Delhi-Sonepat-Panipat-Ambala-Chandigarh-Ropar-Kiratpur-Swarghat-Bilaspur-Ghagas-Mandi-Pandoh-Aut-Sundernagar-Bhunter-Kullu-Manali.
Number of occupants: Nine (including five adults and four kids). And, of course, the accompanying five medium-to-big pieces of luggage, not to mention the half-a-dozen small on-the-way kind of bags.
Started from home at 12:30 a.m. (yes, midnight). Delhi to Kundli was a breeze. But after that, it was dead slow. Why? The killer fog engulfed the road completely. I drove in the middle of the road, trying to follow the mid-road markings and also the blinking indicators of the vehicles in front. The newly-built Panipat toll bridge was easy to manouevre as the bridge lights were fully on and the road was easy to see. The fog was present all the way up to Chandigarh, with very few, rare letups in between. It was as if we were driving through white smoke, so thick it was, with visibility reduced to a couple of metres. The blinkers were on all the way up to Chandigarh. The fog picked altitude after that and by the time we left Chandigarh, it was early morning. Ropar highway gave us some more fog, though. But it became slightly easier to drive because of increasing daylight.
Fog on Ropay highway
Right turn at Ropar
Right turn at Kiratpur
Made a right turn at Kiratpur and we entered Himachal. Stopped for tea after Swarghat and saw an awesome sight.
Between Swarghat & Bilaspur
Pit stop after Swarghat
Govind Sagar Lake
Lunch near Mandi
From there on, it was easy drive up to Manali. The entire hill road journey was breathtaking, but the one part that really shook us was the 3-km long tunnel just before Aut. Wow, it was simply amazing, marvelous piece of engineering with full lights inside. It’s a two-lane tunnel. While going, we did not realize that the tunnel was that long and kept looking for the exit but it never came. After three kms, we finally saw daylight and out we stepped into Aut – another great halt if you’re looking for something local to buy.
Kullu valley was beautiful. Manali was our base station while we checked out the surroundings. We visited Solang Valley, Kothi (had initially thought of going up to Gulaba but the traffic on that highway was simply too much and we decided to return from Kothi), Vashisht temple, Hadimba temple, the local Monastery, the forest park and, of course, the Mall. The main Mall has been kept out of bounds for vehicles.
The weather was superb in Manali – very cold at nights, and bright and sunny at day time.
Kullu narrow road
Kullu valley
Kullu playground
On way to Manali
Manali valley
Diversion on Manali-Solang highway
On way to Solang
Vehicles parked near Solang picnic spot
Mine too
While returning to Delhi, we started late morning and took several stops and could only reach Swarghat by the time darkness fell. Checked out the two hotels on the highway, but both were fully booked. One of the hotel managers was kind enough to arrange accommodation at Anandpur Sahib. Even though it meant going in the opposite direction to Delhi, we decided to go for it as the kids were feeling restless and tired. It turned out to be a welcome stop as we got to see the gurudwara that we always passed by at great speed while on our previous trips to Himachal.
More pics follow...