We started from Gurgaon at 6 a.m. and finally at 6 p.m. we are at Kasauli. There were many pit stops including a 3 hour lunch stop at Mohali. Apart from that, a couple of car-trouble pit stops at vehicle workshops ( The Maruti Ertiga always has some issue – especially when driving in the hills. Easily loses it’s wheel alignment, doesn’t easily climb up slopes, etc. ), some short stops for driver changes and some short stops for medication breaks – aging parents means they eat pills more than they eat food.
And now we’re here. This is my first time at Kasauli and it is just as it had been described – the clouds do enter your room! The next seven days have a daily rain / drizzle forecast and we’ve come prepared with umbrellas. The weather forecast mentioned a high temperature of 28 degrees Celsius and a low temperature of 20-22 degrees Celsius. So far, everything’s been accurate.
Lots of monkeys here. The cantonment also has some Langurs but these are docile and I’ve been told they are scared of the regular monkeys. We’ve been advised to keep our room doors latched at all time as monkeys leave no opportunity to ransack rooms. The water tank lids are covered with pointy aluminum bits to keep the monkeys away.
There are power cuts every few hours – twice in the last two hours that we’ve been here.
The bar opens at 1930 and dinner is served at the Brigade Officers Mess at 2000. Our room is called “Solan” after a nearby town where the Mohan Meakin distillery that produces the whiskey Solan No. 1 is manufactured. Since it rains so much at Kasauli, the pathway from the rooms to the Mess is covered and well-lit. Lots of stairs.
I always tend to set up my room – at least toiletries and cosmetics as soon as I get to the accommodation. Especially when the stay is at least 3 days long. There is an empty wardrobe but it seems damp. I think I’m going to leave my clothes in the suitcase.
There’s a pretty weird pencil sketch on the wall right above the table I’ve setup the laptop on. It’s a girl in dungarees with what looks like a dog / cat / man-eyed animal of some sort.
Mobile network is pretty solid but there’s patchy mobile itnernet connectivity. Comes and goes in waves. It lets me post to Instagram sometimes, which in my experience means it’s actually half decent. Posting this blog piece took a while though. 2MB of images uploaded in about 40 minutes. Reminds me of wheezing dial-up days. ( CoSchedule isn’t even loading on the blog. I had signed up for their paid annual plan but their support has not been up to the mark at all and so many glitches – in two days I’ve had 45 failed Facebook updates that were not published. That’s terrible considering the time it takes to setup scheduled social media updates and that one expects them to work when one’s travelling. I still haven’t decided to ask for a refund because the CoSchedule app definitely does have positives that I know of in no other service but I’m close to taking that call. )
As soon as we hit the winding roads in the hills – especially after Parwanoo – both Akanksha and I kept hopping in our seats pointing to every scenic spot as an “outfit post location”! We aren’t carrying too many of said outfits though but I’m going to improvise because I have, for company, not one but two excellent photographers in the family. Dad is the original photographer.
Our goal with this short break was to spend time together – just the four of us. We plan to go for walks, listen to music, chat, laze, and that’s it. There are no plans of going for picnics each day or to explore new places around Kasauli. We plan to stay put and explore the town on foot. But then plans are always subject to change!
