India, Sri Lanka and The Maldives - Days 9 & 10

Oh dear! A monkey steals Jackie's prescription sunglasses at the Jakhu monkey temple, Shimla. We got them back (after it had chewed one of the ends) when someone threw a bag of sweets to it

After a good night’s sleep we met Manjit at 10.00 for the first of our “two days at leisure” i.e. organised by us, to take us, we thought, to the bottom of the Jakhu ropeway, a cable car that goes from the ridge to the Jakhu monkey temple on the highest point. It appears we have forgotten, or become incapable of organising a p**s up in a brewery as rather than take us to the bottom, he drove to the top. I thought we were going high but Brian was happy, till he wasn’t! It really didn’t matter though, we know what a cable car is like, and this way Manjit could park up and come and have a look too. We are doing a long hike in Sri Lanka that mentions monkeys living at the top that will steal your glasses, and then we read a vague suggestion of the same here, so, very efficiently I thought I brought my old prescription sunglasses with me on the trip too. 

The very large monkey statue on top that can bee seen all over Shimla

Well, despite being prepared, or so we thought and as well as wearing a woolly hat, we walked out from the covered walkway, looked around and quick as a flash one had bounced up my back and grabbed my glasses. We were surrounded by a very friendly group of people, all looking slightly shocked, one of whom had a paper bag of sweets or something. He tried approaching the monkey to do a swap but all it did was look really aggressive and growl, it was really quite scary. He tried a couple of times but it obviously wasn’t going to work so he approached the guy who was sweeping leaves. He took the bag of sweets and threw it past the monkey who dropped the glasses and went for the bag. Brian went and gave the sweeper a tip, not realising they weren’t his sweets, not that I think the other guy was worried, he’s got a story about rescuing some stupid English tourist, I got my glasses back, albeit with the end of one arm chewed off, the monkey got some sweets and the sweeper got a tip. There is a suggestion in the Rough Guide that the monkeys may be trained to do this sort of thing, but who knows…. As we left one was sitting there holding someone’s woolly hat, so there could be some truth in the suggestion!

Fine views of distant Himalayan snow capped peaks marking the border with China

We decided to walk down from the temple, a lot less effort, well we are at an altitude of 2455m where Brian has certainly been known to get altitude sickness. Still a lot of steps that made my leg dithery, though nothing like this hike in Sri Lanka I mentioned. We then spent a very relaxed day walking along the ridge, looking in the shops of the mall and going further down the precipitous steps into the craziness of the bazaar. We stopped for a pleasant lunch and had a great conversation with 3 young people who work for Expedia. One local to Shimla, a second Indian who spent three years studying at the university of Aston, so very local to us and a Spanish girl from Madrid. The local girl recommended a drive to the north of Shimla, which Ranjeet, our tour agent had also mentioned so think that’s going to be tomorrow.

Down on The Ridge in Shimla town looking back to Christ Church, beyond on the top of the hill is the monkey statue, the mock Tudor building to the left of the church was constructed in 1860 and is the library. Left of that, on a white plinth is a statue of Gandhi 

We were wondering how we were going to get in touch with Manjit when we wanted collecting, he’s a lovely guy but his English, particularly written is not very good. He showed me how to share my location on WhatsApp, which along with the message come please has worked very well. The fact that we have all got cell activity all the way up here in the mountains is quite amazing. I am very impressed with my Lebara SIM, £1.99 a month for 6 months then £4.99 and works U.K., Europe and India. There is a slight hiccup with it at the moment though, WhatsApp is working, as is data, and outgoing calls, I’m just not receiving incoming calls. Having said that I have just received one from a lebara agent, so just trying to find someone in the U.K. available to give me a call. Strangely everyone has got better things to do on a Saturday lunchtime than be on WhatsApp!

This is a short Relive video of our Shimla walk with a few more photos. Chick on the triangle to play,  it really shows the sharp ridge Shimla is built on high up in the mountains

Day10

Phew, I’ve managed to plan a day! Naldehra was the place suggested by both Ranjeet and the girl at lunch, and it seemed a good place for a drive. Well we couldn’t have Manjit getting bored! About an hour north, along some thinner windier roads, but we were ok, we weren’t driving, and we could look out of the windows. It was very scenic it has to be said. We arrived at a place that wasn’t even a town but appeared to be our destination, there were lots of men with horses. That was a surprise! We are not really in to horses, particularly thin scraggy ones so we declined a horse ride but sort of followed two on foot. Some random bloke appeared, who works at the golf course, so he said, but he could show us the way, as it wasn’t the same as the horse way. For £5 we thought why not? He took us up through the woods, showed us the river (if you squinted) snow covered peaks, and the highest point hereabouts. We then got to the activity park, but having seen the state of the harnesses we weren’t tempted by the zip wire or climbing so we carried on walking to the golf club and round. It was an easy little saunter, but lovely to get out in the fresh air under a clear blue sky. And yes, I had enabled location on WhatsApp with Manjit, just in case anything untoward happened! There is still snow about from the last snowfall which I’m guessing is when we had the rain in Delhi. It would have been an entirely different journey up here if there had still been snow on the ground.

This is the view from The Ridge, a pedestrianised area by Christ Church and near The Mall pedestrian street in Shimla. Fabulous views all around

Coming back the way we came our next stop off was at Carignano nature park which I’d found on Google maps. It wouldn’t have been worth the journey just for this, but as an additional little stop, particularly with the slightly hairy road to get there it was a good addition. Brian was determined that Manjit should come too rather than sit in the car. The ticket man waived the entrance for him, though obviously we were going to pay, and so he came, whether he wanted to or not, though he did seem touched that we wanted him to come too. Definitely something and nothing but a pleasant enough little stroll.

Thats The Ridge from above. It literally is built on the ridge of the mountain and gives panoramic views all around

Back to Shimla to the Viceregal Lodge, that became the Rashtrapi Niwas, (presidents residence) or now the Indian Institute of advanced study. This variety of names and the random one way system in Shimla that Google doesn’t know about meant our journey took a little longer than expected, with Manjit stopping to ask for guidance along the way. One of the places he stopped was the Oberoi hotel, where he threw us out just to go in and have a look. It was beautiful, and was one of the suggested places to eat, but we’d have been right out of our comfort zone in the clothes we have available to us!

Whatever you call it it was beautiful. You could only go in on a tour, so we had to wait 45 minutes for the next one, which gave us time to look at the gardens and have a samosa each, which was delicious a

Its so disconcerting walking down The Mall as it could be any street in England. The shops are all built on the southern side so the shade kept shoppers cool in the summer sun. Behind those shops the slope is precipitous, gaps have steep steps down where there are several layers of the bazaar of typical Indian street shops huddled together selling everything. Its definitely worth the trek down there

nd the first food we’ve had that hasn’t been cooked fresh for us - we haven’t died yet! There were no photos allowed inside, but the teak from Burma in the entrance hall was certainly suited to the residence of the Viceroy of India. It was completed in 1888 for Lord Dufferin at a cost of 3,800,000 rupees or £38000. The Simla conference was held there in 1945 by Lord Wavell to sort out Indian self government. Once this had happened it past to the president of India who decided it was all a bit of a waste really so it was put to academic use.

This is the old Post Office (it is still a post office)

It’s felt like quite a full on day, so we are back to the hotel, to try and blog, as tomorrow will be travel, pretty much all day, 6 hours on the ‘toy train’ to Kalka where we connect with a train to Delhi, for a quick overnight before we move on to Jaipur.

A bit more of The Mall. We had lunch in a first floor cafe in the yellow building on the right

The are some beautiful buildings in Shimla and many have been very well restored. This one is Bantony Castle, built over 140 years ago and was the summer residence of Mararaja Sirmour. Its now a museum (£0.50 entrance fee!) and inside tells the story of the history of Shimla

Looking over the edge down towards the buildings containing the Bazaar

They were very happy to pose for a photo

Our very nice hotel in Shimla, The Woodville Palace

Days 10 photos now, starting with Naldehra:

https://video.relive.cc/3976848577_underarmour_1707565724250.mp4?x-ref=site

Here's a Relive video with photos of our walk in Naldehra. Click on the link above to open it in a new page

 

Views on the way, just stunning views

Walking with our guide through the woods

Through a bit of an adventure park where you can go on a high wire course and zip wire. We declined having seen the equipment!

This, apparently is the highest peak in these parts. 11,000 feet he told us

The golf course from the club house

Back at the car, here's our driver Manjit

Carignano Natural Park:

https://video.relive.cc/5986848577_underarmour_1707566334273.mp4?x-ref=site

Here's another Relive video with a few photos. Another ridge walk as you'll see. Click the link to open in a new page

And  finally, the building we really wanted to see, the magnificent Viceregal Lodge of Shimla. The summer residence (March to October) of the British Raj. It was from here that the whole of the Indian sub-continent was run during these six summer months: 

https://video.relive.cc/4807848577_underarmour_1707566177089.mp4?x-ref=site

Another Relive video with photos, but worth a look as you can see how it was built on the  highest part of this mountain top. Click the link to open in a new page

And there it is, the magnificent Viceregal Lodge, now known as the Indian Institute of Advanced Study. The whole of India was ruled from this building during the summer months 

We were both here, but you can see that Jackie definitely was

Everything about it is opulent and on a grand  scale, befitting of a building from which a whole sub continent was run.

We weren't allowed to take photos inside, but this one is from the shimlatourism.co.in website. It really doesn't do justice to the interior, but this is inside the grand entrance and shows some of the woodwork of the hallway all made from teak from Burma (then part of British India)

This was inside the entrance of the 5* Oberoi Hotel

We looked through into a lounge area there and a member of staff asked if we'd like our photo. So here it is. Its not that expensive to stay here, Jackie looked on their website and it said room from £135 per night but, to be honest, its not really for us. We'd have had to bring a load of extra clothes to dress up for dinner and we're much happier meeting local folk and getting to know how a place really works