The great outdoors: Beat the heat with cool climes and adventure

It’s summer, and while all you might want to do at the moment is sit and laze around to beat the Hyderabad heat, there’s a much better option to keep you cool and active — adventure travel.

With a plethora of destinations available across the country, travel and adventure groups from the city recommend at least week-long trips, wherever you go.
Rajani Pothineni from the Great Hyderabad Adventure Club suggests Dharamshala and Dalhousie in Himachal Pradesh.

“Summer is the best time to visit Dalhousie, because even though it won’t be snowing you can still see and experience the snow that’s on the ground. It’s definitely cooler than the plains,” she says, adding, “If you’re lucky you get to see the Dalai Lama in Dharamshala, but really close by is Bir-Billing which is the number one place in India for paragliding. And from Dharamshala you can also trek to Triund.”

With Khajjiar and the Kalatop Sanctuary around the area, horse riding and outdoor camping are some of the tamer things you can do over a stretch of six or seven days, Rajini adds.

“The typical tourist places like Gulmarg, Amarnath, Mussoorie, Gangtok...are pretty family friendly,” says Hyderabad Adventurers and Trekkers Club’s Prithvi Dheeraj Reddy.

He adds, “But if people want a little more adventure, there’s always the Har Ki Doon Valley in the Garhwal Himalayas in Uttarakhand where one can go trekking for about five days.”

Prithvi also says that for rafting and bungee jumping, you won’t find a better place than Rishikesh in Uttarakhand. “Rafting and bungee jumping are the main attractions for sports in Rishikesh. You can also paraglide and raft at Manali at the Beas river,” he says, adding that if you’re heading East, rafting on the Teesta River near Gangtok in Sikkim is a must.

For those looking for a road-based trip, Prithvi says, “The North East is a very popular destination for bikers or for road trips. You can start from Siliguri, through Assam, Guwahati, Tawang...and then on to most of the Seven Sister states. The roads are very good in most of the places there.”

But if you’d like something closer to home, Rajini adds that a four-to-five day camping trip touching Coorg, Madikere and Mysore in Karnataka would be perfect for this time of year.