Kasol Diaries: Trails, Bakeries, and Unexpected Lessons

I usually need to know the end-to-end details of an itinerary before I travel anywhere. This was the first trip where I had no clue what the activities would look like until a few days before flying out — and strangely, I was okay with it. I was joining the Jaipur Shaala group, a set of people I barely knew apart from Kapil Sir, and it didn't feel right to bombard them with questions. I knew there was a trek involved, but not where or what it entailed. I told myself if it meant camping overnight in a tent, I'd skip it and roam around instead.

Minni and I had wanted to travel together for a while, but our plans kept falling through — so when the Jaipur Shaala trip to Kasol came up, we jumped at it. We met the group in Chandigarh and drove down together, stopping along the way to eat. Traveling with a group of genuine foodies was a novelty; usually I'm the one pushing for good food while everyone else is indifferent. This time, all I had to do was tag along.

The drive from Chandigarh to Kasol took about 10 hours. We checked into our hotel and headed straight out for dinner — at 9 pm, which is usually my bedtime. Kasol has a vibe unlike anywhere else I've been in Himachal Pradesh or Uttarakhand. We ate at a lovely restaurant with live Hindi music and dance performances — a far cry from what I expected a "trekking trip" to feel like. Friends joked, "Har din thode na hum trek karenge". The nightlife in Kasol has its own distinct energy, and that first evening was fun and fulfilling.

By day two, the pace had shifted from music to mountains. We visited Manikaran — a gurudwara and a Shiva temple, with steam rising off the hot springs even in the daytime heat — before heading to a beautiful little village called Tosh. We hiked up a bit to reach a cafe called Pink Floyd, perched with lovely views. On our way back, we got stuck in traffic, and I found myself wondering how skillfully the drivers maneuvered their vehicles on such tricky roads. As a passenger, I was sometimes frustrated with the traffic, but most of the people in the driving seat seemed thrilled, enjoying the adventure of driving on such terrain.

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Trek day arrived next: Bhandak Thatch in Pulga. We set off early, and the trail wound steadily uphill through forest — the canopy thick enough that we were spared the worst of the sun, which felt like a small mercy as the climb wore on. The guide kept saying "very good, very good." I wonder sometimes how these guides manage to carry so many bags and walk in ordinary shoes, all while talking the entire way, when I'm gasping for breath at every step. We were told it was mostly flat, with an incline of about 30-40 degrees here and there, but I hardly remember seeing any flat land — most of it felt inclined. Four hours in, the trees suddenly opened up into a meadow, and the view was worth every step. We sat there for a while, catching our breath, someone passing around snacks, everyone stunned into silence by how far we'd come. The descent was harder for me — not physically, but mentally. I kept fighting the fear of slipping. Minni shared her technique for descending, and with help from friends on the tricky sections, I made it down safely. On the way down, I kept wondering what had possessed me to climb all the way up in the first place — I hadn't realized how steep and difficult some sections were until I was going back down them. Still, it was a good day, and we were all relieved and happy to have made it down safely.

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We were originally supposed to head to Malana the next day, but the plan got dropped since the roads were closed. Looking back, that unplanned rest day turned out to be one of our favourites. We woke up leisurely and had breakfast at a wonderful place called Bistro Nirvana, where I ended up overeating. Afterward, Minni and I took a stroll and did some street shopping around Kasol. At some point, we realized some of the group were at a German bakery, so we headed over. I was too full to even look at the food, and I found myself wondering how everyone else was still indulging in desserts right after eating. But when Minni and I took one bite of the Tiramisu, that was enough to convince us to order a whole one and finish it, despite being completely full. As Kapil Sir joked, there are probably more German bakeries in Kasol than in Germany itself — and the desserts were absolutely worth drooling over. After all that trekking, I decided, we'd earned every bite. That night, we partied once again to live Hindi music.

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This trip was unique and enjoyable in ways I hadn't expected. I met people whose energy was unmatched — full of life and genuinely present in everything they did. I learned a lot from the Jaipur Shaala members: they know how to enjoy life and good food, while still being fit, focused, and serious when it mattered — like on trek day. Friends started teasing me that my definition of a "trek" had officially changed, since I'd clearly enjoyed the relaxed pace of this vacation just as much as the climb itself. There was no packed itinerary this time, nothing rigid about the plan — we were all just flexible, going with the flow, and somehow that's what made it one of the most memorable vacations I've had. I even joked with a few friends afterward that I could probably get away with eating late and sleeping late every once in a while.