Landour, above Mussoorie
Landour, the cantonment ridge above Mussoorie: its old bazaar, St. Paul's Church of 1839, old-growth deodar forest and long views of the Garhwal peaks.
Uttarakhand⛰ 2,000 m2 itineraries
Mussoorie
Mussoorie at about 2,000 m above the Doon valley: Landour's ridge, Gun Hill, Happy Valley, Sir George Everest's House and Kempty Falls, with drive times.
Itineraries you can copy
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Day plan · First visitleisure
One day in Mussoorie — Gun Hill, Happy Valley and Landour
A one-day Mussoorie plan: the Gun Hill cable car, the Tibetan temple at Happy Valley and the Landour ridge, with short legs and no long drives. Free to copy.
Best Apr–May · Oct–Dec
See the plan →
1 night · 2 days · First visitleisure
Two days in Mussoorie — Landour, Everest's House and Kempty Falls
A two-day Mussoorie plan: Gun Hill, Happy Valley and Landour on day one, then Sir George Everest's House and Kempty Falls on day two. Free to copy.
Best Apr–May · Oct–Dec
See the plan →Mussoorie is a hill station at about 2,000 m in Dehradun district, founded as a resort in 1825 and known as the Queen of the Hills. From Delhi it is about 250 km by road on our routing, where free-flow routing says 4 hours and traffic and hill roads usually add several more, so it works as a long weekend. The railway stops at Dehradun, 22 km and 46 minutes below.
The ridge is two towns. Mussoorie itself is crowded and commercial around the Mall Road, with Gun Hill's cable car and Happy Valley, where Tibetan refugees settled after the Dalai Lama arrived in 1959. Landour, a cantonment ridge about 300 m higher, is the quieter half, with old deodar forest, St. Paul's Church and the long view of the Garhwal peaks. Out of town, Sir George Everest's House is 14 minutes by road and Kempty Falls 30.
A day covers Gun Hill, Happy Valley and Landour; two days add the Everest house and the waterfall. See the one-day plan and the two-day plan, things to do in Mussoorie, when to visit and how to reach Mussoorie.
Photos: Paul Hamilton (CC BY-SA 2.0) · Paul Hamilton (CC BY-SA 2.0) · BestMan20 (CC0) — via Wikimedia Commons, resized.
Places worth the drive
Kempty Falls
Kempty Falls, a waterfall of about 40 ft on the Chakrata road, 13.6 km and 30 minutes from Mussoorie, and where its camp-tea name comes from.
Happy Valley, Mussoorie
Happy Valley, the Tibetan neighbourhood of Mussoorie where the Dalai Lama arrived in April 1959: the Shedup Choephelling temple, prayer wheels and a garden.
Gun Hill, Mussoorie
Gun Hill, said to be the second-highest point of Mussoorie at about 2,024 m, reached by cable car from the Mall Road, where a cannon once marked noon.
Sir George Everest's House, Mussoorie
The Park Estate house and laboratory of Sir George Everest, who led the Survey of India, 6.7 km and 14 minutes from Mussoorie, now a museum.
On the map
Open the Mussoorie map →The places a Mussoorie day reaches, with the road time from town. Each opens on the map with its plans and pages beside it.
Before you go
All articles →
Things to do in Mussoorie — 5 stops, and which need a car
Five things to do around Mussoorie, from the Gun Hill cable car and Happy Valley to Landour's ridge, Everest's House and Kempty Falls, with drive times.
How to reach Mussoorie — distances and drive times
How to reach Mussoorie from Delhi, Chandigarh, Dehradun and Rishikesh by road, with measured distances and times, and the nearest station and airport.
Best time to visit Mussoorie — month by month
When to go to Mussoorie: the warm, clear weeks of April and May, the monsoon rain of about 660 mm a month, the clear autumn, and snow in December to February.
Questions people ask
What is Mussoorie known for?
It is a hill station at about 2,000 m above the Doon valley, founded as a resort in 1825 and called the Queen of the Hills. People come for the cool air, the Mall Road, Gun Hill's cable car and Landour's ridge, with old deodar forest and long views on a clear day.
How many days do you need in Mussoorie?
One day covers Gun Hill, Happy Valley and the ridge at Landour. A second day adds Sir George Everest's House, 14 minutes out, and Kempty Falls, 30 minutes out. Most visitors come from Delhi for a long weekend; the road is about 250 km, 4 hours free-flow.
What is the nearest railway station to Mussoorie?
Dehradun, about 22 km and 46 minutes below the town by road on our routing, with Jolly Grant airport 51 km and 79 minutes away. Wikipedia says the railway reached Dehradun in 1900. Agree the taxi fare before you set off, because we have no verified fares.
Photographs by Wikimedia Commons contributors (CC0, CC BY, CC BY-SA), resized; each picture is credited on its own page.