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Jammu and Kashmir

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Photographs

Places worth going

Nishat GardenDon't missOutdoorsThe big one: a long central water channel between beds of flowers, running straight down twelve terraces to the lake with the mountains across it. Walk it top to bottom. Busy, and rightly.Pari MahalDon't missLandmarksStone terraces stepping down the hillside under arches, with lawns and clipped trees between them and the lake spread out below. The best-placed of all the gardens, and the one to keep for last light if you can manage it.Char Chinar Dal lakeWorth a stopOutdoorsThe little island with four chinar trees in the middle of the lake. You don't go to it so much as past it, and the sunset from the water beside it, with Hari Parbat fort in silhouette across the lake, is a good reason to be in a shikara at six.Chashme Shahi GardenWorth a stopOutdoorsThe smallest of the Mughal gardens, built around a spring, and in September full of dahlias the size of dinner plates. Twenty minutes of flower beds and terraces with the hills behind, and the mynas working the lawns. Do it on the way up to Pari Mahal.Dal LakeWorth a stopOutdoorsThe postcard version is real for about an hour at sunset, when the shikaras go to silhouettes and the herons work the reeds. The rest of the time it is hard to look past: weed choking the channels, rubbish along the banks, houseboats that haven't been painted in years. If you're in Srinagar you'll end up on it anyway, so go late in the day and keep your expectations where the light is.Shri Shankaracharya Temple SrinagarWorth a stopLandmarksThe temple sits on the hill above the lake and the climb is sold on the view. The morning I was there, the haze and the pollution were so thick you could barely make out the city below, let alone the mountains, and the photographs show it. Phones and cameras stay at the checkpoint. Go only on a clear day, first thing, and treat it as a temple visit rather than a viewpoint.SrinagarWorth a stopTownsGreen after Ladakh, which is a shock in itself. Four days is right: the lake by shikara, the Mughal gardens in a morning, the old city's timber-and-brick lanes, and the view from Shankaracharya before the haze comes up. Eat the wazwan, and stay on the water if you can.GulmargSkipTownsA green bowl of meadow at 2,650 metres with pine forest round it, and on paper the best thing in Kashmir. In person it is run down: litter in the grass, half-built and half-abandoned huts, the place looking like nobody has cared for it in a long while. The drive up through the forest and the goats on the road were the good part. Hard to recommend the hour it takes to get there.