We all love to travel, well most of us,  do we like to travel solo or with a partner, or a jing bang of families and friends!! Travelling alone has its advantages, of course. If you’re looking for maximum freedom to go where you desire, when you desire and in whatever way you desire, solo travel might be the right thing for you to do. But for many people, having someone along for the trip is unthinkable and better more to have your family, friends or children along.

I personally feel, the journey is better when you have someone to share it with, because you get to be yourself and share yourself and make memories to last a lifetime.

Touring with my husband however, is a different ballgame altogether. He likes to explore the destination thoroughly with loads places to visit nearby, nightlife, complete with sightseeing. It’s a lot of fun thou… I know a whole lot of people would say a BIG NO to this kind of a holiday!!

To share a moment with someone when traveling is like no other. Enjoying that perfect sunset, catching a glimpse of a rare site or experiencing another culture is enhanced when you can share your excitement, laughter and opinions with people who mean the most. Better yet, you can re-live the experience once you come home for years to come.

Having someone to share the journey with, keeps you from getting lonely. At the end of the day when the excitement is still brewing you have someone who can relate to everything you say. You have someone by your side that cares about your opinion and what you’re talking about. Not some stranger that is just waiting for you to finish speaking so that they can tell you about their latest adventure.

If you are afraid to try something, you may be more willing to give it a try if you have a partner beside you to give you the encouragement. When you are not feeling well, you have your loved one there to take care of you and give you the TLC that’s required, and when you are at the top of your game, you have that voice cheering upon you. You have to kids to show the world, different cultures, experiment on different kinds of cuisines, lot of fun moments spent together, spend quality time with the family whom we generally take for granted in our stressful lives back home.

Traveling together offers you different outlooks on one destination making the experience richer in the end and a happy and content family to love more.

What say Guys ???

A quaint little town nestled in the Uttaranchal. A place perfect to do just nothing…absolutely just Nothing!!!

We visited Lansdowne in February and it was freezing cold !!! Its just a perfect weekend destination if you want a break from technology, No Laptops & Most importantly NO Mobiles and best of all its one of the closest hill stations from Delhi !!!

It’s best to drive down; the drive is about 5-6 hours. The total distance is 260kms. Plan to leave early morning so that you can cross Morinagar – Meerut road and avoid the horrible traffic zone on that belt, don’t tell us, We didn’t warn you !! Once you have crossed that it’s a pleasant drive ahead. The route that you would follow would be Delhi – Ghaziabad – Meerut – Mawana – Bijnor – Kotdwar – Lansdowne.

Lansdowne is essentially a cantonment area and it’s clearly evident as soon as you enter. The town has superior road quality, is clean and has and has a law and order which can only be found in cantonment towns. Lansdowne is primarily a non commercial hill station which has great weather, excellent views of the mountains, a lake and good pakodas J

There is a bit of sightseeing which combines the Tip N Top, which is a small point with fantabulous views of the Himalayan ranges on a clear day, but the area is quite deserted so you can’t really spend a lot of time there because there’s actually nothing to do apart from having a good view. There is also a small lake which has boating and a few ducks as well. Adjacent to the lake is also a small kiddies park and a café for some basic coffee or tomato soup and chips J a good way to break the monotony of doing nothing at all.  You can also explore the entire town on foot and get a local feel of the area which is very charismatic.

There are just about 2 hotels there which operate without much complaints, any other hotel if you come across your sure to run away from there!! The GMVN Tourist Bungalow and Fairydale Resort. We stayed at the latter and it’s definitely worth recommending ( not that there’s a wide choice, but nevertheless). It’s a simple resort with basic facilities.  The hotel is approximately half a km from the main market.

The main market itself is nothing great a long stretch of a small road with shops on either side selling all the local clothes, food and vegetables. So don’t expect to really find anything there in terms of shopping. There are a couple of decent restaurants in the main market as well which dish out some delectable fresh stuff.

The Fairydale is actually an old residential bungalow. Tariff ranges between 1000 -1700, depending on the room category; they also have a family room which has 2 bedrooms shared with one bathroom. A total of 6-7 rooms are available. The rooms are generally sold out on weekends round the year, so it’s a good idea to actually plan well in advance to avoid disappointment. The hotel has a small log hut type of a restaurant called “The Pines” which is a few steps down from the reception area and it’s actually a good idea to eat there so that the food doesn’t get cold by the time it actually arrives in the sitting area outside your room.

The rooms are basic but comfortable. All the rooms are refurbished a few years back. The rooms  have large beds, a couple of chairs, a table, wooden cupboards, floor to floor carpeting and a TV. Electricity tends to come and go but breaks are not longer than 10 -15 minutes.

The bathrooms are big too and they have no geysers, so we actually froze in the winter chill!!! They provide hot water buckets in the bathroom upon request, within minutes. Each room has a private sit out too, which is good so that you can sit out and enjoy the warm sunshine, while you read, chit chat or the kids play and enjoy the outdoors.

The food available is this region basic, nothing extraordinary. The menus offer plenty of options but its best to stick with the basic dishes and not experiment too much. You can comfortably ask what fresh for the day and they would be happy to assist you on the same. Anything particular that you want to be prepared has to be informed well in advance.

There is no provision for alcohol whatsoever (so people please carry your own stuff…same goes for cigarettes too).  The army area has a liquor shop but it’s strictly available to only those having an army id card and no localite favors you on this!!

To summarize the whole thing it’s a gratifying place to visit and you’ll surely come back a calmer person wanting to escape to this composed haven at the next available opportunity!!