Parvati Valley

Parvati valley , usually known as the ‘Israel of India’, is runs along the Parvati river and you can see a lot of people from Israel around here along with sign boards in Hebrew. The fresh mountain air, and smell of hash burning through the otherwise unpolluted air make this place the perfect getaway.

Kasol : Kasol is a small village in the Parvati valley situated on the early banks of Parvati River. I personally do not like Kasol itself much due to large noisy crowds. The only good thing left about Kasol is it's amazing cafes and it being the starting point of Grahan trek. Some of the best places to eat around here are : 1. Jim Morrison Cafe 2. German Bakery 3. Evergreen Cafe

Grahan : Grahan is a small village and the first spot where people set camp on their 5 day trek to Saar Pass. The entire stretch is green with scenic paths, river flowing all along the way, a few bridges that you need to cross, plateaus for good breaks, beautiful flowers to make the whole stretch magical. It took us six hours to complete the trek which I believe the better half of us could have done in about four and a half hours. Just before the last hike there is a separate path for YHAI camps which is easier and finishes long before the village and I personally would recommend you to not take that. Anyway we reached Grahan at around 5pm , completely tired but extremely thrilled by the scenic and beautiful village. We stopped at New Krishna's and decided to rent a room there itself. Tired and hungry we order some food and shifted to a sun room, our host Mr. Krishna charged us 500INR for the room for a night, helped us set the room up , made us really delicious dinner of omelettes and maggie which is all you can get at such a height and call our parents who were so tensed about where we were since we had no signal in our phones.

Manikaran : Manikaran is one of the most famous Gurudwara in India mainly because of the hot sulphur springs. Well free food (langar) and hot water springs , there was no way that I would let this not be a part of our journey. Do take a bath in these hot springs if you feel tired, the sulphur helps a lot in taking the pain away after an arduous trek.

Tosh: Tosh is a rather big village as compared to Kasol , but it is very less populated along with a considerably lesser amount of tourists. The one thing that you need to know about Parvati Valley is that hash , psychedelic music and Israeli food is what people here survive on while praising Bob Marley as their one true lord. If you're visiting Tosh its best to climb to the top of the village which is practically all spread out on one single hill, the views from the top are the best and you can get an amazing view of the night sky. I would recommend Hill Top Cafe/Hotel for the best accommodation as well as food.

Kutla: Kutla is a very small and remote village about 1.5 hours away from Tosh via a hike. You'll find the amazing Tosh waterfall at the midpoint of Kutla where you can relax and move on to the difficult steep climb of the hike. Kutla is not famous at all and hence you'll find very less people here, with no internet connectivity and completed broken off from civilisation it is a great place to take a break from the world.

Kheerganga : Kheerganga is another small and remote village about 5hrs/10kms of easy hike away from Tosh. It is also famous for its hot water springs pool which becomes much more valuable after that small hike through the forest. You'll encounter a few waterfalls along this way as well and also go through Kalga Village. Tents and food is easily available at Kheerganga to spend the night. The lights of the valley go out by 9PM and we were seated under the light of the uncountable stars and the galaxies visible above us, for a city boy like me this sight was orgasmic and if that wasn't enough I just had to gaze above constantly for a few minutes and was easily able to spot falling stars and the constellations that we only read about from images in our textbooks.

I will be covering more villages in Parvati Valley soon and shall update those as well.