Chandigarh is the best planned city of India. It has one of the best maintained roads, parks and other infrastructure. Chandigarh is known as “The City Beautiful” due to the cleanliness and the greenery of the city. It is also India’s first planned city and was planned by Le Corbusier. There are trees running alongside every road which gives the city its peaceful environment.
If you are making a visit to this city, here are a few things you just can’t miss:
1) Sector 17: is the pedestrian’s paradise in Chandigarh. There are special celebrations in sector 17 on occasions like The New year, Independence Day and on similar days. Though many malls have come up in Chandigarh but still sector 17 is jam packed and is the first choice of citizens.
2) Malls: There are many malls in Chandigarh and the biggest one of them is Elante mall in Industrial area. Other malls include Centra, DT, Fun Republic (the oldest) etc. A new mall has opened on the outskirts of Chandigarh “North Country Mall” which is the biggest mall of North India.
3) Lake and Rock Garden: Sukhna Lake which is considered as the best gift of Le Corbusier to the city. Sukhna is sanctuary to many exotic birds like storks, cranes and siberian ducks. Near the lake, there is Nek Chand’s Rock Garden which is a beautiful piece of work. It is completely built of industrial & home waste and thrown away items. It also consists of interlinked waterfalls. There is another lake in sector 42, which is newly built but it’s beautiful.
4) Gardens: Bedside the New Lake, there is a beautiful Palm Garden. Zakir Hussain Rose Garden is a botanical garden with 50,000 rose bushes of 1600 different species. Other gardens include Cactus Garden, Terraced Garden, Botanical Garden, Garden of Fragrance, Children Traffic Park and Bougainvillea Garden.
5) Museums: The museums to visit in Chandigarh are Government Museum and Art Gallery, International Dolls Museum and Museum of evolution of life.
6) Youth’s Paradise: Among the youth, Panjab University’s Student Center (StuC) and Night food street(NFS) are famous. There is a special Gehri route in Chandigarh which spans from sector 8,9,10 and 11. It is a route where people mostly roam on cars and motorcycles in groups.
7) The surrounding areas: Places near Chandigarh include Kansal and Nepli forest reserve. It surrounds the Sukhna Lake and one can get a real feel of forest. Fateh Burj in Chappar Chiri is 328ft high tower dedicated to the establishment to Sikh rule in India. Another amazing place near Chandigarh is Kasauli. The Himalayan Expressway connects Chandigarh and Kasauli which is a hill station. On the way to Kasauli, one can enjoy nature’s beauty in Morni hills. The beautiful hills are a place of tourist attraction and nearby is Chakki Mod which comprises of beautiful waterfall.
Parwaano which is a few Kilometers from Kasauli has Timber Trail resort. Situated at an altitude of 5000 feet atop the Shivalik Ranges, the resort is accessible by a Cable Car which in itself is a unique experience as you get the aerial view of the beautiful mountains. Another amazing place near Chandigarh is the Pinjore Gardens which are typical example of Mughal Gardens style. Apart from this there are several other tourists’ attractions around Chandigarh one of them being Shimla – “The Queen of Hills”. A train can be boarded from Kalka (half an hour ride from Chandigarh) to Shimla.
Trip of 7-10 days is required to visit Chandigarh and the nearby places as all of them are worth the penny spent.
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Chandigarh is a neat and clean city. Totally agree here, I visited all famous places like Rock Garden,Rose Garden Sukhna Lake,Sector 17 and Elante Mall. It was a great trip. I would suggest everyone to visit at least once.
Great list of places. My sister’s marriage held on next month and we did some shopping from Chandigarh.Great experience. I fully enjoy the shopping and the street food.