Days 4, 5 and 6: Tuesday, June 08, 2010 to Thursday, June 10, 2010
Location: Misty Mountains, Chaukori
Club Mahindra, Binsar; to Misty Mountains near Chaukori is approx. 100 kms and 3.5 hours away. The Misty Mountains resort is not exactly in Chaukori. It is located 30 kms to the South of Chaukori, on the way to Patal Bhuvaneshwar. A right U-Turn at Syuti Bend takes you to Ram Mandir. Misty Mountains is a further 4 kms beyond Ram Madir.
Let’s get the only negative about Misty Mountains out of the way first. Although the road up to Ram Mandir is manageable, the last 4 kms are ugly. It’s a stone road, and not well made at that. Our car (Santro) which otherwise handles the hill roads quite well, creaked and groaned on the way up. We were wondering whether we had made the right choice.
However, all doubts were put aside the moment we reached the place. Our cottage itself gave a lovely 180 degree view of the Himalayas. A short 1 km trek to a viewing point gives a 270 degree view of the entire mountain range. Misty Mountains is a 5-acre property which has been operational since about a year. It has approx 10 cottages, and 70 rooms in all. Each of the rooms gives an excellent view of the entire mountain range.
Since the objective was to chill out, this is precisely what we did for the first 2 days here. The resort is located on one of the highest mountains in the area, at an altitude of 2000 metres. Evenings were spent taking short walks around the resort. Apart from the ‘Sunset Point’, a 1 km walk also takes you to a beautiful garden which is at absolutely picture perfect.
On Day 3, I along with the local guide Manu went for a walk on top of the mountain where the resort is located. It is a roughly 2 km walk, but we gain about 400 metres in altitude. We started at about 5 in the morning, and reached the top in about an hour. The view of the Himalayas was clouded – this has been pretty much the case wherever we have gone, and things aren’t expected to improve.
After spending an hour on the top, we were back to the resort at 8 am. After some time, we left for the Patal Bhuvaneshwar caves, which are about an hour away from the resort. The approx 30 metres walk to enter the main part of the caves is very narrow; but our confidence was boosted when we saw a 100+ kg woman making her way out just as we were about to enter. The engraving on the caves is quite spectacular. It is claimed that all the formations inside the caves are natural, but I have my reservations on them. There are fascinating inter-woven stories relating to each formation on the cave, and made for engrossing listening.
After that, we headed to a musk deer farm in Chaukori. This was a complete waste of time, since we were allowed to view the deers only at about a 25 metre distance, and separated by 2 fences which made any proper viewing extremely difficult. We were back at the resort at 4 pm. Next day, we left for the Wayfarer Resort in Munsiyari early in the morning
Verdict: Worth visiting, and worth staying at the Misty Mountains. The location, the cottages, the food and the overall facilities are of extremely good quality. The view of the Himalayas wasn’t great at this time of the year, but I am told that September and October offer a picture-perfect view.
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