroads. It’s low-slung skyline set against the hills and bends in the road tells a story of a region that has known many religions in its history. Mosques and Buddhist temples coexist, as do the Muslims and Buddhists who visit them. Appearances begin to shift. Wide faces with high cheekbones replace the darker, more chiseled features of the Kashmiris.

Breakfast, too, lifts our spirits: a simple yet dazzling truck stop thali. Giant cauldrons stew egg curries and lentils and greens; three dishes with rice run us a cool 60 rupees ($1.20 or so). It was the egg that cost extra.

Landscapes shift into moonscape rocks. Our environment now looks like the Ladakh I’d had in my mind. Lamayuru, a town inset in mountain stone served as foundation to monasteries built on top of the hill. My imagination stretched to consider what it must have taken to build this place.

From the side of the road, we picked up a Buddhist monk wearing black, wide-rimmed, photo-gray glasses. He looked like a young Dalai Lama. It didn’t seem out of the realm of possibility that he could have been a close relative.

We dropped him off an hour later in what seemed like the middle of nowhere, a narrow dirt road snaking nowhere discernible into the hills.

Where are they coming from? Where are they going? I wish I knew.

Leh: My Why, My Way

The bus entered Leh, the capital of Ladakh. It had taken two days to advance 258 miles (416 km). I felt on top of the world and also, because of the nature of the journey, very much deep inside of it. Srinagar to Leh via a wobbling bus was my gateway through worlds, from one to another, unto each other.

As we turned into the Leh bus terminal station, the man behind me seemed to let out a gasp as if to close the trip, to bookend it with one last hack. As much as I cursed the roads, the bus, the bed bugs, and the bad breath of the last two days, I wouldn’t have traded any of it for the ease of an hour-long flight.

An experience such as this defies a flyover. It also fit as the final segment of a quest, one that began over fifteen years ago in San Francisco with a photo on a neighbor’s wall.

Though the road was rocky, it was the journey that mattered – because it helped me understand where I was and why I’d come all this way.

The post The Joys and Pains of Getting There (Kashmir to Ladakh by Bus) appeared first on Uncornered Market.

Ladakh: a place we had dreamed about for well over a decade, a visit packed with expectations. What made this place remarkable wasn’t quite what we expected.

Imagining Ladakh for all of those years, we focused on the landscape. Sure, Ladakh as a setting for just about anything did not disappoint. The physical beauty was more stunning – and more consistently so — than we’d ever imagined.

But that’s not really what made our journey there exceptional. What made it truly remarkable was something that went beyond the incredible vistas. It was the sense of something spanning and broad, a journey and exploration of within and without, an experience that was stitched of encounters with Ladakhi people, their culture, their religion, their homes – coming together in an inimitable coherent sense of place.

That’s Ladakh. And here are a few memories and images that we hope might demonstrate why.

9 Memories from Ladakh

1. Roads that Stun: You Almost Forget That You’re on a Cliff

OK, I know we said it wasn’t all about the landscape. But oh.

Unless you travel there by airplane, which in some cases carries its own drama, getting to Ladakh feels epic. If you go the way we came, it takes two days on a bus from Srinagar, Kashmir to cover about 250 miles (420km). Keep in mind this is not just any old bus, but the so-not-aptly-named “Super Deluxe Bus.” And the roads are not just any old roads, but the sort of horrific roads that will leave you reaching for the spare pare of trousers.

The views almost made us forget the potential fall…almost.

2. Ladakhi People: A Breakfast Moment

Meal times, as in the world over, were times to bond and get to know one another. Breakfast time with a family in the ten-house village of Skyu, our first homestay stop after the Gonda La Pass was no exception. These grandparents were playing with their granddaughters after an outing to the family garden to pick spinach for our lunch tiffins (boxes) that day. The grandfather's adoring gaze and a granddaughter's eyes wide open express something universal.

3. Tibetan Mani: Rocks and Chants

In Ladakh, Buddhism is a part of the wider cultural landscape. The land is infused with it. One visual representation of this: mani prayer stone walls, typically placed within eyeshot of a peak or a sacred space such as a monastery. Imagine hundreds if not thousands of flat stones engraved with the Buddhist mantra om mani padme hum. As I touched the surface of one of these stones and felt the etching, I wondered how many hands had passed since its artist first uttered his prayer as he carved into the stone.

4. Ancient: Tea Time with the Underground Shepherds

If we had one cup of tea along our trek, we might have had hundreds. It was a morning and evening ritual. But our most memorable was taken in a subterranean shepherd’s hut in the base camp village of Nimaling. The eldest shepherd’s face was wizened, showing weathered signs of bringing animals to high pasture for over fifty years.

His daughter offered to make us chai, something one must never refuse, for the experience and the propriety. She fired up a pot of fresh goat’s milk tea courtesy of the goats outside. As their milk came to a boil, they gathered peeking through the small window at the high end of the kitchen.

The scene was smoke-filled, rugged, serene, peaceful, and timeless. In the fast rewind of life that happens just before it ends, this gets a frame.

5. Momos: A Tibetan dumpling-making lesson in a Ladakhi village kitchen

“Do you think we will have momos one night?” I asked Dorjee, our guide, as we walked into Markha, the town after which the famous valley trek is named.

“I don’t know. They are difficult to make,” Dorjee responded.

A couple of hours later: “We’re having momos tonight. They are making them just now in the kitchen.”

Dan and I jumped on the opportunity. Could we watch them? Maybe even join in? The two sisters of the house tirelessly rolled dough and cut circles out of it while Dorjee gave us lessons on how to fold, stuff, and tuck the dumplings into quick yet elegantly decorated half-moons.

I was challenged – instead of the beautifully outlined crescents, my momos looked something like squished toads. Dan – a man no less — was much better at the folding, stuffing and tucking, which amused the women to no end.

6. Timeless Faces, Eyes that Smile

Ladakhis in the Markha Valley, especially the women, have a way of smiling with their eyes. When you find a grandma with smiling eyes and that look of wisdom and experience, you just might feel like you are drawn into the tractor beam of human magic.

7. Wisdom of Young Men: Dorjee Tells of Going Counter-Clockwise

Our guide, Dorjee, a young Ladakhi man wise beyond his 21 years, unknowingly dispensed with wisdom in small doses along our way. He was a living case study in the power of positive communication. His respectful approach to all people opened doors everywhere he went.

“Anything is possible. You just need to ask first,” he told us several times. Notice that his advice didn’t guarantee certainty, but suggested that the act of asking respectfully might unveil new possibilities.

Another piece of wisdom came during lunch one day when we were hesitant to feed a dog that the mother of the house had been treating very badly. “If she [mother of house] throws stones at him [the dog], she probably doesn’t feed him well. Then the dog needs the food from us even more,” he explained.

Finally, when we asked whether it was necessary or advised that we circle the Buddhist mani rock walls clockwise as others had done, his response: “Well, only if you believe.”

Much of this could be filed under the general reminder to focus on doing what is right rather than always doing as others do.

8. Novice Monks and Dharma Trumpets: A Buddhist Ceremony

Sometimes, timing is everything. And so it was when we dropped in on Hemis Monastery on our return to Leh from the end of our Markha Valley trek. There, we stumbled upon a novice Buddhist monk ceremony in one of the temples. Monks of varying ages sat lined up with prayer books in front of them to guide them in their chants.

It was a scene of serenity. Then came the music: a cacophony of sounds — like elephant bellows — emanating from long horns; cymbals lightly crashing, traditional flutes and drums. The scene shattered just lightly our image of a peaceful Buddhist chant. Then it made us chuckle. Then we admired their focus. Maybe that’s the whole point of surprise experiences: to shake us from our expectations.

9. Hybrid Creativity: When A Cow Meets a Yak

What do you get when you cross a yak with a cow? You get what's called a zo. Yes, a zo. For lack of a better descriptor, the zo is the “mountain cow” of Ladakh. Zo is a also a good word to know for Scrabble when you're missing that second “o”.

—–

When we set out for Ladakh we did so with its nature and landscape in mind, but it turns out that was really only the equivalent of a frame to what was truly inside. Ours was a deeply moving experience that involved simple connections to people and their sense of place, a remote place. Ladakh is not easy to get to (although it's becoming easier), and it's this feature that has shaped the Ladakhi people and culture through the centuries. For us, Ladakh is a place — a well you might say — from which we'll continue to draw stories and lessons as our experience sets in.

The post Ladakh: 9 Memories of Deep Himalayan India appeared first on Uncornered Market.

Tibetan Buddhist prayer flags greet us as we reach Ladakh's Gongmaru La pass. All the residual fatigue from climbing up to 16,800 feet/5,130 meters seems to evaporate once we've reached this place, our goal. It's been six days in the Markha Valley and we've been up and down — and up again.

We have to remind ourselves not to move around too quickly up here, not to exhaust ourselves from the altitude. But it's difficult to contain the excitement of being on top of the world — and as photographers, to grab a piece of and bask in every little visual slice that we can capture. The scenery stuns with layers of mountains for as far as the eye can see, while a surprise snowfall earlier in the week means our view is blessed with dramatic snow caps.

But what goes up must go down. Soon, we must begin a long journey into the valley below. Until then, we have this view to enjoy.

The post Crossing Gongmaru La Pass, Hiking the Markha Valley Trek in Ladakh appeared first on Uncornered Market.

This is a story of our re-discovery of a few of life’s truths amidst a seven-day trek in the Himalayas.

“One foot in-front-of-the oth-er.”

Through my head coursed a glacial cadence whose stitched syllables represented four tiny steps, over and over, up and through the mountains of the Tibetan Himalayan cache of Markha Valley in the northern Indian region of Ladakh.

My pace was akin to that of a snail, or perhaps a determined zombie. The tempo I’d embraced kept my heart rate so low that I felt almost as if I weren't even moving, despite the fact that I was persistently scaling a steep incline above 15,000 feet in elevation.

Why? I'd reached my trekking meditation zone.

Maybe you've felt something like this before. You’ve walked a long distance, even something arduous. And all the while, you haven’t lost a breath. During the process, your mind wandered to freedom, allowing you to drift into the nature around you; you absorb and feel immersed in your surroundings instead of intentionally observing them.

Suddenly (or perhaps not so suddenly), you find yourself looking to a valley below — that’s where you came from. And there you are on top of a mountain, exactly where you were meant to be.

Something really significant occurs to you. When you aren't concerned with the pace of your movement, the pace of your progress just might astonish you.

That’s what rhythm will do for you.

But how?

“One foot in-front-of-the oth-er.”

The Grind

But it wasn’t always this good.

Amidst this lightness, I thought back to a conversation Dan and I shared earlier in the trek. While climbing our first big pass (16,200+ feet/4,950 meters) on the morning of the second day, we found ourselves in the middle of an hours-long unexpected snowstorm, a surprise blizzard. Dan was sick with a lingering sinus infection and fever. Top this off with residual fatigue from a beautiful but grinding two-day bus journey from Kashmir to Ladakh, and you have the makings of emotional dissonance, an anti-rhythm that adheres to lingering bits of self-doubt as to whether you are still physically and emotionally equipped to tackle treks like this.

“Maybe we should have gone to the beach instead…a real vacation…relaxation…this is hard work,” I heard Dan grumble that day.

I knew what he meant.

But things improved. (After a round of antibiotics from our medical kit for the sinus infection…but that’s for another story.) A good dose of sunshine never hurts, either.

The Himalayan Tortoise, The Himalayan Hare

Not only is trekking meditation a beautiful phenomenon to experience in and of itself, but the technique effectively moves you greater distances more quickly than you'd imagine. Why? Because this slow, steady movement means you won’t require long breaks to catch your breath. Think: the tortoise and the hare.

In the earlier moments of our trek we’d acted more like the hare, tearing off, trying to keep up, slowing down, taking long tea and lunch breaks just to recover between fast-paced clips. Mind you, it wasn’t bad. Our surroundings were stunningly beautiful, but something was off. And that something was our rhythm. It was missing.

Then, on our fifth day, something snapped into place. Perhaps it was the ominous write-up I’d read weeks before of the day’s 2,300 feet/700-meter ascent that told me, “Go slowly today.” Or maybe it was simply that I needed a few days in the mountains to actually find my rhythm. Amidst all that beauty and adventure, it was tempting for us to try to keep up with the pace of others rather than to seek our own.

I asked Dan, “Do you want to go in front? I know I’m moving really, really slowly.”

“No. This is just about perfect. It’s like my body is moving without effort,” he replied. He was in step just behind me.

Dan had hit the trekking meditation zone, too.

We were in the right place after all, moving tiny through the Himalayas, our minds opening, our bodies feeling paradoxically weightless, out-of-body.

Finding the Good Way

On one of the steep inclines, amidst a series of snaking switchbacks, I looked up to see how much further we had to go. At the top of the hill, Dorjee, our Ladakhi guide looked down at us, almost paternally (ironic, considering he was only 21-years old).

I could see him watching us, smiling.

When we finally reached him, he clapped softly: “I am very happy for you. You’ve found the good way. You’ve found your rhythm.”

The Final Pass

The following morning, we were on our way up again – this time, to the trek’s highest pass, Gongmaru La (5,130 meters/16,800 feet).

This pass, too, had been cause for concern. Our previous crossing at 4,950 meters/16,200+ feet had been exceptionally challenging and a voice echoed in my head, “This is high-er.”

By now, however, the climb before me had disassembled itself into baby steps, cadence and flow.

This is doable, this I can manage, this I can enjoy thoroughly.

“One foot in-front-of-the oth-er.”

Indeed, we’d found our rhythm. We’d found the good way.

If you've never experienced this sensation before, please give the following a try. Next time you find yourself at altitude or faced with having to tackle miles of challenging, snaking, winding and ever-upsloping trails — go very slowly, even more slowly than you’d ever imagined yourself being able to tolerate. Almost plodding. And lose yourself. So long as your goal is clearly understood, it’s only one sure slow foot in front of the other.

And maybe you’ll find that progress matters more than pace.

And maybe you’ll find your way, the good way.

And maybe you’ll think to yourself, “…not bad advice for life off the mountain, too.”

The post Finding the Good Way: How to Meditate While Trekking at 15,000 Feet appeared first on Uncornered Market.

This is a story about how when you hear penguins at 20,000 feet, there’s a good chance you’re in deep sh*t.

“Ladies and gentlemen…the weather situation in Srinagar is very bad…flights are being diverted to Delhi…four flights just before us…we will try and see.”

I'd absorbed only fragments of the pilot’s announcement as my head was buried in a book. We’d come from Mumbai and rivers of monsoon to escape to Kashmir in northern India, apparently only to find more storms.

Then we began our descent.

What? Flights are being diverted, but we’re going anyway?

Immediately, we could feel an updraft, the sensation of the plane being gently lifted by an unknown hand from underneath then pounded incessantly with large rubber mallets.

I’ve felt this before. I can handle this, I think.

As I peered out the window, I noticed we were clearly on top of – or perhaps even inside of — a storm. Bits of thick white cotton framed foreboding swirls of gray in the shapes of swans and distended unfurled breakfast rolls; ominous layers and puffs roiled into a twist. (If my deftly constructed metaphor feels tortured, imagine what it was like on that plane!)

Then our plane began to bank. I’m familiar with banking. For example, I notice that flights to London Heathrow usually do it about 16 times before landing.

But why on earth would we make a banking turn at this altitude, just above the clouds?

We descended a bit and struck some light resistance, a jolt. The pilot pulled out and turned again, this time banking at an even steeper angle, as if he were deliberately aiming to spin directly into the grayness. It felt almost like a pitched descent, the sort I’m told is employed by service flights taking contractors into “green zones” in places like Kabul and Baghdad – in order to avoid anti-aircraft fire like rocket-propelled grenades and Stinger missiles.

We were not headed into a green zone. I heard no anti-aircraft fire.

A cloud swallowed us. We vanished into complete blackness. The plane leveled. And that’s pretty much when all hell broke loose. The plane rocked, shook and seemed to vibrate from without and from within. A huge drop, we lost altitude.

The entire plane – full up with Indian families and honeymoon couples on vacation — erupted in screams, then quieted again.

My stomach was in my throat, right next to my heart and a handful of other vital organs. I gripped Audrey’s hand, or she gripped mine. We’d begun to sweat. We looked at one another, grabbed tight.

Usually, I feel good enough about these things that I joke. No jokes this time. I was scared. I’ve been on a lot of flights that rocked and rolled, but something about this said, “This just might be your last.”

If it’s going to happen, it’s going to happen. And I just hope it happens quickly. These are moments in a flash where I snap and drift into thinking “What will it look like if this plane disintegrates in mid-air?” If an engine falls off, how long will it take for us to drop? What would it feel like if the plane broke in two? If an engine breaks off, would the whole wing go with it? Or would the wing remain attached yet limp? I imagined myself in a Magritte-like surrealist scene where the sky is filled with passengers and a handful of airplane toilets.

I was uncomforted.

Meanwhile the twin girls across the aisle joined in by projectile vomiting and turning their seating area into a Jackson Pollock painting. I give them an A for effort in trying to be tidy though, unknowingly bypassing the barf bags and grasping with their father’s help for the plastic Ziploc bag that held the safety information card. Meanwhile, their mom sat next to us terrified, occasionally glancing at us as if to say, “Are we going to make it?”

“I don’t know.”

It felt as though we’d committed and there was no going back, no going up.

The only way out it seemed was down.

The only question was how.

The pilot attempted another descent, driving the plane deeper into the clouds. The plane dropped again. Clearly, he was forcing it, likely because his position offered him no choice. I could hear him fire the engines; I could feel the air resist around the plane.

Then the engines made a sound so god awful, I was certain they’d fall off. (If you’ve ever taken a fully loaded jet like a 747, the engines make that grinding whirl upon initial ascent, a slightly unsettling noise that one easily comes to terms with after it disappears. The sound we heard: absolutely nothing like this. In a word: wrong.)

There’s no onomatopoeia to do it justice: thwap, thwap, thwap, maybe. Quick in succession like an overzealous spatula beating a mountain of wet cookie dough. But there was no cookie dough and the magnitude of the tremor shook the plane to something apocalyptic.

Had a bird gotten caught in the engine turbine? Really, it felt more like an emperor penguin.

The shuddering sensation was hellish, of the sort that makes you wonder whether something is really happening or whether it’s over and you are only dreaming in the embers of what’s left of your brain function.

The circumstances felt torturous. We were in a tiny little metal tube 10s of 1000s of feet in the sky and Mother Nature would have her way. She always does.

Screams reached blood curdling. Their sound became part of the horror. In a moment of awareness, I was struck by the fact that most screams sounded of terror (understandable) while many others sounded of exhilaration, like the collective cry at the peak of a roller coaster (curious).

Regardless of how thrilling this was, we were all pretty much confused, terrified of dying — dying a death of flying toilets and penguins.

I could not imagine enduring 10 or 15 more minutes of this, nor would I expect any commercial aircraft to emerge from this intact.

“Ladies and gentlemen. We can’t penetrate this weather. I’m afraid we must divert to Delhi…” I’m glad the pilot was still alive.

Relief, except for the small matter of the penguins in the engine. Jokes aside, I’d wondered how a plane so battered could remain mechanically sound enough to continue flying.

Eventually, our plane returned to cruising, with a few bumps of the sort that I would previously have ignored. Not anymore. I was a scarred. Or was that scared?

[We landed in Delhi. What ensued was so entirely Indian, it me made thankful for all things big and small. “This is an unintentional welcome to Delhi,” the pilot announced deadpan, fully composed. Since he was uncertain how long we’d have to wait to take off again, he invited people to get up, move around and even enter the cockpit. Next thing we know, the aisles are packed, the cockpit has 10 people in it, the co-pilot is on Facebook on her smart phone while the instrument panel reads, “ NO DEVICES, PLANE REFUELING” and there’s a guy who’s hitting his head on the ceiling where all sorts of buttons are located. I’m sure that at some point he’s going to inadvertently shut down the entire electrical system. I will that the pilots be absolutely thorough in their pre-flight check.]

After the pilot received clearance to return to Srinagar, we set off again. I closed my window shade.

As our wheels approached the Srinagar airport runway, the plane erupted in cheers. I thought to myself, “People, we aren’t on the ground yet!” I winced, thinking that irony delivers a blow just when you think you are safe.

Our wheels touched ground. We made it. There was a breath deep inside of me that had waited four hours to find freedom.

“Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, welcome to Srinagar.” (And yes, the flight attendant really addressed us just like this multiple times. And you’d have to imagine it said with an inimitable Indian accent where she pronounces it “gu-uls” rather than “girls.”)

And as the plane rolled to a stop, we were greeted by men with assault rifles. They were friendly men, I think. But I didn’t care. We were on terra firma.

And we were in Kashmir.

—–

Epilogue:

Hats off to the pilot. These guys and gals have extremely difficult jobs that require them to prioritize safety while keeping vacation-hungry passengers on track.

After landing in Delhi, the pilot emerged from the cockpit and addressed the passengers (180+) from the aisle. I can’t imagine anyone demanded an explanation, but he gave one, indicating that only one of the recent flights to Srinagar made it because its pilot was more experienced in the mountains and had chosen an approach from the opposite direction.

Regardless, I am supremely grateful for his attempts, but more importantly for his wisdom in knowing when to quit.

“Are you afraid of flying now?” Not any more than usual. I have my share of flights ahead of me. And they carry with them the risk they always have, which is to say less than that of getting into a car.

“Are you afraid of Srinagar?” Nope. Chances are we’ll be back someday soon.

The post Flight 447: We Cannot Penetrate This Weather appeared first on Uncornered Market.