10/10 – Visiting Shimla

Woke up not too late, but by the time we left the hotel it was already 11am. We tried to book a second night in our hotel as the manager suggested, but we had to do it through a website. We did it, paid online and once we went down to tell them we booked the room they told us “sorry it is full now”… AAArrrggggg we will try to sort this out later.

The Ridge view from above

We crossed the bazaar on our way up to The Mall and stop to get pranthas (or paratha) on the way (type of flat bread with filling), we took 2 paneer pranthas, they were really good but hot! We crossed the Ridge heading for Christ Church. On its left is the start of the path to climb to Jakhu Hill Temple, or mainly known as the Monkey Temple. We can see the 33m statue of Hanuman from the centre of Shimla.

Jakhu Hill Temple in the distance

Motivational sign

We climbed the hill in 33 minutes, we were really proud of ourselves because we were stopped by Indians to take picture with them, so in the end I am pretty sure we would have done it in 30 min, which means according to the sign next to the church that we are “absolutely fit”!! 

Entrance of Jakhu Hill temple

Hanuman Statue 33m

Hanuman Statue

We met more and more monkeys on the way. Once at the top, they were everywhere, and often in strange positions. While we were admiring the really tall statue of Hanuman, a monkey jumped on my back and stole my sunglasses. I was really scared not to get them back… Especially that for once I finally had prescription sunglasses, without them I could not really see properly. 15 people tried to get the glasses back, more than once I thought the monkey would took off with them and I could have said goodbye to my sunnies, but luckily it stayed around the statue. In the end we lured it with a closed packed of peanuts, we had from the train ride to Kalka. The monkey took the packet and left the sunnies behind. Someone managed to get them back before any other monkey decide to claim ownership over them. 30 minutes of struggle and it felt like ages… luckily I got my glasses back, with teeth marks and a light scratch on the glass (nothing too bad) as a souvenir!

the temple

After the incident, we decided to go and visit the temple (but mainly to get away from the crazy monkeys). To visit Indian temples, you need to take you shoes off. One of us kept his socks and the other was bare foot and we got in the temple, you start by ringing a bell and then you enter the temple were you can give donations and get a mark on your forehead (we skipped that part). Then you can generally go around the main part in a clockwise directions. Here the walls were covered of tapestry representing one of their god. Once out we put our shoes back on and washed our hands.

the garden

There was not much of a view which was a bit disappointing after climbing so much. Near the temple was a “garden” full of monkeys, we were a bit afraid to be assaulted again, but they were only females with their babies, so peaceful monkeys! We went back down to the Ridge and headed to the Viceregal Lodge on the complete opposite side of town. We had lunch on the way (spicy samosas).

abandoned Victorian house

another one

castle

Police station

view on the way

We crossed the whole town from east to west. There were a few things to see on the way to the Viceregal Lodge, old colonial houses, the police station, a castle… It took us a while to reach it, but we were not in a hurry. When we arrived we bought our tickets to visit the gardens and the house and we encountered for the 1^st time the two prices: foreigners VS Indians, we paid more than double the price of an Indian ticket. One of us tried to ask with a big smile 2 Indians tickets but the guy looked back puzzled saying “Indian tickets not possible”. At least we tried. The visit of the house was at 2.30pm so we had 40 minutes in the gardens, so we took our time, enjoying the gardens and the building.

Viceregal Lodge

entrance of the Viceregal Lodge

can't claim to be British without a proper rose garden!

To be honest the visit of the inside was kind of a waste of time, 1^st of all you only see 3 rooms and 2 of those are just covered with old photos and the history of the house. Which was fine don’t get me wrong, but we were expecting more, not just that… The 3^rd room we visited was the main hall, really nice but that was it, we were shown the way out. We could see that a part of the building was a big library (maybe part of Shimla University) but we could not get in and we were not allowed upstairs. So in the end, big deception.

enjoying the view, sunset underway

last sunset in Shimla

Went back to the town centre to fix our hotel problem. In the end we decided to take a night bus to Dharamsala at 9.30pm from the new bus stand (reachable by bus or taxi). Then it was time for another pretty sunset. At 6pm we had some dessert (before dinner as we were too early) and once it was 7pm we order some food. We were back at the hotel to pick up our bags and leave again direction the new bus stand. We took a taxi (much easier and hassle free than the bus) and arrived one 1h early. The bus waiting for us is not really has promised… Supposed to be a deluxe semi-sleeper…

Within the first hour, I was vomiting my guts out of the window (luckily they opened). You can imagine which state I was in for the remaining 9h….

our crappy bus

“Slept” in an awful bus on our way to Dharamsala