My first trip to Himachal Pradesh this week !!! We drove down from Chandigarh to Dharer, which is about five hours, and stayed at my friend Hari's place.
His place has a lovely view of the valley and a brilliant sunset view. Dharer is very close to Baijanath and a couple of hours from Dharamshala. This is the closest to nature that I have experienced in a long time. There are 10+ different types of fruits (Papaya, Guava, Kiwi, Banannas, Apple etc.) being grown on the farm plus corn and wheat as well in limited quantities. There is also a greenhouse for flowers. We had a couple of meals with all the ingredients being homegrown (except the salt). It was tough to move on but having spent a couple of days there, we went to McLeod Ganj to visit the Dalai Lama temple.
We took the ropeway from the city (you can also go by car). When we asked about registration for the Dalai Lama talk, we were told "Oh well, there is no registration, you can show up and attend the program, but you'll need to show up at 7am for an 8.30am interaction." We decided not to go for the talk, especially since we were not so sure about how much time it would take. Overall, McLeod Ganj is a bit crowded. The Dalai Lama temple has a lot of visitors, and the Tibetan refugee market is nothing to speak home about. The markets outside also are cursory. We did take a walk to the protestant church of St. John in the wilderness, which is a couple of kilometres from the Dalai Lama Temple. 
One of India's previous Governor Generals, Lord Elgin died and was buried there, and his wife has created a mausoleum there. Unfortunately, we couldn't go inside the church (which has stained glass built in 1852) as it was locked. But it's a nice old quaint chapel overlooking the valley,and a nice experience, except when you're walking on the road and there's a diesel bus which passes you by and you will feel the full impact of the diesel fumes.
We chilled out for a day at the resort, and the next day we had a nice little trek to Naguni waterfalls, a glacier melt. It's a walkable track with little ups and downs, which goes through the mountains and you get to a point where you can see the Dhauladhar range. Our guide was 20 year old Lucky in his final year of graduation. He mentioned that summer temperatures have risen to 41/42 degrees celsius from 30 degrees due to road construction and global warming. There was also a bit of mining in the mountains for slate rocks used for roofing in this part of the world. The path had landslides possibly caused by over exploitation.
Our next stop was to a riverside (Baner Khad near Dritto Hub), that has water being stored in tanks and then used for generating electricity. The driver made an open fire with wooden sticks, cooked some Maggi noodles and tea using the river water. We soaked our feet in the nice, cold glacier water. Amazing experience. I mean, well, I haven't had Maggi for a long time. On the way back, we stopped at Aghanjar Mahadev Temple, which has a fire that has been burning for 500+ years. Our last stop for the day was at Norbulingka Institute. Norbulingka believes in the preservation and continuation of Tibetan art through self-sustaining means. It has a Temple and art gallery in its premises as well as a nice cafe.
We enjoyed our trip to Dharer and Dharamshala since we did this at a very slow pace. There's the Triund trek (about 7 kilometers), which we skipped , nor did we feel the need to go to Dalhousie.
Will we come back to Himachal? We will but perhaps not this side. Dharamshala is really north of Chandigarh and we have yet to explore the areas around Shimla and further up. The lower Himachal is interesting and a lot more populated than expected with houses and shops all along the road. Upper Himachal is a completely different experience.
Himachal is now producing some of its own wine with fancy flavors like Rohodendron, Plum, etc. We tried the Rhodendron (sort of Bacardi Breezer taste) . Himachal relies a lot on tourists as an economy, and people look forward to jobs in the government. Outsiders cannot buy land, which means it has not been affected by land hungry city dwellers, the way Goa has been.
Until the next time.....Safe travels and happy experiences.
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