A floral fantasy to the Valley of Flowers
Like most women, I love flowers, rainbows, and butterflies. Flowers play an integral role in the Indian culture and can be found decorating shrines, ladies’ coiffures, bridal cars, and big fat weddings. Thus, hailing from a flower-crazy country, you can imagine my happiness when one monsoon, a few years back, I got invited by a friend to join him on a trek to the Valley of Flowers.

The Valley of Flowers trek
I love trekking and the Valley of Flowers National Park is one of the most beautiful treks in the world. A protected park famous for endemic alpine flower-filled meadows, snowy peaks, and pine forests, it is located in the West Himalayas in the state of Uttarakhand in India. This valley owing to its difficult accessibility blissfully supports a rich and diverse fauna. Many rare and elusive animals like Asian black bears, snow leopards, red fox, musk deer, and blue sheep inhabit the valley and according to folklore, the mysterious Yeti/Bigfoot calls it home. Birds fill this valley with pretty songs and many rivers originate from/border it. Located at a height of around 3658 meters above sea level, the gently sloping Valley of Flowers along with the neighbouring rugged Nanda Devi National Park consists of the unique transition area between the fearsome Zanskar and the Great Himalayan mountain ranges. It spreads over an area of more than 85 kilometers and is also very important for Hindu mythological reasons.

Blue poppy, brahmakamal, and other rare blooms
Listed in the UNESCO World Network of Biosphere Reserves since 2004, the Valley of Flowers is also a World Heritage Site. Although only a few zones are open for tourists, the beauty of its slopes changing colours, owing to the gradual blooming of its different coloured flowers, with the transition of the time is absolutely magical. This high-altitude alpine valley was a favourite haunt of Indian yogis throughout history and it has been mentioned in great Indian epics as the home of rare medicinal plants. In fact, this valley contains many extremely rare highly medicinal plants, critically endangered, and endemic (not found anywhere else) flora growing in its crevices. At the last count, around 520 species of alpine plants were recorded growing at Valley of Flowers, although the real number is yet to be known as a lot of its area is still unexplored. Among the unique flora of the Valley of Flowers the magnificent and highly rare blue poppy, cobra lily, and brahmakamal are the most spectacular.

Discovery of the Valley of Flowers
The discovery of this floral paradise happened by chance. Until 1931, the Valley of Flowers was blissfully lost to the modern world until the team of British mountaineers led by Frank S Smythe got waylaid while returning from an expedition to Mount Kamet. They stumbled upon this magical place filled with flowers and it is said that they could smell it even before they could see it as the mist was swirling over the valley. Entranced by the profusion of its blooms, they named it the Valley of Flowers. Frank S Smythe later made many other expeditions to this secluded place and even published a book on it. The incredible beauty of this place attracted many nature lovers over the years and it claimed quite a few lives as well. The most notable was the British botanist Joan Margaret Legge who lost her life by falling off a cliff when she was collecting some flowers to study them. She was deputed by the Royal Botanic Gardens and later her sister visited the valley to build a memorial at the spot. In fact, Margaret Legge’s memorial stands in the middle of the valley, and every year she gets surrounded by some of the world’s most beautiful flowers.

Dreaming of flowers, more flowers, and how
As you can imagine, the invitation which came out of the blue made me incredibly excited and the prospect of finally visiting this magical valley gave me sleepless nights. I have trekked in various parts of Nepal, South America, Indonesia, and Africa before, but nothing was comparable to the magnitude of trekking in the Himalayas. Excitement ran supreme as I counted days before starting with one of the most beautiful treks in the world, to the stunning Valley of Flowers. Stay tuned and let me take you through the hard, yet stunning Valley of Flowers trek and beyond. It was one magical journey.







Follow the rest of the Uttarakhand series
RESPONSIBLE TRAVELING-BECAUSE I CARE
I fully agree with you Svetlana, the trek is one of the most beautiful trek even tough I’ve just seen it through your pictures
Thank you very much. I hope you enjoy the series of posts on Valley of Flowers.
Beautiful pics! I’ve been meaning to do the Valley of Flowers trek for a long time now. I’ll try to make it this year or early next year!
Thank you. This year Valley of Flowers is officially closed to tourists. Next year would be a better idea.
Ah, I didn’t know that. Thanks for the info. Next year, then. 🙂
You are welcome. Hope you enjoy VOF and do share your experience.
I will re visit Uttarakhand, Thanks to you this is on my list.
P.S. please correct “lies in the Western Himalayas in the state of Uttarkhand” to Uttarakhand. Please do not find this transgression
Thank you. I am sure you will love Uttarkhand. Thank you for bringing the error to my notice. I tend to throw grammar in the wind while writing.
WoW! I like this post. Maybe one day I will go there… 🙂 Bye. K.
Thank you. I hope you visit Valley of Flowers soon.
Stunning visuals. It has been my dream to visit this place someday.
Thank you. I hope you do. Its unbelievably beautiful.
Yes, I do intend to…waiting for the chance and the time.
Wishing you a lovely Valley of Flowers trip.
I wanna go there right now !!
Let’s take you on a virtual tour
Fantastic!
Have seen many lovely photos of this beautiful place and it has been on my ‘list’.
Hope to visit soon, I am sure the wife will love it 😉
VOF is gorgeous. She will definitely love the place.
I am sure she will :).
Have you done ‘Hampta pass’ BTW?
No I have not. Those are on my to do list this summer.
Ahh really!!
Same here, we too are planning for this summer!! 😀
Which month are you planning to?
Wow What a coincidence. I intend to be there sometime around May-June.
For us, it will be either June end or July (but thats the onsoon time so Im worried about that 🙁 ).
Are you going on your own or with some TA or…. is it the first batch of your ‘Travel with me’ 🙂 ?
VOF is open during monsoon and the mountains are gorgeous at that time. I am going alone or probably with my friend, if he has time. “Travel with me” starts from August.
My concern with the monsoon is related to… how bad the conditions would be …. 🙂
Have a good one…!
And who knows, we might bump into each other 😉
Thank you. Last year I had visited the area in monsoon and it had neither been terrible nor dangerous. Having said this, there had been a landslide on the way which had delayed our journey by a few hours. Apart from that, I have not faced much setback.
I am okay until we don”t have to sleep in a set sleeping bag or on dripping slopes :p
Nah you will be fine. Tons of hotels, guesthouses and bnb’s all over the place.
Pingback:Reblogged from Maverickbird.com – Santa's Reindeer
Hey Svetlana, I loved the post immensely and the pics are just awesome…. I have reblogged it on my page… 🙂
Hope thats ok! Please let me know if it is not….Thanks
Thank you very much, Santosh. I am happy that you shared.