Kipling Trail (also known as Kipling Road) is the old walking route that connects Dehradun with the hill station of

Mussoorie Mussoorie is a hill station and a municipal board, near Dehradun city in the Dehradun district of the Indian state of Uttarakhand. It is about from the state capital of Dehradun and north of the national capital of New Delhi. The hill s ...

in India. It was the only means of reaching Mussoorie before the cart roads, for tongas, or roads for automobiles were constructed. It is named after the English novelist

Rudyard Kipling Joseph Rudyard Kipling ( ; 30 December 1865 – 18 January 1936)''The Times'', (London) 18 January 1936, p. 12. was an English novelist, short-story writer, poet, and journalist. He was born in British India, which inspired much of his work. ...

, who is believed to have walked the trail in the 1880s, though there is no definite evidence. The trail fell out of use when cars or buses became the preferred mode of transport, but the route is being revived by nature,

colonial Colonial or The Colonial may refer to: * Colonial, of, relating to, or characteristic of a colony or colony (biology) Architecture * American colonial architecture * French Colonial * Spanish Colonial architecture Automobiles * Colonial (1920 au ...

history and hiking enthusiasts.

History

In the 1880s, novelist

is believed to have trekked this trail and the walk described in his novel ''

Kim Kim or KIM may refer to: Names * Kim (given name) * Kim (surname) ** Kim (Korean surname) *** Kim family (disambiguation), several dynasties **** Kim family (North Korea), the rulers of North Korea since Kim Il-sung in 1948 ** Kim, Vietnamese f ...

'' is thought to have been through this route. With the construction of an

asphalt Asphalt, also known as bitumen (, ), is a sticky, black, highly viscous liquid or semi-solid form of petroleum. It may be found in natural deposits or may be a refined product, and is classed as a pitch. Before the 20th century, the term ...

road in the early 20th-century, going right up to

, the heritage walking route gradually fell out of favour. Today, the path is being revived as it is increasingly being used by hikers and nature or history enthusiasts, who prefer walking up to the hill station over driving. In his book ''The Kipling Road'', author

Ruskin Bond Ruskin Bond (born 19 May 1934) is an Anglo-Indian author . His first novel, '' The Room on the Roof'', was published in 1956, and it received the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize in 1957. Bond has authored more than 500 short stories, essays, and ...

explores the many stories of people who walked the old route from Rajpur to Mussoorie.

Route

The 9 km-trail takes between 2 and 3 hours to complete, and begins at Shahanshai Ashram in Rajpur village, Dehradun. It winds its way up through five steep inclines that are locally called ''paanch kainchi'',

Hindi Hindi ( Devanāgarī: or , ), or more precisely Modern Standard Hindi (Devanagari: ), is an Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in the Hindi Belt region encompassing parts of northern, central, eastern, and western India. Hindi has been ...

for "five scissors". The halfway point is at Jharipani, which is surrounded by '' Quercus leucotrichophora'' or banjh oak forests. The path then leads to Barlowganj near St George's College, Mussoorie, then goes past

Wynberg Allen School Wynberg-Allen School is a boarding school in India, founded in 1888. It is located at Bala hissar in Mussoorie, India. The alumni of Wynberg Allen School are known as Alwynians. History From a meeting in Kanpur in 1887 of friends, Mr. Powe ...

, finally reaching

Library. Along the route lies an old railway tunnel, remnant of a failed project, and British-era rest houses. In 2017, parts of the trail were cemented without providing necessary outlets for drainage, and it was reported that road construction was "ruining the path's beauty". There were protests by the public, stating that vehicular traffic would harm the

biodiversity Biodiversity or biological diversity is the variety and variability of life on Earth. Biodiversity is a measure of variation at the genetic (''genetic variability''), species (''species diversity''), and ecosystem (''ecosystem diversity'') l ...

along the route and change the nature of the heritage path.

References

External links

Been There Doon That - Kipling Trail information
{{Dehradun, state=collapsed Hiking trails in Uttarakhand Tourist attractions in Dehradun Dehradun Mussoorie Geography of Uttarakhand