Manali

Manali is the town most Indians picture when they imagine the mountains. Set at the head of the Kullu Valley in Himachal Pradesh, at around 2,050 metres above sea level, it sits where the roaring Beas river, deep deodar-cedar forests and the snowline of the Pir Panjal range all come together in one compact, walkable place. For a generation of honeymooners, families and first-time trekkers it has been the gateway to "snow" — the accessible, photogenic Himalaya you can reach on a night bus from Delhi — and for the backpackers who have drifted through since the 1960s it has been something quieter and stranger: an apple-orchard hill station that became a global crossroads.

The name comes from Manu, the progenitor of humankind in Hindu tradition, and the valley wears its mythology openly. This is the Kullu Valley, the "Valley of the Gods," where hundreds of village deities (devtas) are carried in palanquins to fairs and festivals and where temples to sages and demon-queens stand in cedar groves within sight of the bazaar. The 16th-century Hadimba Temple, the sage Manu's shrine in the old village, the ancient hot springs at Vashisht — these are living places of worship, not museum pieces, and they give Manali a spiritual undertow that the ski-lifts and cafe strips can obscure.

What pulls most visitors up the valley, though, is the landscape and what you can do in it. A short drive northwest, Solang Valley is an all-season adventure bowl — paragliding and zorbing when the meadows are green, skiing and snowboarding when they are white. Higher still, the Rohtang Pass at 3,978 metres was for centuries the only door between Manali and the stark trans-Himalayan district of Lahaul, a snow gate shut for half the year. Since 2020 the 9-kilometre Atal Tunnel has punched clean through the mountain, opening Lahaul's cold desert to day-trippers year-round and rewriting what a Manali trip can include.

Manali is really two towns stitched together. The main town clusters around the Mall Road and Model Town, busy, commercial and geared to package tourism. Across the Manalsu stream, Old Manali is the counter-culture heart — apple orchards, guesthouses, and a famous huddle of cafes serving Israeli, Italian and Tibetan food to a slow-moving international crowd, a legacy of decades on the old hippie trail. Half an hour down the valley, Naggar carries the region's medieval history in a wooden castle and a Russian painter's hilltop home. The contrasts are the point: you can ski in the morning and eat shakshuka by a river in the afternoon.

Practically, Manali suits almost every kind of mountain trip. Give it three to four days and you can fold in the temples of the old town, a snow day at Solang or Rohtang, a heritage run to Naggar, and a taste of Himachali cooking without feeling rushed. It is also the launchpad for some of India's great road journeys — the Manali–Leh Highway to Ladakh and the rough road over Kunzum Pass into Spiti — so many travellers treat it as base camp before the real high-altitude adventure begins. One caveat worth setting early: there is no railway to Manali, and the roads up the valley can be slow, so plan your arrival with a little patience.