Is There Tea Plucking in Gulmarg? What Travellers Should Know

Jammu and Kashmir's first tea plantation drive only began in July 2025, in Billawar in Kathua district, far south in the Jammu region. We are saying this plainly because an older version of this page described terraced tea estates, local tea pluckers and dress-up photo shoots in Gulmarg. None of that exists, and we have corrected it. If someone offers you a "Gulmarg tea estate tour", treat it as a red flag. Facts on this page were checked by our Kashmir desk against Kashmir Life's July 2025 report on the Billawar plantation and its reporting on where Kashmir buys its tea.

Are There Tea Gardens or Tea Plantations in Gulmarg?

No. Search for tea gardens in Gulmarg and you will find several travel blogs describing British-era estates, tea factories and tasting rooms. Walk around Gulmarg and you will find a grass bowl, a golf course, ski slopes and conifer forest. Snow covers the meadow from about December to March, and frost is common well into spring. Tea is a frost-sensitive evergreen, and the established gardens around Palampur in Kangra grow at about 1,200 to 1,500 m, roughly half Gulmarg's height.

Here is what you will read online, set against what is actually true.

Is Tea Grown Anywhere in Kashmir?

Not commercially, and not in the Valley. The tea Kashmiris drink every morning comes from outside. Most of it is Assam green tea, the leaf used for noon chai, and a 2016 Kashmir Life report called Assam the largest supplier of green tea leaves to the Valley. It put Assam's green tea output at 5 to 6 million kg a year, and found millions of kilograms rotting when Kashmir's markets stayed shut for 75 days that summer.

The only planting in the Union Territory is new. In July 2025 the Agriculture Department launched Jammu and Kashmir's first tea plantation drive in Billawar, Kathua district, with more than 20,000 saplings brought from Palampur. Officials chose Billawar because its Shivalik foothill climate resembles Palampur's. It is a pilot on farmland in the Jammu division, roughly 400 km by road from Gulmarg, and it is not open to visitors.

Tea Tasting in Gulmarg: Kahwa and Noon Chai

This is the part of the old page that was half right, and it is the real reason to think about tea in Gulmarg. Kashmir has two tea traditions of its own, and you can taste both within a few minutes' walk of the gondola. They are nothing alike.

The old line that kahwa is "soda and salt in sheer tea" mixed the two up. Soda and salt make noon chai. The baking soda reacts with the leaves as they boil down, and when milk goes in the brew turns pink. Kahwa never has milk or salt, and its colour comes from saffron. "Noon" means salt in Kashmiri, and "sheer" comes from the Persian word for milk.

Where to drink kahwa in Gulmarg

Almost every hotel restaurant in Gulmarg serves kahwa, and so do the tea stalls and dhabas along the market and near the gondola base station. Noon chai is harder to find in tourist restaurants because Kashmiris drink it at home, so ask your hotel staff to make you a cup at breakfast.

A samovar is the tall copper or brass kettle with a chimney of burning coals running up its centre. The coals keep the kahwa hot for hours, which is why you see them on stall counters on cold mornings. A hot cup after the Gondola ride down from Kongdori, when the cloud rolls over Apharwat, is the closest thing Gulmarg has to a tea experience. It is a good one.

To take some home, buy a packet of kahwa mix (tea with the spices already blended) in the Gulmarg market or in Srinagar's old city, and buy saffron only in GI-tagged, sealed packs. Kashmir saffron has carried a GI tag since 2020.

Things to Do in Gulmarg Instead of Tea Plucking

The old page got one thing right: there is no skipping Gulmarg's mountain sports. If you came looking for a slow, unhurried activity, Gulmarg has those too. Here is what is actually worth your day, with our full guides linked.

• Ride the Gulmarg Gondola over the forest to Kongdori, then on to Apharwat for snow into June and, on a clear morning, Nanga Parbat.

• Learn to ski in Gulmarg on the nursery slopes in the main Gulmarg bowl, near the golf course. Most beginners are turning on easy runs within two or three days.

• Go trout fishing in Gulmarg at Ferozepur Nallah with a permit from the J&K Fisheries Department. This is the closest Gulmarg gets to a slow, quiet morning outdoors.

• Walk the meadow past St. Mary's Church and the Gulmarg Golf Course, or trek up to Alpather Lake, which stays frozen into June.

For all 20 activities with costs and seasons, see our guide to things to do in Gulmarg. For sights rather than activities, see places to visit in Gulmarg, and to pick your month, see the best time to visit Gulmarg.

Where You Can Really Go Tea Plucking Near Kashmir

If tea plucking in Gulmarg was the plan, move it south. The nearest real tea gardens to Kashmir are in the Kangra Valley of Himachal Pradesh, around Palampur. This is where the Billawar saplings came from. Kangra tea has had an Indian GI tag since 2005, and in 2023 the European Commission granted it protected status as well. The gardens sit under the Dhauladhar range, and you can walk between the rows of bushes on the edge of Palampur town.

For the full tea experience, visit Wah Tea Estate, about 7 km south of Palampur off the Andretta road. Lonely Planet dates its tea to 1857, and its short factory walks show withering, rolling, drying and grading. Processing runs only from April to October, so come then and call ahead. The Palampur Co-operative Tea Factory, downhill from town, also lets visitors watch the process. Pluckers pick by the rule of "two leaves and a bud", and a guide will show you how to snap the shoot cleanly with thumb and forefinger.

Palampur is about 220 km from Jammu, roughly 6 hours by road via Pathankot, so it pairs better with a Dharamshala or Himachal trip than with Gulmarg. Our guide to places to visit in Palampur covers the tea gardens and what to see nearby. For full estate stays with plucking sessions, Darjeeling and Assam are the long-haul options, and you can browse Darjeeling tour packages if that is the trip you want.

Plan Your Gulmarg Trip

Gulmarg is about 50 km from Srinagar, roughly a 2-hour drive via Tangmarg. Most visitors come for a day or two as part of a wider Kashmir trip. Our Gulmarg tour packages bundle the Srinagar transfers, a hotel and the gondola day, and our Kashmir tour packages combine Gulmarg with Srinagar's houseboats and Pahalgam. Couples can start with Kashmir honeymoon packages, and families with Kashmir family packages. Driving up on your own? Our Srinagar to Gulmarg route guide covers taxis and timings, and the Gulmarg travel guide has everything else.

Sources: Kashmir Life, J&K's first tea plantation drive, July 2025, Kashmir Life, Assam tea and Kashmir, September 2016, Lonely Planet, Wah Tea Estate, PTI via The Week, Kangra tea EU GI tag, 2023, Wikipedia, Gulmarg, Wikipedia, Noon chai and the TravelTriangle Kashmir desk.

Edited by TravelTriangle