Darang Tea Estate – My #SecondHome

Welcome to the Kangra Valley in Himachal Pradesh. The one place that comes to everyone’s mind is Dharamshala or Mcleodganj. These places are the tourist hotspots but not very far from these places are leisure spots where you can just relax and do nothing for days together. As the Kangra Valley is full of tea gardens growing the famous Kangra tea, the owners have very generously opened their doors for tourists to come over and explore the tea estates, interact with the locals while enjoying an absolutely amazing and comfortable stay.

One such place is the Darang Tea Estate owned by Mr. & Mrs. Bhandari. A lovely old couple who have so much to tell you about the entire Kangra area and its history. They have 4 wonderful cottages out of which one is a multi-room cottage for a joint family, two are double room cottages for couples with kids and one is a single room set for a couple. They have an amazingly friendly set of people serving you delicious home cooked food right from the butter to the marmalades which are all made in their backyard. The cottages are decorated with old style furniture and are full of books on different subjects that will keep you busy throughout your stay. If the books aren’t enough for you, then the huge tea estate spread across a couple of mountains can keep you up and about on day long treks.

The tea estate is located right on the Dharamshala – Palampur road smack dab in the middle of the Kangra Valley. Coming from Dharamshala and going towards Palampur, you will cross a railway crossing, yes you read that correct. There is an active railway line which has toy trains running on it from Pathankot upto Joginder Nagar. So once you cross the track on the road going towards Palampur, you got to slow down a bit because after about 1km, you will see a small wooden board hanging on a tree mentioning ‘Darang Tea Estate’ and a Coble Stoned road winding up into the trees. You drive up this road and in 100 metres the tree line will suddenly give way to the open tea estates of Darang. Welcome to my ‘Second Home’.

Places close by are the Andretta Pottery, Baijnath Shivling Temple, Norbulingka Temple & Norling House, Masrur Rock Temples, Kangra Fort, Bir Billing, Dharamshala Cricket Ground and Mcleodganj with all its tourist hotspots & treks.