Meandering through the magical mountains of Spiti, where monks and mummies, forts and fossils, ancient history and untold stories await You may have pored over maps and scrolled through a million images online. But nothing quite prepares you for the moment when you cross the Kinnaur Valley in Himachal Pradesh, and cut through the Malang...Read More
With Booking.com now vetting and recognising sustainable accommodations with a new badge, sustainability is finally being ‘mainstreamed’ in the global tourism industry. Mountain Homestays is proud to be a part of this future-facing journey Over the last few decades, the concept of sustainability has been refined and chiselled, until it acquired a distinctive shape of...Read More
Meeting, dreaming, building with partner communities in post-vaccine Ladakh What if we woke up one morning, brushed our teeth, made a cup of tea, and clean forgot what the words sustainable, responsible, eco or regenerative mean? What if we just got on with our lives, and reacted instinctively to every risk and opportunity like we...Read More
Tourism can impact any destination in both a positive and a negative way. It depends on how the host community perceives tourism, and the decisions they take in order to hold on to traditional and cultural values, while opening up for travelers. The approach towards tourism development is always destination-specific and varies from geography to...Read More
“Half of us will deliver the homestay kits and the rest will set up the homestays. Let’s keep the ball rolling, people!” hollered a member of the operations team at Mountain Homestays (MH) to pump up his mates on a cold Ladakhi morning in March. These young men had set out for the remotest corners...Read More
In the thick forests of West Garo Hills, at the foothill of Nokrek Peak, a quaint village is holding onto their Garo culture and traditions. It is a region popular for orange orchards, rich biodiversity, and Wangla Festival in which locals perform traditional dance on the beats of 100 drums. Locals proudly declare that Sastagre...Read More
Hidden for several years under the sands of time, the village of Murgi is a treasure of Nubra valley in Ladakh, India, waiting to be explored by the external world. Jigmet Namgyal mentions that the village was originally named mHul-re (The Silver Mountain) and over the years the name transformed into the modern village of...Read More
This is the story of a man who is preserving his culture and roots in his own way. When you reach village Ayee beyond Nubra Valley on newly opened Siachen Road, you will hear about Master Ji. A local teacher who is passionately studying, writing about, and even sharing the history of his village –...Read More
“The art of our village has reached so many corners of the world.” – Ms. Ly Thi Nhat replied joyously upon asking why she does what she does. Hidden within the valleys of the Annamese Mountains is the region of Da Bac of Vietnam, where Ms. Nhat lives in Sung Village. The lady with infectious...Read More
When we think of mountains, we think of adventure, natural beauty, a pleasant climate and peace. It’s only when we dig deeper, we begin to understand the lived realities and challenges that the communities here navigate on a day-to-day basis to survive in such harsh regions Ms. Lo Thi Trang, a Muong woman born in...Read More
