Hello All,
Hope you’re doing great!!!
Kath Kuni architecture is an ancient architectural style of Northern Himalayas that produced homes and temples that were earthquake proof, weather controlled and beautiful looking. All the buildings in Northern Himalayas were constructed using Kath Kuni approach only until last century but modernisation changed everything for worse.
We were going to Dachani village in upper Kullu valley that still contains beautiful Kath Kuni houses. Infact all the houses in this village are Kath Kuni style. This is mostly because of the remoteness of this area from the main valley.
There a road still under construction to this village that’s why it’s protected. There was a trek of 3-4 hour from the valley to this village for the longest time before.
After walking through a thin pathway, you get a glimpse of the first house of the village from a distance and it looks stunning! You don’t see a lot of houses like that now, even in Himalayas.
First house of the village
A typical Kath Kuni house is constructed only via wood, clay and rocks. Wood and rocks are layered over one another to form a strong weather proof structure that’s hot in winters and cool in summers.
A Kath Kuni house is usually a three or two story building. On the ground floor, cattle are kept. Heat from the cattle is radiated upwards to middle store room. The top floor is where people live. There also an attic in Kath Kuni style houses that is called tala. You can slide off a slate from your roof to get a sunroom of demand!
Slate roofs of the houses
Although this village also got electricity and network connectivity, not a lot of people live here. Those who live here are quite old and have lived here all their lives. Their children live in the valley below to avoid hardships of living in such a remote area. There are no shops, restaurants, and any modern amenities that are required nowadays.
Winter is coming in Himalayas soon so the people of this village were preparing for the harsh cold days of winter by stocking grass for cattle, washing their rugs and dehydrating some fruits.
Drying rugs for the winters
People of this village had a lot to do. They might never get bored. Everyone seemed busy in something and no one looked stressed or in hurry like we see in cities. They are really enjoying the slow village mountain life.
An old man stocking dried grass for cattle
It snows a lot here during the winters as this village is on the top of the mountain at about 2300m elevation from sea level so all the houses have a sloping roof.
After walking a little further, I saw the only house with steel roof in the village. It made me realise that the time is very near that all the Kath Kuni houses will be destroyed to make a concrete jungle of no use here too!
I was so amazed to see such old houses still existing. I couldn’t take my attention off of this amazing architectural style. All these houses had a 360 degree lookout style hot room around the main room which they use in cold winter days to enjoy warmth of the sun.
A typical Kath Kuni house with 360 degree verandas
Going beyond the last village -
After exploring the village we thought that we should take a step further and go to the end of the pathway that we were following. We asked the people of village about this idea and they told us that we’d see a very beautiful view of the valley from a little distance from the village. So we started our little hike to the view point.
Just after walking for 10 minutes, we started seeing the view of whole valley. We also met a woman from the village who was cutting grass on the dangerous slopes of the mountain.
A village woman cutting grass in dangerous slopes
We could see whole valley from there. Villages including Dobhi, Dwara, Shim, Fojal, Katrain, Laran Kelo, Nathan, Nashala and Jana were clearly visible along with high mountain ranges of Dhauladhar and Pir Panjal. It was a view of its own!
We could also see the view of Dachani village from there. I couldn’t stop thinking about the Kath Kuni houses I saw there.
It was time for sunset now! We spent some time admiring the beauty of the Himalayas and the vibe of this remote place on the view point.
Sunset from the viewpoint
After witnessing such a beautiful sunset, now it was time to go back as our way back home was also very difficult with a unconstructed road to cross on the difficult slopes in our motorbike.
We were on our way back home and I was thinking that we should do something to protect our heritage instead of blindly moving towards modernisation for our short term comfort. What are your thoughts on this? Let me know in the comments.
That’s all for today.
Thanks for passing by.!.!.!
Peace ✌️