How did a whale go up the Himalayas? Where would you find a spider shaped like the Sorting Hat in Harry Potter stories? On which peaks and slopes can you find both snow and coffee beans sometimes? Up which hill is the observatory that helped to sight a super-Neptune-sized planet? Put on your climbing boots to find out hundreds of fascinating facts about our country's best-known mountain ranges - the Himalayas, the Trans-Himalayas, the Aravallis, the Vindhyas, the Satpuras, the North-east mountains, the Eastern Ghats and the Western Ghats. Find out how each range was formed, discover the plants, trees and wildlife on them, and do your bit to save them from getting destroyed. Meet amazing communities who live in harmony with nature even now. Clap for the scientists who look under rocks and into tree holes for new species of flora and fauna. And once you have worked up an appetite, the yummy dishes of the hills will fill you right up (bamboo biryani, anyone?). From ice stupas and battles in the snow to floating schools and Titanosaurus eggs, from wool gatherers and medicine makers to the fastest diving bird and a tiger that could win the 'Best Dad' award - this book, filled with photos and illustrations, will take you on an exciting climb up and down the mountains of India.

From approximately the third century BCE through the thirteenth century CE, the remote mountainous landscape around the glacial sources of the Ganga (Ganges) River in the Central Himalayas in northern India was transformed into a region encoded with deep meaning, one approached by millions of Hindus as a primary locus of pilgrimage. Nachiket Chanchani?s innovative study explores scores of stone edifices and steles that were erected in this landscape. Through their forms, locations, interactions with the natural environment, and sociopolitical context, these lithic ensembles evoked legendary worlds, embedded historical memories in the topography, changed the mountain range?s appearance, and shifted its semiotic effect. Mountain Temples and Temple Mountains also alters our understanding of the transmission of architectural knowledge and provides new evidence of how an enduring idea of India emerged in the subcontinent. Art History Publication Initiative. For more information, visit http://arthistorypi.org/books/mountain-temples-and-temple-mountains

This Book Explores The Tourism Aspects Of The `Mountains Of India` In General And Provides Useable Information On Their Geography, Pilgrimage Centres, Hill Stations And Adventure Options Available To An Individual.

A magisterial history of the Himalaya: an epic story of peoples, cultures, and adventures among the world’s highest mountains. For centuries, the unique and astonishing geography of the Himalaya has attracted those in search of spiritual and literal elevation: pilgrims, adventurers, and mountaineers seeking to test themselves among the world’s most spectacular and challenging peaks. But far from being wild and barren, the Himalaya has been home to a diversity of indigenous and local cultures, a crucible of world religions, a crossroads for trade, and a meeting point and conflict zone for empires past and present. In this landmark work, nearly two decades in the making, Ed Douglas makes a thrilling case for the Himalaya’s importance in global history and offers a soaring account of life at the "roof of the world." Spanning millennia, from the earliest inhabitants to the present conflicts over Tibet and Everest, Himalaya explores history, culture, climate, geography, and politics. Douglas profiles the great kings of Kathmandu and Nepal; he describes the architects who built the towering white Stupas that distinguish Himalayan architecture; and he traces the flourishing evolution of Hinduism, Islam, and Buddhism that brought Himalayan spirituality to the world. He also depicts with great drama the story of how the East India Company grappled for dominance with China’s emperors, how India fought Mao’s Communists, and how mass tourism and ecological transformation are obscuring the bloody legacy of the Cold War. Himalaya is history written on the grandest yet also the most human scale—encompassing geology and genetics, botany and art, and bursting with stories of courage and resourcefulness.

The Himalayas are called the roof of the world. The tallest mountain on Earth, Mount Everest, at 29,028 feet, is ones of 14 peaks in the Himalayan chain. The Himalayas stretch 1,550 miles from China to Afghanistan. More than 40 million people live in the Himalayan regions. Among them are sherpas, people of Nepal, who help to guide climbers up Mount Everest. A chapter discusses the record-setting climb of Edmund Hillary and Sherpa guide Tenzing Norgay. Students will also read that it is a Hindu belief that these mountains are the abode of gods.