Day 3 : Pahalgam

Here I am sitting in the balcony of the Valley View Resort surrounded by huge Himalayan mountains on three sides, some of them snow capped. Between our resort and the feet of the mountains runs a river on a heavily pebbled bed. I am munching my crisp just plucked by by hand apple and writing this with my slightly chilled fingers. This indeed is a magical moment for the soul. We have just arrived after a 4 hour interesting journey from Srinagar houseboat to Pahalgam and my parents rest for a while and wait for the evening pony ride, I have some time to reflect and ponder on the present and the morning gone by.

The journey started with driving throught the city of Srinagar, once again army seen at every nook and corner, shops, empty fields, on house roofs, everywhere. It was as if the whole city was a cotonement area. Army trucks, vehicles moved around on the streets. What a waste of Government resoures. As I flipped through the Kashmir Times I could see how inspite of all that the government was doing for the protection of people and the country, the press was so biased against them, as if the the army was the real terrorist and locals the victims.

We left the city and drove through the country side seeing various trees and driver explaining to us which one was which and its usage. There was the chinar, willow (which the driver refered to as yellow), popular etc.We saw lines of shops with cricket bats made of willor wood hanging on them. We stopped at a saffron feild where some field workers explained to us how the saffron is made and from which part of the flower. We even saw apple orchards with heaps of apples being packed. We bought some freshly plucked ones and they were the most delicious and juicy ever.

After reaching the city of Pahalgam, the first thing we did even before checking into our hotel was to stop by the market and have lunch.As we drove through the market, town, village, the whole feel was very different from Srinagar. This was a real Kashmiri village. The most beautiful part was the Lidder river flowing all along our way. Dad said it was easier to construct road following the movement of the river. I gaped at the raw beauty all around me and soon we reached our resort. It was just next to the Lidder and that was the best part.

After we put our luggage in a croner, and While mom rested in the room, me and dad explored the viscinity. We walked in the neighbouring area and went down the adjacent river. There a man came to us and started showing us his kesar for sale. He tried to prove by the bowl and spoon test explaining why his kesar was 100% pure. We bought some from him. We bought so much kesar at different places just to understand which is pure and which is not but still not sure of it. In the evening we started from the hotel for a ponyride to some of the points of interests like the Kashmir valley, Baisaran where lot of movie shootings have taken place.