We got a long weekend for Diwali and thought would do a quick visit to Srinagar in its Fall/Apple season. There are 4 seasons in Kashmir of which I have covered two of them already and this is my third visit.

Day 1 – Delhi to Srinagar

We boarded our flight to Srinagar from Delhi and waited for the first sight of Himalayas from the flight. To our disappointment, the Himalayas appeared only on one side of the flight and we were sitting on the wrong side. If anyone is traveling to Srinagar from Delhi, choose seat numbers D-F as the view is too good that side. Every time I look at Himalayas, the kid inside me awakens and I feel like jumping around with excitement.

I finally tried to capture the Himalayas photo from the other side of the plane.

As soon as we landed, we looked around for mountains, but couldn’t get a clear view of them due to fog. We quickly reached our hotel (JH Bazaz) and had a good chat with the hotel owner and our friend Sarwar on the situation in Kashmir and our trip plan.

We decided to do local Srinagar trip today and head out to Gulmarg the next day. We went out first for Dal lake Shikara ride as it would be ideal to do ride in the afternoon.

It was great ride and we could see lot of plants growing inside the lake (below the water, not above). We got to know the reason too, that because of sun light plants grow in the lake, but in summer due to continuous water flow, they can’t grow much. Now that it is the end of summer, water flow decreased  and plants are growing well. In 2-3 months, that will completely stop due to lack of sunlight and Dal lake becomes frozen, and then the cycle continues. I got this crazy idea that I have to  walk on top of frozen Dal lake 😛 . So, our next visit to Srinagar will be in winter (Feb).

After our Shikhara ride, we headed to Pari Mahal, as we missed this during our April visit. It is situated on top of a hill with great city views and  beautiful flower garden.

We headed to Shankaracharya temple from there, which is also on top of a hill. Mobile phones are not allowed there and entry is prohibited after 5pm. We had to climb around 250 steps to reach the temple. It’s a Lord Shiva temple visited by Adi Shankaracharya. It is a very very old temple (200 BC) and its completely built with stone. I haven’t seen such an old temple so far and it looked fascinating. The views from the temple are also very good. I would definitely suggest people to visit this place, provided they have enough energy to climb the steps.

We then went to Nishat Bagh which is filled with various kinds of flowers. We absolutely loved the kind of symmetry present in some flowers. It was a treat to eyes to watch these.

We also got an opportunity to witness sunset in the mountains from Nishat Bagh.

We headed back to our hotel after sunset and took rest for the day.

Day 2 – Gulmarg

We started our trip to Gulmarg today morning. It looked completely different with fall colors.

We reached Gondola point and waited there for sometime and got to know that cable car is under repair today. We felt little disappointed initially to hear that, but since there will be no snow at this point of time, it didn’t really matter much.

Our driver was more disappointed than us and he offered to take us to some offbeat places nearby and we were more than happy to visit new places this time.

He stopped us at various view points on the way down, which are very serene and breathtaking.

After spending couple of hours there, we stopped at Tangmarg for lunch and then moved on to visit apple orchards on the way.

Having never seen an apple tree till now, we felt very excited over the first glimpse of apple orchards.

There are various varieties of apples and we got to taste all of them. They are very juicy and tasty. We spoke to the garden owner and ordered a box of apples to our place. The vendor said that we can transfer the amount after we receive the box to our place (it was never delivered, its better you carry that box than relying on them)

Day 3: Sonamarg

The road to Sonamarg is beautifully filled with the Sindh river and trees with fall colors.

Since its a national highway,  journey is very comfortable. This road goes from Srinagar to Leh and you can see changes in patterns of mountains from time to time. After a point of time, we observed that the road on one side is full of mountains with trees and on the other side, not even a trace of tree, that was quite surprising element for us. We wish to travel to Leh from Srinagar next time, the journey sounds so awesome.

After reaching Sonamarg, we took a pony to reach Thajiwas Glacier where snow can be spotted. There are also some vans from there that take you to Zero point, but the road to zero point is not that good and we didn’t want to go there. My cousins have been there to Zero point and they advised us against that. So, we chose pony option to explore Sonamarg.

The pony ride was very comfortable, although there is change of terrain in some places, the pony took us very well without troubling much and its not that steep, it was pretty much smooth journey with couple of ups and downs.

After around 40mins, we took a break at small restaurant along a stream in between and had maggi and hot tea.

We finally reached Thajiwas glacier, it took close to 1hr 30mins from the Sonamarg. There is small stretch of ice there, which formed a cave like structure. More than the final destination, it was the journey with great views that made the trip awesome.

On the way back, we walked for sometime taking photographs in between and enjoying the place. Its filled with fall color trees.

There is a mountain called “Nanga Parbat”, on which you cannot see even one tree and that’s the one which appears very white and shines in gold color when sunlight falls on it. Sonamarg is famous for this mountain.

We had some food after we reached back and started our journey back to Srinagar, bidding goodbye to Sonamarg.

I would say Sonamarg is the best part of our trip and this looked so different from the one which we have seen in April/May, and the views, trekking to glacier made our journey very memorable. Would love to come back to this place, as a stop-over next time on the way to Leh.

Sonamarg and Gulmarg are the must do places, if you are planning a visit to Kashmir in any season.

Day 4: Bye Bye Srinagar

We had our flight today evening and our hotel owner arranged us a second Shikhara ride in the morning specially for us and it was wonderful as usual.

We also did some dry-fruit shopping in Srinagar – Cranberries, BlackBerries, Akroot etc. All are freshly found there and since its the season, we got them very fresh. Definitely worth a buy, they are very tasty.

Bye Bye Srinagar one more time, I wish to visit again in a different season or on trip to Leh.