McLeodganj is the easiest place to live in - so it was time to step out of the comfort zone, loop down the winding roads from our deodar covered ridge and see what the rest of Himachal Pradesh has to offer.
| The solid walls of Kangra Fort |
At 7.30 am one recent hazy morning, we jumped into the Suzuki Maruti taxi with our friend Sachin and his mate Sonny behind the wheel (and a spare battery in the passenger foot well) and headed down the Kangra Valley, following the Beas River.
First stop was the stone pile of Kangra Fort, defensively perched high on a 100 metre arrete between two rivers and only accessible across a narrow tongue of land, and even then only by crossing a defensive ditch and passing for 200 metres under a crenelated curtain wall pierced by arrow slits.