Time bound, yet timeless
The roots of some traditions are so deep, like the roots of ancient Banyan trees, that they have persevered despite the advent of modernism and its attempts to overshadow them.
The Queen of Hills, Shimla on Saturday saw huge rush of tourists, both domestic and foreign, to welcome the New Year.
The other popular hill stations of Himachal Pradesh also witnessed sudden influx of tourists with the hope of snowfall in the first week of 2017.
The Winter Carnival in Shimla virtually turned the historic Ridge Ground and Mall Road area into a human sea.
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With more and more tourists heading towards Shimla for the New Year celebration, there were long queues for parking in ‘Queen of Hills’, adding to traffic jams and parking woes.
All the hotels and other tourist accommodations in the hill station were full to the capacity bringing cheers on the faces of hoteliers who did brisk business, especially after snowfall on Christmas on December 25.
The administration made elaborate arrangements to maintain law and order and deployed additional security on The Mall and Ridge to avoid any untoward incident. However, the rules, as usual, were relaxed to make the tourists enjoy to the full and dance with music in the open spaces.
Over the years, the winter tourism which lasts about three weeks from mid December to first week of January has picked up very fast in Shimla and the rush during the peak days from Christmas to New Year is even more than summer tourist rush.
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