Before coming to India, before we had even left our home in London, Ellie had her sights set on the Spiti Valley. This remote Himalayan corner of India had drawn her in with its strange beauty. The Spiti Valley quickly joined our crowded map of places we had to see in India!  

The Spiti Valley lies in the very north of India. Winding its way into the Himalayas, the region spans lush green mountain meadows through to high altitude cold deserts with the Spiti River carving through the towering snow capped mountains of the Himalaya. The Spiti Valley is a remote, beautiful and fascinating region and we couldn’t wait to experience it. 

Ambitions are one thing but reality is another, planning was needed! Spiti Valley, with its high altitude and narrow winding roads, is  treacherous and freezing in winter. The valley is effectively cut off during the winter and even in summer, the routes in and out can be closed by landslides and snowfall. We settled on visiting in the early summer of late May/June. The snow should be gone from the roads, the passes should be open and, if we were lucky, the apple trees should be in bloom.

We found ourselves in Northern India at the perfect time, it was late May and we had just had a great week in Rishikesh so we decided to head up into the mountains. From the modern city of Chandigarh we had taken the incredible “Himalayan Queen” train (otherwise known as the “Toy Train” due to its dinky size) up through the foothills to the hill town of Shimla. Shimla was the state capital of Himachal Pradesh and used to be the British summer capital back in the bad old days of the Empire. It is a beautiful town that clings to the steep slopes of the surrounding hills. It is also very busy during the summer as Indians flock there on holiday to enjoy the incredible views and cooler climate.

Shimla would be our starting point for our adventures into the Spiti Valley. We booked ourselves onto a Zostel tour. Zostel had been one of the key sources of trip inspiration for India during our long London lockdown. They are a chain of “poshtels” (slightly fancier hostels) across India and their instagram account had Ellie noting down destinations left and right. Their slick marketing and beautiful photographs sold us on their tour and, as you will see, this turned out to be a great decision.

We would be staying at Zostel properties (a mixture of hostels and homestays) throughout the trip. Zostel would provide the accommodation, breakfasts, dinners, medical cover (hopefully unnecessary), minivan and expert driver (definitely necessary). The tour was not a “guided tour” as such; we would be driven around to amazing places but then left to explore them by ourselves. There would be a tour leader with us but they were there more to coordinate and deal with any issues than to shepherd us around. This hands off approach suited us fantastically as we don’t usually like guided tours (food tours being an obvious exception) and like just to explore at our own pace. 

We were introduced to our lovely group of fellow travellers on a WhatsApp group chat. Our group hailed from all over the vast country of India and we were the only non-Indians on the tour. Everyone was super friendly and our amazing bunch of fellow Spiti explorers made us feel right at home straight away. We were all looking forward to our mountainous adventure!

The trip itself would take us from Shimla up into the mountains, though the Spiti Valley stopping for the night in some incredible towns and villages before finally climbing across the Kunzum pass and out to the popular town of Manali. That was the plan at least….

The weather in 2023 has been weird, abnormally cold in the north with massive snowfall late into the year. The army had been called in and were trying to clear the passes. We quickly learned that the Kunzum pass was closed due to snow and the tour would have to loop back to Shimla rather than ending in Manali. We adjusted our plans, hoped for good weather and boarded our Zostel minibus.

This is our Spiti Valley Diaries, a mini adventure within the vastness of the Indian Himalaya.