Up-hill struggle in Kashmir

First off, continuing from my last entry, it was real; we didn't get scammed (sort-of)!

On our first day in India, in a very sleep deprived and jet-lagged state, we somehow got ushered into a Delhi travel agency (that stated many times it was part of the government tourism programme). Once inside, we somehow got convinced to cancel our planned trip to Amritsar, and instead go to visit Kashmir; where it apparently wouldn't be raining. The next day was filled with discussions on how stupid we were to fall for a such well known scam, especially when we tried to check our plane tickets online and couldn't find them. Eventually after a lot of back and forth, we decided to go with it and see what happens...

First glitch in the plan; arriving at Delhi airport terminal 2 only to be told it was terminal 1 the flight would leave from. This of course has to happen while me and Ben were both suffering with the infamous Delhi belly. After that it was pretty smooth sailing.

We did in fact have seats on the plane! Unfortunately we were seated next to a group with the most appalling plane etiquette i have ever seen; standing up during the plane taxiing, swapping seats, shouting and (my least favourite) constantly grabbing the back of my seat - thank God the journey was only an hour.

After filling in some exceptionally confusing paperwork we were free to meet our very nice driver, who basically gave us a tour of the city to the way to the home-stay. So, to be completely honest, the home-stay is a slightly further away from the town than we were expecting... Okay 10km could be seen as being quite a LOT further but we'd decided to embrace it (and get a lot better at walking). We were in a quiet residential area with beautiful views of the surrounding mountains, staying with a very welcoming family, who fed us twice a day and only occasionally tried to sell us package tour deals.

Our first full day here we decided to go for a lovely walk to a nearby lake, in the monsoon rains that (despite our guide's promises) had just arrived. Being very determined to find this lake, we walked through flooded streets, residential areas (which may have never seen a tourist from the strange looks we were getting) and got lost quite a few times before we got a glimpse of the lake. It was a rubbish view, so a helpful local showed us a shortcut through a soggy field to another residential block, where we could see the beautiful view of the lake; only if we listened to spiel on houseboat holidays for twenty minutes while seeming vaguely interested... but we did get free tea.

The second day here was more successful, we visited Hazratbal Mosque which overlooks Dal Lake. Inside the waiting area of the Mosque we got accosted by a fervently religious man who desperately wanted us to believe in god. Not his own god specifically, just any, he had a lot to say about "Mary the mother" and Jesus, while his mum (or nan?) tried to drag him away and while I, wide-eyed and agnostic, tried to slowly edge away from the conversation. I did how-ever meet a lovely Kashmiri lady who, on seeing me waiting patiently, pushed through the crowd of in line for the toilet and held a broken door up to a cubicle so i could go to the loo in private.

We meandered our way through the bustling market that surrounds the mosque on a Friday. After trying and failing to find me some harem pants, we wandered away from this area for a little break from the chaos. We found a bakery (moonlight) that was recommended to us by our airport driver on the way in. The guy running it was lovely and opened just for us before heading off for prayers. We had a small piece of rich walnut fudge cake, which was delicious and a small bit was perfect, any more and i think we'd have had a sugar overload.

From a jetty in the market we went for a Shikara Boat ride (managing to barter the price down from Rs 600 to Rs 500, Score!). Our helmsman was an enthusiastic talker despite his lack of English, and would like to point things out for us such as "bird" referencing Herons and Eagles we could see; as well as asking us personal questions about our marriage status, lack of children and our fathers' names. He took us to a floating "garden"; a concrete structure in the middle of the lake with about 5 on it trees and some grass, before heading back the way we came. The scenery was beautiful in a moody, misty kinda way and the whole experience was enjoyable, when we could get him to shut-up for a few minutes.

We headed back after this as we'd been warned off going into the old town on a Friday due to the weekly Stone-throwing by locals at Indian Soldiers that happens after afternoon Prayers. Kashmir wants its independence.

On our way back we were followed by two boys who wanted to buy me from Ben for Rs 20 (at time of writing £0.24 Sterling)... luckily Ben decided i was worth more than this. When that didn't seem to work they just wanted the Rs 20 to go away. In attempting to defend my honour he did manage to teach them some choice swearwords, and eventually they did leave us alone.

We got an early-ish start the next day as we planned to visit some local gardens. A scenic walk 6km along the edge of Dal Lake got us to the Shalimar Bagh. During this walk we were harassed by some lake workers, who shouted something at us before breaking into laughter; got stopped by people passing by for selfies, and even had a very enthusiastic father stop his car on the side of the duel carriage way to literally drag his screaming son from the car to be in a picture with us.

Inside Shalimar Bagh we wandered along the central canal that is bridged by 17th century terraces, surrounded either side by plots of exotic flowers. The selfie-mania continued inside and at one point there was even a queue. While wandering towards the next gardens on a not so scenic route that took us past two army barracks, we decided that the only way we could put up with the incessant selfie requests was to make a game of it. From then on we would get a selfie for us too. We're going to start an instagram account named "Not Famous in..." to put all our photos with randomers.

The Heritage Mughal gardens, also know as Nishat Bagh (the garden of joy in Urdu) was our next stop. However, by this point we were a bit tired so stopped for a drink in a small marketplace next to Dal Lake. Rs 60 got us a teeny-tiny coffee and a strange tea that was luminous green and had bits of nuts floating in it. Ben also enjoyed a platter of pakora, being a bit braver to eat street food while being so far away from passable toilets (my protector of the toilets, the friendly Kashmiri lady from the day before was no-where in sight). The Mughal Gardens have twelve levels to wander, with water flowing down from the uppermost level through a water feature spanning the entire gardens. It was beautiful, impressive, and i imagine could be peaceful if there weren't quite so many people there... and if those people didn't want selfies with us. We did decide to find a relatively quiet spot to throw down Ben's rain-mac (which he promptly put a hole in by accidentally jabbing his belt buckle into it) and had a read. After a relax (and a few more selfies) we decided to grab a tuk-tuk home, walking 14km was enough for one day.

On a day where we didn't have anything planned our host decided to take us on a tour to see how Kashmiri carpets and shawls are made which involved meeting up with his nephew (who is incidentally not a carpet salesman). Travelling into the old town, we ended up at the little ramshackle wattle and daub house. After climbing several sets of stairs in darkness, we were led into the top room in which one of the locals showed us on a massive loom how each strand was separately woven into the carpet before being cut all while the others in the room stared at us smoking a shared pipe. The amount of work that goes into each carpet is immense and they each take at least 8 months to make.

From the old town we made an unexpected stop at the Khanqahi Shah-I-Hamdan Mosque, an 8th century highly decorated mosque made in honour for Islamic revolutionary Syed Ali Hamdani, a man who helped bring the Islamic culture to Asia and parts of Europe. The mosque is locally known as the Paper-Mache Mosque as every inch of it is covered in hand-painted decoration. Unfortunately we could only stick our heads through the door because i didn't have any head covering and Ben had his legs out.

Then to the house of the man who was definitely not a carpet seller, where we had tea and cakes and saw what seemed like hundreds of beautifully made Cashmere (Kashmir) and silk carpets and shawls. We learned of his esteemed client list (Harrods, Hermes etc) and how he was a international wholesaler and definitely didn't sell retail... but would just for us as we were staying at his Uncles house. The carpets were all handmade, and all of them were unique, or as Ben would put it they were like an "hypnotic kaleidoscope". We didn't buy a carpet, despite his assurances it was "buying champagne for the price of beer" for many reasons; firstly it was still way more expensive than any beer I've ever tried, and secondly we don't even have a house for the carpet to go in. We did however buy some Shawls. Once that decision was made the transaction was quickly wrapped up and we were whisked away back to our temporary home.

On our last day of activities in Kashmir our host took us for a trek. We weren't informed about how far away we needed go by car to get to the trekking spot. So 3 hours later; after driving through many villages; Sangam (a village famous for making cricket bats) and Kashmirs own Islamabad, we arrived at Pahalgam (a name meaning Valley of the Shepherds). The whole region was beautiful, a huge white water river flows from the surrounding mountains and through the valleys in between. After a security checkpoint, where we had to walk our bags through a metal detector before getting back in the car for another 10 minutes drive, we started our hike.

We hiked 11km, starting 1km before the start of the wildlife preserve towards the village of Aru. It was hard work (for some reason this came as a surprise to us) but it was well worth it, the views were amazing. It took us about 2 hours to reach Aru, stopping of course for the obligatory photos with random passersby, and stopped for a cup of tea at an Eco Camp we came across when i was bursting for the loo. We cheated on the way back and got a sharing cab to the gate of the wildlife park, we were exhausted.

While trying to leave the region we got stopped by the army (along with a group of other tourists) because of a rule no-one told us - you can only leave the area before 1pm otherwise you have to spend another night. Luckily our host was a quick thinker and lied, saying were leaving for Leh in the morning and staying a night would lose us money. It worked, so we and the other tourists were allowed to leave with the warning not to try it again. The journey back would have been a lot quicker, if our host and the driver didn't stop along the way for an impromptu shopping trip, but we got back eventually. I think that's just the Kashmiri way.

Our time spent in Srinagar was strange. It is a heavily militarised area, but once you get used to seeing armed men at every corner and an army barrack pretty much every where you go, you can find the beauty in the lakes, gardens and the Kashmiri hospitality. It has a very rich history and the current political unrest means it doesn't see as many tourists as it should. I would definitely recommend Kashmir to others, but maybe it would be worth staying somewhere more convenient.

So over-all it wasn't a scam but just wasn't quite what was advertised.