Himachal
Places to Visit
dark side of manali in June
How’s Manali town in June? It’s over-crowded, noisy and marred by horrible traffic jams.
As the plains of India start to sizzle in the summer heat of June, all roads, it seems, lead to Manali in Kullu district of Himachal Pradesh. Thousands of tourists visit Manali every day in June leading to a host of issues in an already over-burdened Manali town.
We have already written about how you can avoid visiting Manali in May and June. In this article, we will cover how the experience of visiting Manali can turn out to be in June and what you can do instead if you are like really desperate to visit Manali in the summer.
Entering Manali
Even entering Manali in itself is a hassle in June. There are frequent traffic jams before and at the entry point of Manali due to huge traffic on a narrow road. The traffic jams are caused by heavy vehicles, mostly by these huge monstrous tourist buses and even by goods-carrying trucks.
The Mall Road, Manali
The famed Mall Road of Manali appears quite dull in the daytime due to warm temperature in June. The maximum temperature starts hovering around 30 degrees Celsius during summer months in Manali. It’s not much for those who are coming from 40 to 50 degrees Celsius but it still feels warm here.
Like many other hill stations of Himachal Pradesh, the average temperature of Manali has also increased in last around a decade.
Hadimba temple
The narrow road from the Mall road to the Hadimba temple remains jam-packed with vehicles in summers. Crossing this stretch of just around 2 kms is any motorist’s nightmare. There is barely enough space on this road for two small vehicles to parallelly cross each other, which leads to frequent traffic jams. Even most autowallahs refuse to go on this road due to massive rush and there is no guarantee how much time it would take for them to return to the same spot. It may take even hours.
At the temple itself, there is a huge rush of visitors in summers. You have to wait in long queues for entering the temple for darshan.
Old Manali
The condition of the Old Manali village, another favourite haunt of the tourists, is equally miserable in June due to heavy rush. The congested Old Manali road remains chock-a-block with vehicles throughout the summer days of June.
There are frequent traffic jams here and you can remain stuck endlessly on this road. So narrow are the roads and so heavily occupied by the vehicles that there is literally no space left for the pedestrians to walk here. You have to juggle your way through while being extremely cautious of the passing vehicles on this road.
Similar is the condition of the road that takes you to the nearby Vashishth village, called Bashisht locally, which is known for its hot springs. Driving on this narrow and congested road is also nightmarish. Even outside Manali you can get stuck in jams especially on the Atal Tunnel and Rohtang Pass roads.
Please honk, you are in Manali
Manali is easily not only one of the most crowded but also noisiest hill stations in June. There is constant honking on all of its roads. The visitors come here for peace and solitude and end up feeling like being in any other crowded Indian city. The cops also don’t bother too much about honking and probably have not issued even a single challan for honking in the history of Manali.
There are also no ‘no-honking please’ signboards anywhere in the town for creating at least a little awareness among drivers. The only almost hidden no-honking signboard we stumbled upon was at the roundabout at the north end of the Mall road. Ironically, this signboard was surrounded by constant honking of vehicles.
No Parking
Like other hill stations of Himachal, Manali too lacks parking spaces. And in June the parking problem becomes worse. You park wherever you find space but then you can get challaned by cops too.
Litter and stink
As the tourist rush increases in Manali in June, so dies the problem of littering. A general insensitivity among visitors to keep Manali clean adds to the problem. Even the local Municipal Council of Manali has failed to dispose of garbage properly at its nearby solid waste management unit at Rangri village on the edge of the town. As you enter Manali, a stench spread for miles and heaps of garbage welcome you.
The problem of stench in Manali is not specific to the summers only. It’s an all-year affair. Guess, the local Municipal Council will have to do something about Manali’s garbage if it wants to keep this paradise a paradise.
What’s the alternative to Manali in June?
If you are ready to brave this dark side of Manali and still want to visit in June, then you surely can as do so many others. But if you’d rather be somewhere else then there are alternatives to Manali in June. Most visitors want to visit the Rohtang Pass, Atal Tunnel or Sissu in the summer.
For that you don’t necessarily have to stay in Manali. You can stay away but still near to Manali in places like Naggar, Raison, 15 Mile, Jagatsukh, Prini etc. All these villages are within 20 kms of Manali and moreover less crowded or congested. From here you can always move to your favourite destination, keeping in mind the traffic situation and crowds in summers.
Visiting Kasol and other places in the Parvati valley of Kullu is not advisable due to massive traffic jams there in the summer months. The top reason for the traffic jams on Bhuntar-Manikaran road is the narrow road and massive traffic rush of visitors in June. Even Jibhi and Tirthan valleys remain jampacked in summers. The bottom line is you must look for less-crowded places.
Manali in June video
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Hope I would have found it before planning and visiting.
I found same problems there. I waited in queue for 3 hours to visit temple.
I went to vashisht and came back without visiting as I didn’t found parking
Best time to visit mall road was 7 AM.
Even at 4 PM it was hot as it was crowded.
We visited Manali in the last week of May and experienced the traffic jams. Don’t ever visit Manali in May and June.
It’s very hard time for our guest coming to manali from different part of India in summer. After spending heaps of budget to visit manali and in returns all they getting nothing only over crowded hotels, fully packed traffic. It’s TRUE throughout the year you will see massive garbage around manali not individual nor tourist understand the problem of litters around. Manali is one of the beautiful and highest tourist place in India and government must provide lot of dustbins around manali and moreover there should be facilities to change them time to time. And for that they need lot of worker which must be the top most priority of management. It’s not hard,on entry barrier they must distribute pomphlets to all drivers or vehicles coming from anywhere written with clearl instruction that every driver must have their disposable bag to keep all waste and dump inside dustbins. If anybody not following the rules set by the authority would be highly fined by the under uniform cops or surveillance cameras. All business class people making good mony from tourists and it’s also adding growth to the government sector as well.
Most of the roads are so crapy and toilets are so unhygienic. So there are so many things to discuss but not possible to keep writing. Anyhow we deeply need to look into the matters seriously if want to keep the legacy of our hill stations in Himachal.
Thanx
Manali is too commercialised altogether should be avoided. The taxi driver are looting tourist. Manali is too hot in may and taxi driver refuses to switch on a/c although one have paid for a/c car.
We had worst experience when it came yo hiring taxis. All activities in Manali are overpriced and the town is maintained very poorly.
We are planning for manali on 20 June 2024…pls suggest whether we should go or not?
Thanks I am cancelling my trip.