One of Those Days That Feels Made for You

The days in Dharamkot have been moving slowly. For the past few weeks I've been volunteering at a café, settling into a routine that feels very different from my usual life. Most mornings begin with coffee, familiar faces and views of the Dhauladhars. It's simple, repetitive and surprisingly comforting.

Still, every now and then, the road calls. One night, just as I was about to fall asleep, I received a message on Instagram from a traveller named Bunny. He was somewhere near Dharamshala and wanted to meet.

The next morning the sky was clear, the mountains looked inviting and neither of us had any plans. That was enough. I opened Google Maps and looked for somewhere green. A small village tucked beneath the Dhauladhar range caught my attention. Two hours away.

By breakfast, the plan was made. Bunny arrived and a smile that suggested he wasn't in much of a hurry to be anywhere.

Over the course of the day I learned that he had left his village in Madhya Pradesh when he was sixteen after watching a film that filled his head with ideas of distant places. Now, at twenty-five, he had travelled through much of India and still seemed happiest without knowing where he would be next.

Getting out of Dharamshala on a Sunday wasn't easy, but eventually the traffic faded behind us. The road opened into long stretches of pine forest and cool mountain air. Small streams crossed beneath old bridges and every few bends revealed another valley.

We stopped often, sometimes for photographs, sometimes for no reason at all.

By the time we reached the village, the afternoon sun had softened.

A handful of stone homes sat scattered across a plateau. Smoke drifted lazily from a chimney. Somewhere a radio played local music. Birds seemed to have taken ownership of the place.

We found a small place serving aloo parathas and eggs and sat there longer than necessary.

Nobody appeared to mind. After lunch we wandered through narrow paths between homes. Women sat outside quilting. A mule stood patiently beside a wall. Butterflies drifted between gardens and marigolds grew from old tin cans placed outside doorways. Many of the homes were built from stone, mud and timber, painted in bright colours that stood out against the green landscape.

An elderly villager waved us over. He told us about the years he spent away from the village, curious about life in the cities. Eventually he returned, finding the noise and crowds less appealing than he had imagined. As he spoke, he gestured towards the mountains around us.

There was a quiet certainty in the way he described life there, as though the village already contained everything he needed. It was difficult to argue with him.

The village felt peaceful, though not untouched. Between the old homes stood a few new concrete structures, half-finished and waiting for the next season. One of the locals mentioned how many people had discovered the area through social media and travel reels over the last few years.

The village was still quiet, but change seemed to be arriving one building at a time.

A little later we followed a trail through the forest in search of a river. The path wound through fields waiting for the monsoon. Soon they would be covered in maize. Wind moved through the trees with a soft rustling sound that followed us all the way down. When we reached the water, Bunny confessed that despite years spent in the Himalayas he had never entered a cold mountain river. Apparently he hated cold water. That seemed reason enough to make him try.

The river had carved out a small pool between the rocks and before long we were sitting in glacial water, wondering why we had agreed to it. Ten minutes later neither of us wanted to leave.

"I feel alive," Bunny said, climbing onto a rock warmed by the afternoon sun.

Nearby, I found one of my own and lay there for a while watching clouds drift slowly overhead. The river moved steadily below, disappearing around a bend before reappearing further downstream. It had been a long time since I'd watched clouds pass by.

On the walk back, dark clouds gathered above the mountains while the sun somehow managed to stay out. The light was becoming beautiful, but my camera battery had died earlier in the day. Then we noticed a small green house beside the trail. The family living there welcomed us in, found a charger and insisted we stay for tea while it charged. Their two children played outside among the fruit trees. Soon it began to rain. The children ran into it immediately.

We sat on the veranda drinking chai while the rain tapped gently on the roof and the mountains disappeared behind a curtain of mist. For a while, nobody said very much. When the rain passed, we thanked the family and continued on our way.

The evening light returned, softer now, spreading across the valley below. Not long afterwards, a rainbow appeared above the Dhauladhars.

We stopped the scooter and stood quietly for a moment. As we rode back towards Dharamshala, I found myself thinking about Bunny and the old villager we'd met earlier that afternoon. One had spent years wandering the world after leaving home at sixteen. The other had travelled only to realise everything he was looking for already existed in his village. The mountains glowed in the last light of the day as the rainbow slowly faded above them.

It had been one of those days you don't plan. The kind that simply finds you.