EXPERIENCE
A higher plane
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Once you leave the places haunted by tourists behind, Mussoorie reveals an entirely different face. ABHILASH GAUR
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Photo: Abhilash Gaur
Imposing structure: St. Paul’s Church at Char Dukaan.
Mall Road is fun, but there’s a quieter, prettier Mussoorie above it.
Bond is sleeping late, just as he warned me last night. But having trudged up the Landour Bazaar and the Cantonment to see him, what am I supposed to do? I could possibly walk on to Lal Tibba, Mussoorie’s highest peak, which is close by... R
20;It’s about three km further up,” says the boy playing with the dogs below Bond’s window, and the possibility dims. Another kilometre would pop my lungs out of my mouth. And yet, I must kill a couple of hours somehow till Bond — Ruskin Bond — wakes up.
Lal Tibba it is
My plush room at the Park Plaza Sylverton is an option. But why waste this beautiful misty morning watching TV? Mall Road beckons me: Lovely’s lovely red omelettes would make a nice second breakfast. I could also ride the ropeway to Gun Hill or take a cab to Kempty Falls. But the thought of doing these easy, touristy things fills the journalist in me with shame. “What’s there to see at Lal Tibba?” I ask the boy, praying fervently that he would say, “nothing,” enabling me to turn back without guilt. But he seems to have read my mind. “A few churches, very nice walks, binocular point,” he rattles away. All right, so Lal Tibba it will have to be.
Instead of the main road, I take the shorter but steeper path up towards Chaar Dukaan. The Mussoorie that unfolds before me now is very different from the one I have seen since last evening on Mall Road, and even this morning through Landour Bazaar. Houses are few and shops fewer still. I encounter few people and almost no cars till I reach Chaar Dukaan.
It seems like such a long walk but I haven’t come more than a kilometre. I wish it were Sunday, for, then I could have looked inside the old St. Paul’s Church during the morning service. I am sure it must be beautiful inside, for, it was consecrated in 1840, in the extravagant days of the East India Company. But there’s nothing I can do about the locked gate, and coffee at the nearby Anil’s Café is my only consolation before I resume the march towards Lal Tibba.
Just enjoy the walk
Why Lal Tibba? What’s a tibba? Shoo, silly questions, let me enjoy the very lal — red — tree rhododendrons that are in full bloom along this road. By now, the built-up Mussoorie is lost to sight.
All I can see are wooded slopes and all I can hear are the calls of birds. Mussoorie, I admit, is very beautiful above the tourist circus.
That’s what Bond and his two friends were going on and on about last evening. Sitting in the Sylverton’s lawns, warmed by their drinks, they were all praise for Landour and the area above it. Not for them the thrills of Gun Hill and Kempty; they instead gushed forth about the homely delights of Sisters Bazaar and Prakash’s peanut butter!
There was a time when Bond, an avid cinema lover, must have loved the Mall area. For, here stood Picture Palace, Mussoorie’s first cinema, which now survives only as a street address, encompassing, among others, the Sylverton Estate. And the old Estate itself seems to have been popular with the who’s who of pre-Independence India, for, in the hotel lobby you will find a photograph of Mahatma Gandhi conducting a prayer meeting in its grounds, sometime in 1945.
Anyway that was long before Mussoorie and its Mall Road became the tourist magnet they are today. While they drew the crowds, the higher reaches drew celeb-settlers. And as I pause at the gate of Childer’s Estate to catch my breath, I am very close to one such house. Childer’s, built in 1929, and known as Nahata Estate since 1990, is built on Mussoorie’s highest peak. The shop at its gate is famous as Binocular Point, for, on a clear day and with powerful binoculars, you can see the Himalayan peaks Bunderpunch and Srikantha from its roof. It’s the only touristy thing you’ll find here.
Quiet beauty
I have come up to Childer’s by the Lal Tibba Road, and now take the “Thandi Sadak” down on the other side. It’s so quiet that you would be scared to walk on it at night, but look carefully and you would spot an odd house on the hillside. Walking down this road, I come across an old Morris — URM 3083 — under a shed. It turns out to be Victor Banerjee’s, whose beautiful house — Parsonage — is further down the road.
With the slope favouring me, the going is easier now. I reach the old cemetery in a few minutes, but it is locked up. Its occupants indeed lie in peace. Then, for about 10 minutes, I have the road to myself till the Kellogg Memorial Church. Built in 1903, this stone building exudes strength, but is boringly plain inside. If you’re on a stained glass hunt, the Christ Church on Mall Road would be your best bet.
I can now return to Chaar Dukaan or push on towards Sisters Bazaar, where Prannoy Roy has a house. The Bazaar also has A. Prakash and Company, famous for its homemade cheese, peanut butter and jams. And another 15 minutes away lies the Alter brothers’ estate, Oakville, tucked away in the quietest, greenest nook of them all. When I reach their gate, Steve Alter has just finished lunch and is ready for his afternoon nap, but he graciously shows me around the place. Tom is away, and Steve does not want me to click his (Tom’s) house — “too many tourists come looking for it.”
Retaining its character
Climbing back towards Sisters Bazaar, I attempt in vain to reconcile the two faces of Mussoorie. On the one hand, there are Mall Road and Landour Bazaar, and on the other, quiet havens like Lal Tibba and Chaar Dukaan. And on the whole, the quieter places predominate. Notwithstanding first impressions, Mussoorie, I realise, has not gone the way of Shimla. As Bond says, “Over the years, Mussoorie has changed a little, but not too much.”
Which reminds me I have been walking around for more than a couple of hours. When I reach Bond’s door, he has already left for his dear Cambridge Book Depot on Mall Road, which is close by Lovely’s. I will have a “Lovely” omelette after all — for lunch!
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