After visiting the stunning Gulmarg, we headed onto Pahalgam. Pahalgam, the valley of shepherds, is most famous for a religious excursion and fabulous summer high altitude Himalayan treks, that don’t take place in May. The hubby was told that Pahalgam was “strictly average” and could even be missed. Contrarily, I had loved it the best during my childhood trip to Kashmir, and was looking forward to the pine cones and the gurgling green Lidder river that I had once been enchanted by. However, Gulmarg had been such a perfect place that poor Pahalgam had too much to live up to!

We had left Gulmarg with wonderful memories and pictures (Kashmir-May 2023-Gulmarg II) and drove to Pahalgam via Srinagar. En route, we stopped at the ruins of a 9th century temple in Avantipura. These small but well-maintained ruins were preceded by a beautifully manicured garden.

Dedicated to Lord Vishnu and built in late 9th century, it was reduced to rubble in the 15th century. In the 1990s, the area was excavated, and the temple, restored. Sadly though, the new construction around it clashes with the stone ruins and destroys a lot of its beauty.

I do love ruins, but the flowers of Kashmir captivated me far more.

The entire Gulmarg to Pahalgam route is a tourist trap route with too many pit stops. The aim of all of these is to make you buy something or the other and waste your time before you reach your beautiful destination. One of these stops was a roadside stall selling Kashmiri kehwa. The tea maker brewed it in an ornate Kashmiri pot and served it with thinly sliced almonds. However, the scene stealer was a truly irritating vlogger who was trying to capture the whole process and adding her own yakkity-yak.

The lack of a divider surprised me, and our driver told us that it was so that the road could double up as an emergency airstrip. This was truly brilliant!

Willow trees lined the road, and stacks of wood used for making cricket bats were placed on terraces of homes. Fortunately, we had refused to visit one of these “home” factories, from where my brother-in-law had bought a cricket bat on his trip.

The long route had taken us so long that we had to stop for lunch. By now, we had turned into smaller roads and were pleasantly surprised by a different type of traffic jam!

The entire district around Pahalgam is very fertile, and apples and walnuts, in particular, grow here. Soon, we were passing through apple farms and of course, another pit stop was at one to drink apple juice. I was stunned to see apples hanging from the trees, as apple season was far-off, only to realize that they were artificial. As we were waiting for the juice, our teen squealed happily. She had seen a tiny rabbit in a cage, and our driver kindly took out the rabbit and put it in her thrilled hands.

An excited young girl is not happiness for a rabbit, as he soon started to clamber out of her arms and jump off. She held him tighter, trying to put him down, but he kept scratching at her hands. Finally, we hurriedly got the rabbit in his cage and moved ahead!

After driving for what seemed like forever, we saw a very welcome sight, the swift swirling clear blue-green waters of the river Lidder. Coming directly from the glacier, this beautiful river was everywhere to be seen in Pahalgam, and the best part of our stay here.

We drove higher and higher towards our hotel. The sun turned grey with clouds, but the river stayed its lovely blue green color. I was really excited about our hotel, as it was just beside the river, and we’d booked a river-facing room so that we’d hear the sound of it gushing along all the time, like I had when I was a kid.

Once we reached there, the hotel was gorgeous, with a wooden bridge over the river to walk to the hotel itself, but the room given to us had a teeny-tiny sideways view of the river. Naturally, I got it changed, and managed to get a huge corner room, with large French windows overlooking the river and the lawn, a rocking chair and a beautiful window side seating.

The hubby naturally wanted to spend all evening in the room, I, naturally, didn’t. It was cold and raining, so we grabbed our warm jackets and headed off to a nearby beautiful park we’d seen on the drive. Sadly, it was shut, so we walked to the market. It was awful amidst scores of horses and we struggled to avoid horse poop-mixed-puddles of water. Sheer willpower, and more importantly, hunger and the cold pushed us to the marketplace, which was a tiny lackluster lane lined by shops and restaurants. Disappointed, we rushed into the first cafe we saw.

The airconditioner here was actually set at 32 degrees. We were amazed! The tiny cafe served us delicious sandwich, fries and coffee, though it took forever to deliver our order.

Warm and well-fed, we decided to walk down the market. Suddenly, everything looked better. We noticed the cute lamps, the cobbled streets and the small old buildings and shops.

The shop windows were alluring and the kid and I oohed and aahed over dusty pink jackets, that we never bought. There were many stores selling clothes and shawls with intricate Kashmiri embroidery and bright colors.

A shopper would have found his or her heart’s delight here, but we were contented with mere photographs and found my heart’s delight at a small bakery instead. The cakes looked interesting, but it was my much-desired apple pie, that didn’t last long enough for even a picture!

As we walked back, the crowds were less, and the rain had stopped. We chanced upon a pretty looking park and headed inside to see a perfectly manicured garden with lovely flowers and trees and a small, tiered water body running through the center.

At one corner, the grass was overrun by tiny white and pink flowers, looking like a carpet, surrounded by unusual trees.

Back at the hotel, we were thrilled to see a heater in the lobby and central heating in the room. Soon, a thunderstorm set in, battering the window-panes. The entire place became freezing cold. We ate a quick and not very good dinner and retired for the night.

Comfortable in the warm and cozy room, we slept a good night’s sleep undisturbed by the lightning and thunder, looking forward to our next day at Pahalgam. However, that day’s travels will be told another day by me, as I’ve already gone on for too long!