Gairsain
Leave Almora when the light is still pale. The road winds for hours, sometimes clinging to the slope, sometimes slipping into pine (चीड़) shadow. In spring, buraansh (बुरांश) trees spill red petals onto the tarmac, so your tyres crush them into a faint perfume.
Some towns grow out of ambition. Others are born from the soil, shaped by wind and hands that work the fields. Gairsain belongs to the second kind.
Leave Almora when the light is still pale. The road winds for hours, sometimes clinging to the slope, sometimes slipping into pine (चीड़) shadow. In spring, buraansh (बुरांश) trees spill red petals onto the tarmac, so your tyres crush them into a faint perfume.
A stream crosses the road, no bridge, just flat stones where water glides over your shoes if you aren’t quick. Women come down with brass pots balanced on their hips. A boy with a sheepdog stops to watch you pass. It’s a slow arrival, the kind that tells you this is not a place you “visit”, you settle into it, even for a short stay.
Gairsain sits in the middle of Garhwal and Kumaon, like someone clasping two hands together. When Uttarakhand became a state in 2000, many hoped this ridge would hold its capital. It made sense, equal distance, shared soil. But big offices need flat ground, long roads, and winter here can shut both down.
The dream rested for a while. Then, in 2020, the summer capital title came. Bhararisain, just 14 km away, wakes up with the arrival of the legislative assembly. Ministers arrive in white cars. Files come in neat stacks. Outside, shepherds pass with flocks that ignore politics entirely.
Step out early and you’ll hear it before you see it, the scrape of a sickle, the low voices of women cutting grass. Terraces fold around the hills, holding mandua (मंडुवा), rajma (राजमा), potatoes (आलू), and wheat (गेहूं). In April, the wheat ripens gold, and the wind carries that dry, sweet smell.
Water doesn’t gush here; it moves quietly through hand dug channels. Elders bend low, shifting pebbles to guide their path. In the monsoon, everything turns green enough to hurt your eyes. The Ramganga River starts its long song nearby, in a place called Diwali Khal, slipping out of the hills as if shy at first.
The Dudhatoli (दूधातोली) range rises behind it all, deep forest, mossy stones, paths where sunlight barely reaches. You can walk for an hour and hear only your own footsteps.
The market street isn’t big. A row of stores sells woollen caps, spices in glass jars, and metallic buckets stacked outside. Chai (चाय) is available in thick glasses, sturdy enough to keep you speaking. Jalebis (जलेबी) glisten on a tray. The odor of pakoras (पकोड़े) in mustard oil curls through the air.
Ask for chainsoo (चैनसू) or gehat dal (घेट दाल), and someone will take you to an area with a single table and benches worn smooth by elbows. A shepherd might be eating next to a schoolteacher. Nobody hurries.
Bhararisain’s assembly hall isn’t old, but the stories around it are. Elders talk of the first session held here, walking hours with bundles of rotis and salt, sitting under a tree to hear speeches they barely caught, but still feeling they were part of history.
When the assembly meets now, you can hear the hum of voices even from outside. Inside, papers shuffle. Outside, a koel (कोयल) calls, and clouds drift low over the glass roof.
Beyond the main road, footpaths stitch Gairsain to nearby hamlets like Siroli, Gair, and Simli. Nettles (बिच्छू घास) grow thick along the sides, so you step carefully. In spring, buraansh blossoms turn the ground red in patches. Bees work the flowers without caring who passes.
If someone’s roof tiles crack in winter snow, neighbours arrive with rope and slate before the week ends. If a wall breaks in heavy rain, it’s rebuilt with more hands than the owner expected. Nobody calls it help. It’s just what people do.
In Harela (हरेला), children bring tiny saplings in each hand, planting them in courtyards. For Makar Sankranti (मकर संक्रांति), kitchens odor of singal (सिंगल), arsa (अर्सा), and gulgula (गुलगुला). Sweets are passed from hand to hand until every domestic has a combination of many kitchens.
Weddings spill into each lane. The dhol and damau (ढोल-दमाऊं) thump in opposition to the hillside, echoing till even the goat pauses to listen. Work stops for a while. Everyone eats from the same big copper pots.
Winter mornings come with frost (पाला) on rooftops and a breath you can see. Summer turns the fields warm and dusty, kids running barefoot over them. Monsoon wraps everything in damp green, streams rushing so loudly they fill the night air.
Birds mark the months, koel in spring, sparrows (गौरैया) by the grain stores, the occasional kite (चील) slicing the sky.
You leave with more than a picture of the hills. You leave with the taste of chai after a long walk, the smell of pine and soil on your clothes, and the sound of someone calling you in for a second helping.
Gairsain doesn’t try to impress. It just stays in your chest, steady and quiet, like a place you might not see every day, but will always return to in your mind.
| All Districts | ||
|---|---|---|
| Nainital | Chamoli | Almora |
| Haridwar | Champawat | Rudraprayag |
| Udham Singh Nagar | Uttarkashi | Pithoragarh |
| Bageshwar | ||
Uttarakhand is not simply another country. People here name it Devbhoomi (देवभूमि), the Land of the Gods. And it feels that way. Rivers begi...
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