India
The gods’ own mountains — lakes, tigers and the young Ganga
The place
Uttarakhand is what the plains of north India dream about in May. An hour out of Dehradun the air changes, the road starts to climb, and everything the state is famous for sits within a day of everything else: Nainital’s boating lake in a bowl of seven hills, the sal forests of Corbett where India first learned to protect its tigers, Mussoorie strung along a ridge that the British called the Queen of the Hills, and Rishikesh, where the Ganga comes out of the mountains cold, green and fast.
It is also Devbhoomi — the land of the gods. The Char Dham shrines of Yamunotri, Gangotri, Kedarnath and Badrinath open each summer to hundreds of thousands of yatris, and even a purely secular traveller ends up at an aarti on the river one evening, because that is simply what the state does to you.
March to June and September to November are the months that matter. The monsoon, July and August, is beautiful and green but brings landslides and closed hill roads, and we do not run departures then. Winter belongs to snowfall chasers and Auli’s ski slopes — a different trip, and one we will happily build on request.
Best months
The months in gold are when Uttarakhand is at its best — weather, crowds and price together.
Gold = best months to travelDroplets = how wet the month isHigh / low °C
Holiday Packages
New6N / 7DNainital 2N · Corbett 2N · Mussoorie 2N
The classic Uttarakhand triangle in one private-car loop — two nights on the Nainital lakefront, two in a riverside resort at Corbett with a dawn jeep safari, and two on the Mussoorie ridge, with an evening halt at Har Ki Pauri on the drive between. No coach, no fixed group, one driver end to end.
*Indicative — final price confirmed on live availability.
New8N / 9DRishikesh 3N · Corbett 2N · Mussoorie 3N
Uttarakhand at an unhurried, upgraded pace — three nights on the Ganga at Rishikesh with morning yoga, an evening aarti and a full white-water day, two nights in a premium Corbett resort with dawn and dusk safaris, and three on the Mussoorie ridge with the Landour loop and a sunset at George Everest’s house. Premium and five-star stays throughout, one Innova Crysta and driver end to end.
*Indicative — final price confirmed on live availability.
Worth your days
Nainital is built around its emerald lake the way an amphitheatre is built around a stage. Row across it in the early morning before the pedal boats come out, walk the flat Camel’s Back loop, and take the ropeway up to Snow View — on a clear October day the whole Nanda Devi range stands on the horizon like a set of teeth.
India’s oldest national park, and still one of its best. The open Gypsy enters the Bijrani or Jhirna zone at first light, when the sal forest is loud with langur alarm calls. Elephant, deer and wild boar are near-certain; the tiger is a matter of luck and patience, and no honest operator will promise one. Book the safari permit weeks ahead — the park caps entries.
At dusk the ghats at Parmarth Niketan and Triveni fill with lamps, chanting and river mist — go once even if rituals are not your thing. By day the same river is north India’s best white water: the 16-kilometre Shivpuri stretch has named rapids, licensed operators and a jump-off cliff, and needs no prior experience beyond the nerve to get in the raft.
The full circuit of Yamunotri, Gangotri, Kedarnath and Badrinath takes ten to twelve days on mountain roads and, for Kedarnath, a 16-kilometre walk or a pony or a helicopter. It runs roughly May to October, closes in winter, and requires state registration for every yatri. We build it as its own dedicated trip; on a shorter holiday, Rishikesh and Haridwar give you the sacred Ganga without the altitude.
The Mall Road, Gun Hill by ropeway and Kempty Falls are the postcard Mussoorie. The better half is Landour, the cantonment above it: a quiet loop of deodar-shaded lanes, a century-old bakery or two, and views that go all the way to the snow line. Come in the evening when the day tourists have gone down the hill.
Where the Ganga finally leaves the mountains for the plains. The evening Ganga aarti here is older, louder and more crowded than Rishikesh’s — thousands of leaf-boat lamps going downstream at once. It sits neatly on the road between Rishikesh or Mussoorie and Corbett, so most of our routings give you an hour here without costing a day.
Indicative
Spending money on the ground, per person per day — food, local transport and entry tickets outside your package.
Shoestring
₹1,200
a day, per person
Street food, public transport, one paid sight
Comfort
₹3,000
a day, per person
Sit-down meals, taxis, a tour or two
Luxury
₹9,000
a day, per person
Fine dining, private car, premium experiences
Visa
This is a domestic holiday. Carry a government photo ID for hotel check-in and any flight — Aadhaar, PAN, passport or driving licence.
Practicalities
Kumaon’s everyday dish: boiled hill potatoes tossed in mustard oil with jakhiya seeds that pop like tiny mustard fireworks, eaten with a chutney of roasted hemp seed — entirely sober, entirely delicious, and vegetarian by birth.
Garhwal’s spinach and fenugreek curry, slow-cooked in an iron kadhai and thickened with rice paste, mopped up with dark finger-millet roti. This is what the hills actually eat, and any homestay or dhaba will do it better than a hotel buffet.
Brown fudge of slow-roasted khoya coated in white sugar pearls — Kumaon’s signature sweet, and the standard gift to carry home. Buy it in Almora or Nainital from a shop that makes its own; it keeps a week without refrigeration.
The small red rajma grown in Munsiyari and Harsil valleys cooks sweeter and softer than anything in the plains, and churkani — a black soybean gravy — is Kumaon’s winter protein. Both are pure vegetarian staples a Gujarati table takes to instantly.
Uttarakhand is easy country for vegetarians and workable for Jain food: Haridwar and Rishikesh are officially meat- and alcohol-free towns, and their bhojanalayas will cook without onion, garlic or root vegetables on request. Inside Corbett and in Landour choices thin out, so we pre-arrange those meals with the resort a day ahead.
Set a meal preference — vegetarian, Jain or halal — when you book and we brief every hotel and restaurant on your itinerary.
This is road-trip country. Jolly Grant airport at Dehradun is the main gateway for Mussoorie, Rishikesh and Haridwar; Pantnagar airport and the Kathgodam railhead serve Nainital and Corbett. Between towns a private car with a hill-experienced driver is the only sensible buy — distances look short on the map and take twice as long on the ground, because almost every kilometre bends. Inside Corbett only registered open Gypsies may enter the safari zones, and your own car waits at the gate. Local taxis do the short hops; in Nainital the lake area is walkable and partly car-free.
Travel Guide
Month-by-month weather, money, plugs, food, shopping and the small things nobody tells you.
