Dal Lake & The Sunbeam Houseboat
- Jul 2, 2016
- 3 min read
We’re up north! My face isn’t melting! It’s a pleasant 28 degrees!
When Raj told us we were going up north I hadn’t really thought about it, it was the mountains! Perfect! It was only when we arrived it clicked that we were in Kashmir; the most militarised zone in the world with over 700,000 army officers patrolling the streets.
From that start we saw the army EVERYWHERE. We also saw that maybe they weren’t the most disciplined of troops. Lots of them freely pointed their guns into crowds and had their fingers on the trigger. Not in a threatening way, in a forgetful kind of way, which in some ways worried me more. Greg said that all they had a smorgasbord of weapons ranging from the period of WWII to the Vietnam War.
Apparently there are regular attacks by terrorists/ freedom fighters, but they only ever target the army, never civilians. When we spoke to the people in Kashmir it became pretty clear that they consider themselves Kashmiri, not Indian or Pakistani. Kashmir is too valuable and beautiful to let go of though so unfortunately I can’t see them ever getting independence.
Anyway, at the airport we had to fill out forms detailing our home address, profession, visa number and how long we intended to stay. Raj’s brother, Shao, met us at the airport and told us Raj had told him to take extra care of us. He called us brother and little sister and took us to the houseboat which would be home for the next few days. To get to it you had to hire a boat to row you across Dal Lake which costs about £1. It had no Wifi and the rooms didn’t have walls so much as a fence. A high fence, but it had some holes in it and I wouldn’t say it was totally private.
The difference between Kashmir and the rest of India is pretty stark, for one thing, it’s a 95% Muslim area. We quickly found out that our houseboat was bang in the middle of three or four mosques who often seemed to be in competition for praying the loudest and latest. 1am was the record, starting again at 4:30am.
We were the only ones on the houseboat which was full of grand furniture, all hand carved and impressive. For the next four days we relaxed on the boat and were taken on day trips to the mountains where we got to learn more about Shao and his father, Ali. Their family have been working with tourists for many, many years and they have got the sales pitch down; make them feel like family, then guilt them into buying you stuff.
Our first day trip up to the mountains was with Shao...
Further up the river we were able to get right down to the banks, Greg took it one step further (this was glacier water by the way, little bit cold).
I think Greg's highlight of the day was meeting this little guys though:
He was born earlier that day, just walked straight up to Greg and asked for cuddles!
The next day we went for a day trip to see the “Cream of Kashmir” with Ali and it was both an amazing and bizarre experience. We got to see gorgeous mountains and glaciers:
But were also made to climb into a stranger’s garden and pose next to their roses… I'll spare you the pictures as they're pretty awful and possibly incriminating of breaking and entering.
Ali has done this trip many times so knows the places to get a good photo, whether you want it or not. He will not leave until you’ve taken it, even if it’s a photo of people. He actually chased down and paid these women to take a photo with us:
Awkward.
In return for all this extra effort, Ali began asking for very expensive “gifts” such as a fishing set or remote control decoy ducks for hunting. Initially we were taken in and considered getting him something, but when it didn’t deliver to the area he became a tad unpleasant and started shouting in Kashmiri at the driver. Shao didn’t ask for anything, but his conversation consisted mostly of all the girlfriend’s he’s had (particularly the Brazilian one) and the gifts he gets sent: “You like this watch? Gift. Rolex.”
The houseboat was lovely, but you couldn’t go anywhere without a member of the family and it started to feel like a hostage situation. We were therefore thrilled to head to the mountains and get away from the noise and dust of Srinagar.
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