Amritsar Trip - 10 March 2009 Day 3

Now be ready for the real twist in the story. We were enjoying the car drive on the Grand Trunk Road. Sugarcane, Wheat fields lined the NH1 and showed off the prosperity of this region. Between the fields, we could see huge bunglows or Kothis of rich Punjabi farmers. We saw all possible brands of cars on this highway. I was busy admiring the affluent countryside and then suddenly, I noticed Sheila, who was still a bit down because she did not get a chance to see snow in Shimla. While trying to consol her, I just remarked, “Why can’t we just go to Srinagar? How Omar Abdulla was skiing at Gulmarg that day?. There is a lot of snow in Gulmarg at present.”

That did it. Both Sheila and Yasmin latched on to this idea immediately. Even I did not need further encouragement and started making calls to Ajaz Khar, the houseboat owner, in whose houseboat we stayed last time. He made it look too simple. He asked me to go to Jammu from Amirtsar, which is 5-6 hours drive. From Jammu, he suggested me, to catch a flight to Srinagar. He also extended help in booking air tickets and booking accommodation at Jammu. I needed to think before I said yes to him. I went back to my friends and made sure that they really want to rearrange this program and go to Kashmir. Once I got their O.K., I went back to the storyboard (mentally) and figured out the new itinerary. I realised that we have to finish the sightseeing in Amritsar by noon on March 10^th and leave for Jammu. We should be on the flight to Srinagar on March 11^th for this plan to work. Now I also figured that lot depends on our driver. I pleaded with his to reach us Amritsar on time for the Wagha Border show in the evening. We started negotiating with his to take us to Jammu in his car. But he was asking us for the fare from Amritsar to Jammu and from Jammu to Chandigarh, as his car was from Chandigarh. This fare was coming to about Rs.2500/-, which was costly. When we told him that, he came up with a brilliant idea. He said “Madam, you don’t worry, from Amritsar, you will be able to catch a A.C bus for Jammu, which will take you in Rs.250/- per person.” He also said that he knew the bus stops and he will make sure that he puts us on that bus.

After making sure that it is possible and feasible to travel from Amritsar to Jammu, I moved on to the main part of this plan. I again spoke to Ajaz Khar to give us a 3 nights stay with car rental for Gulmarg and Pahalgam. He quoted me something like Rs.19000/-, which was Rs.3000/- per day for stay and Rs.3000/- per day for travel including airport transfers. I found this quite steep and told him so. I decided to drop a stay at houseboat and look for a hotel stay instead after we reach Srinagar. But we requested Ajaz to go ahead and book a room for us at Jammu JKTDC hotel, which he agreed to book. Now I dialed justdial services and got contact nos of all the low cost airlines like Goair etc. After calling one or two I found out that GoAir is a better option. They offered me fare of Rs.1640/- from Jammu-Srinagar, and Rs.6700/- for Srinagar-Mumbai sector. I went ahead and did the bookings by using my credit card.

Before I could finished tweaking the whole travel plan, it was already a lunch time. We were in Punjab, so what could be better than to have a lunch at a roadside dhabba., These dhabas or small restaurants, which are very basic in ambiance, cutlery and other auxiliary services, but they offer excellent local Punjabi food. Off course, you cannot be dead sure of theses restaurants either. You have to take a chance. We did exactly that, and were very lucky. We ate the local food with some Punjabi vegetable with Tandori rotis. You cannot leave a Dhaba without drinking the very famous Punjabi Lassi, i.e. Sweet buttermilk. It comes in a very big glass. We enjoyed the food and the lassi made us full to the brink.

After lunch the drive was a bit boring as there was a lot of traffic on the road. We were all anxious to reach Amritsar in time to drop our luggage at the guest house and then go to Wagha border before the evening show. By the time we reached Amiritsar it was almost 2.30 pm. He hurriedly kept our luggage in our room and after a refreshing tea left for Wagha border.

Amritsar Trip - 9 March 2009 Day 2

The next day we set out in our car for sightseeing in Shimla. Sheila had her fingers crossed till we reached Khufri Mountain. But as we were approaching the place in our hearts we already knew that we are not going to see even a trace of snow in his hot weather. So after reaching there, I did not even get out of our car and proceeded to Mall Road after momentarily stopping at Shimla House. As school exams were still going on, there were not many tourists around. We loiter on mall road, lakkad bazaar, did some shopping, and ate our meal in a famous restaurant Opp. Church on mall road. It was not very cool but windy, so we were still wearing our sweaters. We returned to our car by 3pm. The car dropped us at the Shimla station as we were supposed to travel back by the legendary Toy train “Shivalik Express”. There is only a 1^st class in this train, and this is a Rajdhani Class train. As a result of the very high fare (Rs.238/-) as compared to other passenger trains (Rs.39/-), the train was relatively empty. There are in all 18 seats in each compartment. There is one attendant in each one, who served us food and water. Our car driver was instructed to go ahead and wait for us at Kalka station. As we left our luggage in the car itself, we were saved from lifting the heavy bags. This is a different train journey with 108 tunnels. We enjoyed the scenery till we can, before it became dark. This train journey take almost 4 and half hours and take you to Kalka at 10.pm. Our driver was waiting for us who reached here little after 6pm. in just two hours. From Kalka the car took us to Chandigarh at our guesthouse.

Amritsar Trip - Photos

Please Click Here to view pics of my Amritsar-Kashmir Trip March 2009.

Amritsar Trip - 8 March 2009 Day 1

Even this trip was planned in my morning train travel. For Mumbaikars this is no surprise. We in Mumbai travel far for work. And being very social like other Indians, we cannot stop from chatting to the person sitting next to us. This is how we form long lasting friendships in these journeys. Since we have reserved compartments for ladies, we gel better sharing each other’s joys, sorrows and problems. So when Sheila and Yasmin saw a movie of Shah Rukh Khan “Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi”, and wanted to visit Golden Temple in Amritsar, they told me to plan for the trip. They also wanted my mother and My husband, Nandu to accompany. In short they wanted to relive the magic of our Kashmir Group.

I did the planning as per everybody’s availability. My mother opted out as she had visited the place before. The itinerary was Mumbai-Chandigarh-Shimla-Chandigarh-Amritsar-Chandigarh-Mumbai. This was a 7 days plan From Saturday, 7^th March to Saturday 14^th March, as we were going to fly to and fro Mumbai-Chandigarh.

Shimla cropped up in this plan much later as somebody told Sheila that in early March you would get to see snow in Shimla. She always wanted to see snow in India. We came to know just one week before that Nandu would not be able to join us as would be going to UK for office work. That left only 3 of us, Myself, Sheila and Yasmin.

We left Mumbai on 7^th March by Kingfisher and reached Chandigarh by 5.15pm. We had arranged for a car, which was waiting for us at the airport. We immediately started our onward journey to Shimla. Chandigarh – Shimla is around 3-4 hours by road. The road is totally through hills. It is well maintained and smooth. Every bit of journey is evident of Shimla being a summer capital of British Raj. We reached Shimla around 9pm. We were taken directly to the guesthouse we were put up at. Accommodation for this whole trip was courtesy one of our best friend. She arranged for our say in her company guesthouse. I am not going to divulge her name, not because of the fear of a long line of my other friends, at her door, but for purely selfish reason. I don’t want to jeopardize my chance for many more such trips.

We were served a nice, freshly cooked dinner and were provided a sufficient bedding to keep the chilly weather away from our bodies.