Workcation, in India, trended after the Covid outbreak. The most famous one was working from mountains. We too, decided to experiment this amazing concept. So, I and 2 of my best friends took off to Manali for a 20 day workcation at the end of 2021. And the experience turned out to be the most amazing one!!
The first step of planning was to find an accommodation. Our requirement was to get an apartment with 2 bedrooms and a kitchen somewhere in Himachal Pradesh. Yeah, 2 bedrooms for 3 people! Just in case our office calls merged, which happened quite a lot. Kitchen was essential because 1. We all can cook, 2. We were not sure if we would like the taste of hotel food, that too for 20 whole days and 3. We saved a lot of money! Finding such an apartment which should fit in our budget was a bit difficult. Besides searching on numerous available booking websites, we also joined many social media groups and posted our requirements and finally, after a lot of searching, done by one of my friends, we found a place in Naggar, a place between Kullu and Manali. A trio of Marathi girls were set to live in Himachal for 20 days.
The adventure began right on day 1. Our train was scheduled at 11:30pm and the boarding station was Mumbai Central. Now, the 3 of us stay at different parts of Mumbai and it was decided that I and one of my friends, would share a cab to the station to join the 3rd. Getting in the cab, we tried to check on the one, who was supposed to join us at train station. And after trying to connect with her for almost half an hour, still unreachable, we decided to contact her family, to learn that she is heading to CSMT, a different station, a very different route! We both panicked and everyone started to try and connect with her. Luckily, after a couple of retries, we cleared the misunderstanding. We were still in panic, until we saw her actually boarding the train, just 5 mins before the train was scheduled to depart. What an amazing start! Next day our train reached its destination an hour earlier, which is “once in a blue moon” moment in Indian Railways. After reaching Hazrat Nizamuddin railway station, Delhi, we found a semi luxurious lounge on the station by the Indian Railways. The cost for 1 person for an hour was ₹ 300/- Tea/coffee, changing rooms were available at this basic cost. Other facilities like bathing room, sleeping bed, lunch is also available, but for extra charges. Everything was maintained well, the toilets and changing rooms were clean, the charging stations were working good. We reached the bus stop which was near this railway station and by 6:30 in the evening we were finally heading towards Manali by bus.
The Bus journey was not at all easy. We had boarded a neat and clean bus but, we woke up to see a mess all over the bus floor. Bottles, luggage, snacks, everything was lying on the floor. All thanks to the zig zag hilly roads! This was not all, the bus driver had managed to miss our stop and dropped us, somewhere, according to him, we were supposed to get a local bus. We again were tensed as we all know how the frequency of local bus is, in village areas, but luckily, after waiting for just 5 mins, we boarded a bus and reached our “supposed” destination, Patlikuhal. Taking a cab from Patlikuhal, we finally reached the accommodation, our home for the next 18 days. The place was just perfect. It was a ground + 2 floors building. The ground level floor had 3 shops, 1 rented room and common washroom area. Our accommodation was on the 1st floor having 2 bedrooms, a kitchen with basic utensils and a bathroom. Partitioned by a door, was the owner’s space, just like a 1 bedroom apartment. The 2nd floor was an whole independent space which was initially built for the owners residence but, they shifted to a lower floor and so, rented this space as well. There was a balcony which was an added treat for us. The architecture in these parts comes with huge windows and my favorite, the screen doors, the ones which you get to see in Hollywood movies. The view from our window was just amazing! Every morning was a different canvas, as we opened our eyes. We saw a huge range of mountains, some even snow covered! Since it was the end of November and start of December, the snow was yet to fall. Coming from Mumbai, where the temperature of 23°C seemed too cold for us, the maximum temperature here, ranging between 15°C to 18°C, was a drastic change for our bodies to adjust.
After getting ready for the day, we had lunch which we already had packed from home. We learned where the market was, so we made a list of things we needed, relaxed for some time and left for sightseeing. Naggar Castle was our 1st stop, we could see the castle from our home which seemed high on a hill top. We could have rented a vehicle or taken a cab, but No! we wanted to walk. The trek was tiring because of steep hill at some places, but we saw 2 of the other sights on our way up, the Shiv temple and the post office and finally made it to the castle! Naggar castle has a great view of Beas valley and its awesome architecture of carved wood and stone and we also, spotted the Sun setting behind the great Himalayas. Later, we headed downwards for the market and this was another great experience. We asked for Kanda and Batata (onions and potatoes in Marathi), like we generally do in our hometown, but the shopkeeper looked puzzled. Looking at him, even we got confused, wondering what went wrong. In a few moments we realized it and started to think and remember what are these things called in Hindi. Finally, we showed him what we wanted and then he told us what the Hindi words were (pyaaz and aloo). After buying all the required stuff, we headed home and spotted a small local restaurant and decided to be back here for dinner after dumping the stuff at home. Returning to the restaurant for dinner, we had the most amazing Thukpa a Tibetan dish and concluded our day after dinner. The sun sets before 5pm and it was just 7 pm when we reached home, it generally becomes pitch dark by 6 pm in this area, so we usually avoided being out after 6 pm after that evening.
Our day used to begin with a short walk around the village, followed by the purchase of milk for coffee or tea, when required. This was our 1st work day in Himachal, the electricity was fine when we reached but today, due to some maintenance work, the electric supply was on and off which worried us a bit, but it was all fine by afternoon. As it was cold, the temperature being 15°C, we all were wearing sweater and all the stuff to keep us warm. My manager asked me if I safely reached to the North Pole by looking at my attire(in online meeting, of course). Whoever was busy in meeting would attend the meeting and the others who had no meeting or at a later time would start preparing for lunch was our morning routine. Most of the day we would sit under the Sun working, for warmth and savor laddus which was a mixture of dry fruit, fenugreek, edible gum, which our mothers had prepared for us. It induces heat in body and are nutritious, a minimum of 1 laddu per day was a compulsion. Both aunty and uncle, the owner of this place, are very sweet and helpful. We used to chat a lot with Santosh aunty, when uncle went to office. We would even visit auntie’s shop (downstairs) and chat with her in our free time. Dinner was a group activity. This was the weekday routine as we all had to work most of the day.
The tourist spots were to be visited on weekends and hence, we were free from cooking for these 2 days of the week. Since it was a 20 days work[va]cation, we had only 2 weekends in hand for touring. Our 1st stop was Khoksar, followed by Atal Tunnel and Vashisht Temple. All these places are a must visit. Click to know more about these places. The beauty of each of this place is unique. Looking at the amount of snow after a tiring trek of about 30 mins at Khoksar, was dream come true. We enjoyed a lot in snow for around 3 hours and also clicked pictures wearing the traditional attire with snowy background. The network was good, so we even had a round of video calls with our family. After the snowy experience, the beauty around Atal tunnel amazed us. We were not very excited to visit Vashisht, but the beauty and the architecture of the temple made us stay for a bit. We even had the famous Siddu, but its taste disappointed us. As it was dark already, we decided to have dinner enroute and had one of the best dinners in Himachal at Valentino’s (link for eateries shared at the end of this post)
Next day, was dedicated to see Manali mall road and near by areas. As the local bus stop was just downstairs, we decided to take a local bus to Mall road. We started a bit late after having a breakfast of coffee and Laddus. It took just 30 mins to reach Manali Mall road after boarding the bus. As it was lunch time when we reached Mall road, one of my friends suggested one of the “most recommended” place to have lunch at and it was the most disappointing meal we had in Himachal. After dropping a parcel, our owner, Santosh aunty had given us to drop at her daughter’s, we started to search for Van Vihar to end up on a trek to Hadimba Mata temple. The beauty of the temple is soul soothing, especially after this trek, road way is available but the walk route is another beauty. The temple is situated right in the middle of jungle, surrounded by huge Deodar trees. We headed down to Mall road after not finding the Van Vihar, which was right under our nose(we did visit Van Vihar on our next visit). After a lot of shopping and having dinner, we realised that it was 8:30 pm already, which was too late in these regions. Somehow, we managed to get a cab to reach back, as the bus service is closed by 5 pm, aunty had called us more than 5 times to check on us, before we reached home.
Again a similar routine for weekday was followed. The interesting thing this week was that the garbage picking van arrived. The van plays loud music so we are able to recognize it and are prepared to throw the garbage into the van. The song goes like, “Gaadi wala aya ghar se kachra nikaal”. It was a fun experience, as were unaware about this fact. We could hear some music playing at a distance and thought that maybe, some ceremony is being celebrated around, to realize what ceremony it actually was, when the garbage van arrived at our place. We kept laughing on ourselves for about half an hour. Later that week, the weather was predicted that it would rain on Wednesday, but it didn’t. So, I decided to go on a solo trip, as my had a busy day, to explore the near by areas. I had an online meeting scheduled at 5:30 pm for which, I either had to be home by that time or sit in a café and attend it. I started the trek by around 10:30 am to reach the Castle. But, since I had a few errands to run on my way up, it took me around 12 noon, to finally reach a café. I attended an online meeting and had a light lunch, travelled further uphill to see visit Tripura Sundari Temple and Roerich art gallery and museum. The scenic beauty is just mind-blowing. Since I had less time in hand, I had to head back to attend the scheduled meeting so I ended up attending it from the German Bakery, a café near Naggar Castle. It is an open café and since it was getting dark, it was getting colder but the heater saved me. You can connect to the Wi-Fi of the café which has a pretty good speed. The meeting somehow lasted longer than expected and I started getting calls from Santosh Aunty, my friends and my family as well. As the meeting ended, I had to call everyone to let them know my whereabouts. Santosh Aunty insisted me to stay where I was, while uncle came to pick me. That was very kind of them. Later, on Friday, the weather was just amazing. I had to complete a few tasks, for work, but the weather was one of the reasons why it was consuming more time. It was cloudy, there was snow fall on near by mountains and we could actually see it and hence we frequently visited the terrace. Aunty warned us to stay away from the edges as the compound was yet to be built. The view was so amazing that we spent hours on the terrace that day, the canvas changed every 10 mins, a true treat to our eyes. Himachal Pradesh is a must visit place if you are an Indian or travelling to India.
For the next weekend we wanted to try some adventure so we enquired about paragliding and decided to try it the next day (on Sunday). Saturday was to visit Kasol and a gurudwara in Manikaran. Our cab driver insisted us to visit a Vaishno Mata temple. We were least interested to visit the temple but it turned out to be “a must visit place”, when in Manali. It is a 7-8 floors structure, each floor surprises you with the wood carved walls as well as the celling. Each floor has a different design and a different god or goddess and “awestruck” is the perfect word to describe this place. Not just the temple, but the view too gets interesting as you move to the upper floors, the beauty of Beas flowing on the other side of the road. We moved for Manikaran after visiting Vaishno Mata mandir. The Gurudwara of Manikaran is soul refreshing. The steam from hot water springs from the lower floor, fills the air with warmness. We ate at the Langar and the menu included Sarson ka saag, which totally made our day! After the lunch, we also helped in serving food to the visitors and later proceeded for Kasol. We strolled at the Kasol Market, did some shopping, bought some souvenirs and moved back towards home. On the journey back home, we stopped at river rafting spot, again, had the famous Siddu, as we moved ahead, we bought some vegetables for the coming week, our last week in Himachal. The day was well spent and totally worth. We were excited for the Paragliding the next day, but the weather was unkind. It rained! and our day was wasted. We ordered food as the weather made us lazy, went for a stroll, saw that we do not get wet in the rain, so we could not go too far. We were craving for an Ice cream but as we had no umbrella, we just kept it on our Wishlist. After a session of photography and selfies, we cooked Mumbai famous Batata Wada and Kanda bhaji at night, we also shared it with aunty and uncle and they loved it and concluded our day after savoring the delicious food.
The week started as our usual week. The electricity was supposed to be out for almost the whole day on Tuesday so we decided to find a restaurant or a café, where we could get Wi-Fi for our work. We went up near the castle, again a painstaking hike, worked at a café near the castle, had lunch and started walking for another café for my upcoming meeting. The place had an amazing view of the valley and the sun set view was astonishing. My friends enjoyed a good photoshoot, while I was still in the meeting. We left for the day and bought ice cream on the way home, our wishlist, checked. Dinner concluded our day. Next few days went well. Friday was our last day so we packed everything on Thursday night. We clicked as many pictures as we could and left Naggar in local bus with heavy heart. We wanted to stay more!! We reached Manali, had lunch and later proceeded finally for Van Vihar, it is an incredible place to be at. The Jungle converted to a strolling garden filled with Deodar trees, Beas flowing nearby and chill weather. We just couldn’t get enough of all this. The Vihar closes by around 5 pm and hence, we had to leave. After some final shopping and having food, we boarded our bus to Delhi.
Manali- Delhi journey was smooth unlike Delhi-Manali. We reached Delhi early by 6:30 am and after searching for almost an hour for a good hotel, where we could get fresh and dump our luggage for a few hours, we proceeded to visit Qutub Minar. The weather was pleasant and hence it was easy for us to stroll through the area of Qutub Minar. Finally, it was time to say good bye to this amazing trip as we headed for Airport. Reaching Mumbai late and getting stuck in traffic after 11 pm, just made us feel home.
It was great to be somewhere, out of our hometown, after almost 2 years of pandemic. I hope you also try and share your experience with us!
Link for Best Eatries
Link for things to do in Manali
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