10 Places in Kashmir You Shouldn't Miss

Almost every Kashmir itinerary runs the same three stops in the same order. It is a good route — that is why everyone uses it — but a week in the valley has room for more than three places, and the additions are usually the ones people remember.

1. Dal Lake, before seven in the morning

The lake does two entirely different things depending on the hour. By ten it is a tourist attraction. At six it is a working neighbourhood: the floating vegetable market trading from boat to boat, kitchens lit on the houseboats, mist sitting on the water until the sun clears the ridge. Ask your host the night before and they will wake you.

2. Gulmarg, past the gondola

Most visitors ride to the first stage of the gondola and come straight back down. Walk instead — the pine loop towards Strawberry Valley takes about ninety minutes and leaves the crowd behind within ten.

3. Aru Valley

Twelve kilometres above Pahalgam, and the point at which the Lidder stops being a river you look at and becomes one you can hear from your room. It is also the trailhead for Lidderwat and Tarsar Marsar if you have the days.

4. Yusmarg

A meadow an hour from Srinagar that somehow stayed off the main circuit. Shepherds, horses, a walk to the Doodh Ganga and very little else. Go on a weekday.

5. Pampore in October

The saffron fields flower for roughly two weeks in late October. The harvest happens at dawn, by hand, and the growers are generally happy to explain what they are doing if you buy from them directly.

6. The old city of Srinagar

Downtown Srinagar is the part of the city that the valley actually lives in. The wooden Jamia Masjid, the copper bazaar where every pot is still beaten by hand, and bakeries turning out girda before sunrise.

7. Sonamarg and Thajiwas

The drive itself is the attraction — the Sindh river the whole way up. The short walk to the Thajiwas glacier snout is manageable for most people, and ponies are available for the rest.

8. A papier-mâché workshop

Two or three families still do the full process by hand. An hour in a workshop will change how you look at everything in the souvenir shops afterwards.

9. Doodhpathri

The valley of milk, named for water that runs white over the rocks. Barely developed, almost entirely local on weekdays, and only forty kilometres from Srinagar.

10. A wazwan, properly

Not the hotel buffet version. A wazwan is a sequence, served on a shared plate, and it takes a couple of hours. Ask to be taken somewhere that cooks it for weddings.

The valley rewards the traveller who leaves one whole day unplanned. Something always turns up on day three.

If you are working out when to go: April and May for blossom, June to August for the meadows, October for the saffron and the chinars, and January for snow.