We arrived through a very long train route from Delhi to Kalka and then on the famous toy train called the Kalka Shimla, a 5+ hour slow but steady meander up the mountains in a very vintage train. A person jumped on selling customized peanut and chickpea masala. The train is so rustic that there is no heating/cooling system and no staff or food on board. It was an experience.
In 1804, the East India Company was in charge of India. The Nepali people known as the Gorkhas tried to take over Shimla, originally known as/named Simla by the British. The Shimla people asked the East India Company for help. The Punjab army was sent but the Gorkhas militia was relentless. So the East India Company told Shimla to ask the British army for help. They were based in Calcutta but Sir David Octaloni in 1814 -1816 agreed to step in and help.
They did win and held Shimla but Sir David felt they had to have a Gorkhas army to keep them away.
Then Charles Pratt Kennedy came and decided to set up housing and 21 communities to define Shimla and also set up forts/hills including Summer Hill. It seemed like Scotland or England to him and the palace resembles this architecture as well. He is considered the founder of Shimla.
Tuberculosis was a problem in 1839-1860 they told people to go to the hills so Shimla became quite popular with the wealthy and politicians who would come for the fresh air. Shimla was the summer capital of India.
1864 was the time of Indian independence and Shimla was the place for the leaders to meet. There was huge development from 1877 to 1903. All replicas of british architecture. In 1947 during the making of the Indian Pakistan accord, a new city was made by them called Chandigarh.
In 1965 a new state was born called Himachal which means ‘snow on lap’. Strict rules include no spitting, no smoking, no plastic bags per the guides.
While Shimla remains the summer capital, the wintwe capital is now Dharamshala. There are 15M residents in the state of Himachal Pradesh. Shimlas has 4M of them. The Shimla main road leads to Tibet about 350kilometers but it took 3 days before modern roads--its now much less although we did not reach it.
This area is a continental divide with water to the north running to Bengal, and the water to the south running through the gangis and to the Arabian sea.
The Himalayas are getting higher every year due to techtonic plates. We were able to head further into the Himalayas on a fun day trip stopping at a few lookouts and at the Oberoi overlooking the middle Himalaya range spanning from Pakistan through India and into China from this one viewpoint.
This area was literally a breath of fresh air from all the congested cities we visited in India.
The monkeys are worth a mention. The red face ones are very aggressive. You arent to look at them and definitely no food in your hands. Check out the ice cream cone one monkey scored and the large container another one knocked over. The stray dogs are also everyhwhere here and quite active at night. They have lots of loud tiffs among them throughout the nights.
Some interesting food images. Indian meals are always accompanied by raw red onions. Also the peanut masala continues to be a favorite along with naan, masala chaii tea and fruit and herb flavored iced teas.
The sunsets here are serene, with our hotel, the original hotel of the Oberoi family (no longer given its name as its not quite up to standard for the in town local--the Clarkes Hotel). Little known fact about the Oberoi chain, they serve wine from their own family vineyard in Australia not available anywhere else but the hotel chain. An Ausrralian Chardonnay on all their menus raised the question to which this was the answer.
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