Woke Up to the wonderful view |
Hey everyone! Hope you are doing well and I
also hope that you have given my first travel blog post a read, where I talk
about all thing Shimla and Kufri. In my last post I talked about how we reached
Manali, crossing Kulu. Time to take you through the trip starting from Day 4!
Day 4: Manali – Solang Valley
After literally freezing for a night in -11
degrees, I woke up to a magnificent view that morning! On day 4 We decided to
go to Solang Valley. In February the route to Rohtang is closed, hence we went
to Solang. It is not very far from Manali and takes about an hour. In case you
want to do some activities in Solang valley like Skiing {LOL}, get the outfits and pay for the activities before reaching the snow
point, because they tend to charge more, once you reach the Valley.
Although the activities might not be fun at
all, do try doing something :P. I only opted skiing, and it was so weird!
Skiing on a plane is not skiing according to me, especially when you have no
place to move, since there are so many people there already!
This was my first time in snow and I was so
happy, even more when I saw my first snowfall! Made snow angels, and a snow
man, had a lot of fun with my family! And that was way better than skiing!
Hahaha! If you really want to have fun doing these adventure sports, then this
is not really the place to do them.
We were here for almost the whole day and
we directly went back to the hotel, because all of us were tired.
Day 5: Manali – Hidimba Temple – Vashisht
Vashisht Temple |
Monastery in Manali |
Our hotel was just at a 10 minutes walking
distance from Hadimba Devi Temple and we walked till there. The weather was
quite bad and it started drizzling so we decided to not go to the Ghatothkach
tree. It is very old and peaceful place. The whole premises is filled with
trees and is quite serene. A must visit.
From here we headed to another temple, in
Vashisht. Locals call it “Garam Pani ka Mandir” because of the presence of hot
water spring inside the temple. It was not what I thought it would be,
honestly. People use the hot water for bathing, washing, etc. There are a
couple of other old temples in the vicinity of this temple. Beautiful, small
temples and the view from here is magnificent! On the way to the temple, there
are a lot of curio shops with great pieces! Do visit, but keep in mind the
prices are higher than usual. There is also a thing called “Supadu” for which
the vendors will call you and ask you to have a look. DON’T fall for it, it’s
just a normal blanket, but it will end up wasting your time. In case you have
plenty of time at hand, then have a look.
After that, we headed to this place called
Club House, where there is nothing much, but if you want to do “river
crossing”, as they call that, then this is a good place to be at. It is okay to
spend some time , but other than that, like I said, nothing much here.
It had started drizzling by the time I was
done with my river crossing and we decided to head over to the marketplace and
the Monastery, praying for the rain to stop.
By the time we reached, the rain had
subdued and it was a lovely weather! So we skipped going to Van Vihar and
directly headed for the Monastery. It is a small but beautiful Monastery and so
peaceful. Don’t miss this if you want to calm down a bit.
We went out on a search for food after that
and had some yummy food, more on that on my food blog. We spent quite a bit of
time shopping and I got a lot of clothes, I didn’t mean to shop this much
though!
A little tip: BARGAIN! And do have a look
around before you buy something, because the price of the same thing is
different at different shops.
But thankfully, it started to pour and we
decided to call it a day, and head to the hotel and take some rest. Or else I would have shoped more *Hides face*
It snowed Later that night in Manali!
I think I will have to do a Part 3 of the
trip, because there is so much I want to tell you about Mcleodganj and
Palampur.
Keep an eye out for the next post, till
then Let me know what you think about this post and the Part 1 of this series.
Loads of love,
Priyanjana
* Most of the pictures of these two days are a bit personal, hence not sharing. Will keep in mind to click loads of pictures for the blog from the next trip!
Read Part 1 of the blog.
Read Part 1 of the blog.