The warmth of homestays in Spiti

At minus five degrees we got out to look for snow leopards. It had snowed the past few days; the paths and fields were covered with half a meter of snow. It was quite a workout for our legs, and at an altitude of 4,200 meters also for our lungs. We were in Spiti, a term meaning ‘middle country’, a trans-Himalayan landscape between Tibet and the rest of India. Our guide was Tanzin Thinley, a homestay owner and Nature Conservation Foundation employee. He had promised to show us the iconic cat, a promise we fervently hoped would be fulfilled, otherwise he would have decided to move on quickly.

Spiti, part of Himachal Pradesh, has a cold desert ecosystem, with most precipitation falling as snow. The landscape is rugged, hilly and treacherous, with wide, arable valleys in some parts. The unique biodiversity includes snow leopards, ibexes, blue sheep, red foxes and several bird and plant species adapted to the cold.

As we walked and half-slided down a slope, we were already nostalgic about the warmth of the house we had just left behind. It was the Thinley Home Stay in Kibber village, one of the last villages on the traditional trade route to Ladakh and Tibet. While walking, Thinley said that Kibber initiated homestays about 15 years ago to combine nature and culture as a tourist experience.

In recent years, tourism from the rest of India and various parts of the world has increased due to better road connectivity and the region’s numerous attractions. This has resulted in approximately 46 homestays in the 80 households in Kibber. In addition, numerous homestays and accommodations have sprung up in the division city serving Kibber and nearby areas, providing a valuable source of income for families, especially during agricultural breaks. This has encouraged local youth to stay in the village and take advantage of these opportunities instead of migrating for work.

“We learned about homestays and their management during a trip to Uttarakhand,” Thinley said. “Then friends from Bangalore encouraged us, helped us spread the word, and slowly we started attracting tourists. They also told us that many visitors want to stay in traditional houses, not new cement concrete houses.” Thinley’s house, where he added a floor for visitors, retains the look and feel of the functional stone-mud architecture that Spiti is famous for.

Kibber’s homestays typically have two to eight rooms. The Thinley Home Stay has four, simply but comfortably furnished, all with the traditional bukhari (wood-burning stoves placed in the center of the room) or the less common electric heaters. The first night we arrived, we were offered piles of razais and blankets, as well as hot water bags, and that night’s sleep was about as comfortable as you could want.

Before Kibber, we were in Kaza, a bustling settlement, home to Spiti’s main government offices, the main market and many tourist establishments. Although not nearly as picturesque and homely as Kibber, it still had its sights, including a relatively new monastery, the Spiti River flowing like a black snake through a pure white expanse of banks, a thousand yellow-billed jackdaws (a bird from the crow family) who does aerial acrobatics every morning and evening. Here our hosts were a couple – Kalzang Uma and Thuktan Chhopal – who ran the Fa-Ma Home Stay (Fa stands for father, Ma for mother). Located opposite the Kaza Gompa, the exterior of the homestay is nothing to write home about (a third floor is under construction to add to the four rooms already available to guests), but the interior is tasteful, comfortable and spacious.

At both Kaza and Kibber homestays, we were asked whether we preferred local cuisine or standard dal-chawal-paneer food. The first consisted of the region’s typical thukpa soup with vegetables and barley or wheat dumplings, fermented khambir roti (bread) and samba (barley malt) for breakfast, momos, black pea curry and the like.

Our Fa-Ma hosts even prepared a delicious dish from the Kullu region, siddu, momo-like dumplings with ground walnut, garlic, onion, local ghee and spices, and a curry made from purple potatoes that turned black during cooking. Thinley told us that many foreigners and Indians ask for local dishes, but because barley can be heavy, plain rice lentils are always available.

Chai and coffee are also served conveniently, white or black, sugary or sugar-free, and salty tea if requested.

Despite the enormous potential for income generation, Kibber residents are aware of the possibility of tourism beyond the region’s carrying capacity. They discuss standards and rules, and Thinley and others have formed a Kibber Sustainable Tourism Association to enforce them. “Money isn’t everything; if our biodiversity is destroyed or the environment is polluted by excessive tourism, then it is counterproductive,” he said.

This sense of environmental and social responsibility is rare in much of the Himalayan tourism industry; it is not clear to what extent this even permeates the homestay initiative. There is an explosion of properties calling themselves ‘homestays’; we saw such signs in almost every settlement, from Spiti to Kinnaur to Shimla. Some looked like standard lodges rather than rooms in someone’s home.

The homestay program, first initiated in Ladakh, emerged from a simple concept: combining the pursuit of better incomes with showcasing local life to visitors, while preserving the environment and culture that are vital are preserved for tourists and the community. When we left Himachal Pradesh, we hoped that such a feeling would flow into all these businesses – and beyond, into the tourism industry as a whole.