Finally left Manali on the 14th, taking an afternoon bus for 4 hours down the Kullu Valley along the rocky and turbulent Beas River to Mandi. In places the valley is wide but in other places there is just the river and a road cut into one of the steep banks. Mandi is about 4000 feet lower than Manali so it was considerably warmer and more humid. I eventually found a decent hotel and looked around, visiting a crumbling palace turned hotel and some temples along the river.
At dinner the family, including seven month old twins, at a table next to mine jumped up from their table when a snake appeared. They hadn't ordered snake. A guy came out from the kitchen with a long, thin pole and killed it, a short, thin one. The family moved their dishes to another table and continued dinner. I had a good dinner there.
The next day I made the 6 hour trip over the mountains to Shimla. On one stretch we traveled 28 kilometers in an hour and 20 minutes -- averaging about 12 miles an hour. The bus was another old, rickety one, but a little more comfortable than usual, with reclining seats. These Indian bus drivers are quite good at judging just when to get back on their side of the narrow mountain road to avoid being hit by the truck or bus coming the other direction.
Shimla is at about 7000 feet and was foggy when I arrived about 5. Every once in a while the clouds would break a bit and you could see the hills beyond. Not many foreign tourists here, but lots of Indian tourists. Shimla was where the government of India moved from 1864 until 1947 to escape the heat of the plains and the monsoon from April to October/November. There are lots of old buildings from the British era, including the former Viceregal Palace, built in 1884-1888. I took a tour today and it still has the original 122 year old electrical switches and wiring and a sprinkler system (with wax seals meant to melt at 122 degrees) for combating fire. The partition of India was agreed upon here in June 1947 and there were lots of pictures of notables of the time: Nehru, Gandhi, Jinnah, Mountbatten and others. The building is showing its age. I'm surprised the Indians don't keep it up better.
Shimla is spread out along a steep ridge, with buildings tumbling down both sides. The center of town is a flat area on the ridge with the old Victorian Town Hall, Post Office, Church and other colonial buildings, plus more recent statues of Indian notables, Mahatma Gandhi, Indira Gandhi, Shastri, and others. There are great views, when you can see them, from the ridge. There are no cars allowed in this central area, which is great, and big crowds of people in a carnival type of atmosphere, despite the rain and drippy fog. The old Viceregal Palace is along the ridge about 3 miles west from the center, a nice walk along the pines, with a few other large colonial buildings on the way. Lots of menacing macaques along the way, and it town, too. There is a narrow gauge railway completed in 1903 down to the plains, which I may take, but with the rainy weather the views won't be very good.
From here I plan to go up the Kinnear and Spiti Valleys and reach Manali again, for another attempt at getting to Ladakh, but I suspect the rain will impede this journey, too, closing the road between Kinnear and Spiti.
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