When I was nineteen I went on a trip to India with the ambition of smoking some of the best hash in the world, first on my bong bucket list to check out was Himalayan charas.
I arrived in Delhi and took a bus to Manali, which lies in the foothills of the Himalayas, I thought the bus journey would only be a few hours, it turned out to be more than twenty hours!
The final leg of the route was pretty scary as the bus navigated the narrow mountain roads often inches away from falling down to the river below!
When I arrived in Manali I had not slept and was seriously tired, as soon as I got off the bus a man asked if I wanted a room and some hash, I said yes.
He took me to a hotel and made a joint using a regular cigarette, emptying the tobacco and replacing it with a hash mix, it hit me pretty hard and I bought a 'tolla' which is enough for a few days, I asked him about getting a pipe called a chilum and he offered to take me to a shop to buy one.
We walked through the medieval looking town and I noticed everyone staring at me, I began to get paranoid, did everyone know I was with a hash dealer? Would I be arrested and thrown in jail already? Luckily Manali is not that sort of place, but I was new to the whole thing.
I was pleased when we finally returned to the hotel and even though I thought the cops must be coming for me I was finally able to chill out and get some sleep.
The next morning I looked at the mountains from the hotel balcony and realised this was an amazing place.
Manali was fairly busy so I moved further away to Old Manali, which is much more relaxed. There were a few cafe's where you could hang out, eat and smoke out. I would spend the day chatting with other travellers and playing Karam, a board game which is like a mix between snooker and tiddlywinks.
Manali was great but I wanted to go to the the source of the best hash, the Parvati Valley.
I took the bus to where the road ends in Manikaran, I spent a couple of nights there and met a strange guy in a cafe who invited me to join him for a smoke. He took me to a secluded area on the hillside and proceeded to make a fire, it seemed a bit weird and he wasn't really making much sense to be honest. Suddenly an angry old holy man appears with a knife, he told us to put out the fire, after he realised we were not burning his sacred weed plantation he invited us to his cabin.
We sat around and smoked chilums and he started to make what he called 'the best chai in the world', chai is a sweet tea with spices, I sat stoned and watched him throw all manner of herbs and powders into his boiling pot with music blaring from his radio. I started to think that he may be trying to drug us and began to get nervous. He passed around the chai and I decided to drink it as not to be rude but I made my excuses and left before any exotic hallucinogen or sedative could possibly take effect, nothing did thankfully.
Soon after I began the trek to a village called Pulga, after a day of hard walking I finally arrived and could see huge fields of weed, I was in heaven. I got a room with a balcony and hung out with various other travellers smoking chilums, comparing hash and telling stories. The rooms were basic with no toilets and not much light, the place was infested with spiders and I hate spiders but somehow I remained stoned enough to not think about them!
I stayed in Pulga for a week or so before trekking further up the valley to a holy spot called Khirganga, the hot springs where the god Shiva is supposed to have meditated for a few thousand years.
It was a long walk on narrow mountain paths crossing waterfalls and bridges, on the way we passed locals who were sacrificing a goat to the god Kali, they greeted us with their tongues sticking out as was the custom, we waved and moved swiftly on.
It was late in the day when we realised that we had walked past our destination, my suspicions were raised when we reached the mountain snow line! It was night and we retraced our steps walking past cows that were asleep on the path, I had lost my torch so we proceeded with caution.
Finally we saw some shepherds around a fire and asked to join them, they were really friendly and we had a great evening smoking charas and comparing shoes. Unfortunately the shepherds only had shelter for themselves and I had to spend the night under a blanket while it rained. After a couple of hours of patchy sleep the sun came up and I could see our destination a few hundred yards away!
Having spent a night freezing on the mountain I especially enjoyed sitting in the sulphurous hot water spring, I spent the day chatting and smoking with the holy men in the temple and then slowly made my way back to Pulga.
I will never forget walking back down the valley high above the clouds.
After a month or so in Manali and Parvatti I started the journey to Nepal for the next chapter in my hash odyssey.