Dal Lake, Meadows & Snow, 5 Nights

Fly Ahmedabad to Srinagar via Delhi and clear the airport security check, which is thorough and takes time. The afternoon covers the three Mughal gardens on the Dal’s eastern shore — Chashme Shahi, Nishat Bagh laid out in twelve terraces for the zodiac, and Shalimar Bagh built by Jahangir for Nur Jahan. At dusk you take an hour-long shikara from Nehru Park past the floating vegetable gardens.

Eighty kilometres up the Sindh valley on the old Leh highway, past Kangan and Gagangir, to Sonamarg at 2,800 m. From the meadow it is a four-kilometre pony ride or a stiff walk to the snout of the Thajiwas glacier, which holds snow into July. Bring or hire gumboots at the base — the last stretch is slush even in summer. You are back in Srinagar by evening.

Two hours west through Tangmarg to Gulmarg, the meadow of flowers at 2,650 m. Your tickets for both gondola stages are already issued — Phase 1 to Kongdoori and Phase 2 to Apharwat at 3,979 m, which is the world’s second-highest operating cable car. Phase 2 shuts without warning on high wind, so we do it first and keep Phase 1, the golf course and St Mary’s Church for the afternoon.

Four hours across the valley floor, stopping at the Pampore saffron fields — worth a photograph any month, and in bloom only for two weeks in late October — and the ruined 9th-century Avantiswami temple at Awantipora. You reach Pahalgam by mid-afternoon, where the Lidder river runs milky grey out of the Kolahoi glacier and the pine slopes start right behind the hotels.

Private vehicles are not allowed beyond Pahalgam town, so the morning runs on a local union taxi — included — out to Betaab Valley, Aru and Chandanwari, the base camp of the Amarnath yatra. Back to Srinagar by late afternoon and on to a carved deodar houseboat moored off the Boulevard, where dinner is Kashmiri home cooking served in the sitting room. Evening shikara to the floating market if you want it.

Depending on your flight time we fit in the old city — the all-wood Jamia Masjid at Nowhatta with its 378 deodar pillars, the Shankaracharya temple on the hill for the full view of the Dal, and the shawl and papier-mâché workshops at Zaina Kadal. Airport drop is three hours before departure; Srinagar runs a double security check and does not hurry.