Traveling guide / Solo Travel
Exploring Mussoorie on foot: Part 2
Exploring Sir George Everest’s House and Dallai hills
This one is in continuation to the previous article, if you haven’t already please give it a read.
Day 2
I woke up around 7 am on the first morning in Mussoorie, boy! it felt good. The sun had just gone up, it was a perfect sunrise view from my balcony. The sunrays falling onto the mountain peaks was a view not to be missed.
It made me realize what I had been missing all this time, trying to match up with the US timezone had killed my morning routine.
Moving on, I ordered myself a ginger tea to compliment this view. After enjoying the tea & view, I started preparing for my day trip. I left the homestay at 8 am and headed directly to the famous “Lovely omelet” shop on the mall road. I had a butter omelet with mango juice and asked the owner, how to reach “Sir George Everest’s house”. He told me that, renting a car would not be the best idea for a solo traveler. Since I didn’t know how to ride a scooty, the only option left was to hitchhike my way to George Everest.
Taking his advice I started walking towards the Library chowk following google maps and decided to try asking for help midway. The first person to stop, dropped me at Library chowk. From there I started walking towards George Everest. After some point, I looked back and saw a bullet coming. I asked for help, the guy, Dhruv, was a local and it turned out that he works as a manager in the Everest base camp. He was generous enough to let me tag in, we stopped to buy some groceries for the camp and reached the base at around 10 am. The road was in a poor condition, and it was also very steep. Dhruv saved me a 5 km trek on that steep road, he was nice enough to give me a tour of the campsite as well. I must say it was a beautiful place to stay.
After thanking him and taking the further direction I started my hike for George Everest’s house. It was a couple of 100 meters up, the path was well built and the house was under construction. I visited the observatory first, an amazing view from up there but it was also under construction. I could see snowy peaks from up there.
Then I headed towards George Everest Peak, stopped at the base to enjoy the view. I was not feeling well, so decided to skip the final hike and stayed at the viewpoint. I took a couple of short videos of myself, talking to myself only (no, it didn’t hurt). Well, those videos are the reason I remember all these details. I walked around and enjoyed the breathtaking view of the mountain range. Stayed there for half an hour and then decided to head back as I wanted to cover Dallai hills on my way back.
I didn’t have a plan to go back, walking back 5 km wasn’t looking like a great option to me now. I started walking downhill anyways, enjoying the beautifully stoned path and the grassland view of the mountains. After reaching the entry point, it was a steep hike again. I continued, keeping up the spirit. After reaching the car parking up there, I saw one taxi and asked them if they would take me to Dallai hills. One of the drivers had a seat available and fortunately, he was going to Dallai hills. So I made a deal for INR 250 till Dallai hills. My co-passengers were a father-son duo, they shared their experience of trekking up till LalTibba, which was on my list for tomorrow.
We reached Dallai hill parking in 15 mins and from there it was a 10-minute walk to the first temple. I clicked a couple of pictures there and started hiking up, there were stairs to the hilltop. It was pretty easy to hike, even though there was some construction going on. The view from the top was 360* beauty, I couldn’t stop staring at the mountains in that warm sunlight. I spent another 30 mins up there looking all around me while feeling tiny in front of the massive landscape. Around 1:30 pm, I started walking down and in front of me was a 5 km walk to my stay. I was taking breaks in between and walking slowly enjoying views of the treeline and the mountains. I reached around 3 pm at the stay, took some rest, and got ready to go out again at 4 pm.
I went to Shahi Rasoi again, for early dinner and then left to enjoy the weather while walking towards the other end of mall road. I explored the road till Picture palace before returning, knowing I’ll be coming here again tomorrow. While coming back, I stopped to enjoy Aloo Tikki chat in the chilling weather and later had a cup of coffee while standing at a viewpoint. Standing there I could see the mountains through the foggy clouds and my coffee cup was serving as a source of heat in that chilling wind.
I came back to my stay at 7:30 pm, after all that walking I was pretty tired. I sat down with the uncle at the homestay and chatted for a while. Ended my day after talking to my girlfriend and telling her that she is the first reader of my yet-to-be-written blog. (okay, that last part is made up).
Well, that was my day 2 of the Mussoorie trip. You can read the complete series from the link below
I hope this article was helpful to you. Feel free to comment below if you have any questions or suggestions, I will be more than happy to help you. If you haven’t already please follow me, to get notified about such posts.
