Mussoorie: A love affair with the Mountains - Musaafir Hun Yaaro

Mussoorie is one of the famous hill stations often known as Queen of hills. It is a most favorite weekend getaway for Delhi NCR people. Mussoorie's history is as rich as its hills, the Mussoorie town has come into existence after the Britishers shown their interest in it. They fought a war with the Gorkhas in 1814 and in 1815 Mussoorie was annexed to the Saharanpur district. Since then it was one of the famous places for the Britishers and they also set up a convalescent center for soldiers in Landour.

Day 1

So that was the history and if we talk about the present then it is the Covid-19 situation, we the wanderers know how it feels to stay at home for 7 long months without any break. So after the proper unlock, we had our first visit to Mussoorie, the Queen of Hills. We started our trip from home early in the morning and reached our hotel by 1 PM giving rest to us while driving to avoid tiredness which is a must point to remember when you travel by road on your own. Since it was a long weekend, and the place was unlocked for tourists, the rush on roads was more than we expected in this situation. People were like dying to go out of their houses. So pre-booking of hotels is always first before planning a trip to avoid spoiling your trip. Our hotel was near to the Mall road having a great view of beautiful Mussoorie and the Doon valley. After taking an hour of rest, we planned to visit the Gun Hill, the second-highest point in Mussoorie which was at 1 Km from our hotel and a small trek of 30 minutes. As it was the first day for the tourists, all places were not open. Gun Hill can be reached via a cable car, but it was not opened that day. We had a 500 m trek to reach the Gun Hill which was one hell of an adventure on its own as it feels alive after so much time of lockdown. I would prefer, trekking by cable car. It was the most beautiful view from the top and the sunset was just amazing.

After coming down, we grabbed some snacks, did some shopping, and came back to our hotel.

Day 2

Our next day started with the beautiful view of Mussoorie from our rooms.

As the roads are really congested, we rented scooters which are highly recommended to have. We planned to visit Landour, a military cantonment near Mussoorie. We first went to the highest top viewpoint of Mussoorie, Lal Tibba. The morning view was more amazing than we expected.

We had our breakfast from Lal Tibba cafe famous for its cheese bun omelet and Coffee. After that we move towards the main Landour, it was like time freezes here because all the things gave us a feeling like we are in our 50's or 60's. Landour is a cantonment barely changed since it's setup. It will give you a whole different feeling from Mussoorie as it was quiet and so relaxed. We went to the famous Landour Bakehouse to taste some of the freshly baked buns with coffee.

Then we visit the Kellogg Memorial church which was closed as of now.

From there we left for our hotel, rested for a while, and planned the rest of the evening. In the evening we planned to visit Kempty fall and from our hotel, it was around 15 km. It took around 45 mins to reach there. The rush at Kempty fall was more than we expected. To reach the bottom of the fall, there are 2 ways, by stairs or via ropeway. We opted for stairs and reached the bottom, but it was quite crowded and as this Covid situation we opt not to go to into the water, so we started climbing back towards the first tier of the Kempty waterfall which was totally empty. We got our spaces and with a hygienic point of view also it was awesome.

We enjoyed it for a while there and climbed back to the top and rushed towards the George Everest peak. George Everest was a British geographer, and he was best known for having Mount Everest, named in his honor. He used to live here and it's famous for sunset viewpoint. We reached there almost at the time of sunset but luckily, we were able to view the most beautiful sunset of our lives from there.

It was dark very soon after that, so we headed back to our hotel, returned our scooters, and left for shopping from the nearby markets. After this, we had our dinner and reached back to our hotel rooms.

The next morning we left for our home via Dehradun and Haridwar the holy water of Ganga. This was one hell of a trip. As we rested adequately in this trip, we felt refreshed as have a traveling soul. So, Stay tuned, Stay safe, and be Musaafir😉.

Written By:- Prashant Chaudhary Instagram- @musaafir.hun.yaaro Facebook- @musaafir.hun.yaaro