Tuesday 18th February 2020 - Shimla and the Himalayan Queen

We were collected from the hotel at 9.30 by Piyush and Ram and driven to Shimla railway station. The train wasn’t due to leave until 10.40 which gave Piyush time to show us around. This meant taking us to the end of the platform and crossing the tracks to get a view of the old steam engine and the Diesel engines. We then crossed back and got into the cab of the steam engine! All good fun.

The British arrived in Shimla in the early 1800s and found it much to their liking for the summers as the climate here was similar to the UK. However travel and transport was difficult so the railway was built and finally opened in 1903. It is a narrow gauge, single track railway that runs for about 96km to Kalka, the whole journey taking 5 and a half hours. The train is known as the Himalayan Queen or the Toy Train. It has been given UNESCO world heritage status. We were only going as far as Kandaghat, a journey of 2 hours and 38km.

Shimla used to be a small town with population fluctuating between 2 - 3000 in the winter and 20 - 30,000 in the summer. There is now a population of 250,000 and a growing and thriving tourist industry. Tourists include the British and Australians, but also many Indians, including those who count Shimla as a good weekend destination.

The train journey took us along the sides of the mountains, twisting and turning, through countless tunnels and over some bridges. The scenery was stunning in places.

As we left Shimla to our right we could see a whole line of snow capped mountains in the distance. Unfortunately the view was continually broken by the pine trees! At one point we could see the airstrip of Shimla airport. They have removed the top of a mountain to make it and there is only one flight in and out to Delhi each day which is weather dependent. That is why we are being driven to Chandigarh tomorrow for our flight to Delhi.

We spent a very pleasant 2 hours watching the world go by and when we reached Kandaghat, Ram and Piyush were there to meet us.

One thing we learned today is the meaning of the word Himalaya. Him means snow and alaya means house. So we pronounce it wrong, the emphasis should be on the first ‘a’, if that makes sense! Another thing we have learnt is that air quality here and in Dharamshala is very unhealthy according to the weather app. We have only just found out that this information is on there so guess that if air quality is bad in the mountains it must be even worse in every other place we have been to.

We stopped for lunch at a restaurant along the road. Although the air is cool the sun is really powerful and we sat on the roof enjoying both the sun and the views.

Next it was onto the Viceregal residence, completed in 1888 and used until partition by the British as the imperial summer capital and after that it was the president’s summer residence. As he used it so little the second president in the 1960’s donated it for use as a post doctorate study centre.

Our tour was nearly done but we finished it with a walk through the old part of Shimla that connected the Viceregal house to parliament buildings and the army base. At one point we looked down onto an area that had been levelled out in the time of British rule to be used as a race course and cricket ground. Today it also has a small golf course around the perimeter!

It was nice to be on our feet. There would have been splendid views across to the Himalayas if only there wasn’t so much haze! We finished at Christchurch, a very typical British Church.

Then back to our hotel and as we have good WiFi here I have managed to upload videos. These can be found on the posts for 24th, 25th, 29th January and 1st, 4th, 5th, 7th and 14th February. The only problem is that in doing this it seems to have messed up the date order and I have no idea how to rectify this! 😳 Sorry!

For our penultimate evening in India we decided to be brave and find somewhere in town to eat. So we left our safety net of the hotel and with the help of Trip Advisor went into town. We have felt that some of the hotels have really overcharged, particularly as when we have stopped for lunches the food has been so cheap and just as good if not better. The big exception to that of course was our Tibetan hotel. So we pitched up at a bar/restaurant and had a simple meal for not a lot. We watched the sunset then wandered back to the hotel to pack and do the online check in. Looks like we are heading home 😢