Kalinka Temple, Bironkhal

Kalinka is a hilltop temple to the goddess Kali in Bironkhal block of Pauri Garhwal district, close to the Almora district border; it is distinct from the Bunkhal Kalinka in Thalisain. Its founding is credited to the Badiyaari, a semi-nomadic shepherd community, and folk legend tells of a shepherd woken on this ridge by thunder and a furious voice ordering him to climb up and raise a shrine to the goddess. The present temple, with a lotus-bud shikhar, dates from around 2010, and people from about a dozen nearby villages look after it.

The temple sits at roughly 2,100 metres on a bare, rocky summit, with dense forest of banj oak, rhododendron and chir pine below. Paths climb up from both Garhwal and Kumaon, and the ascent is easy to moderate. The top looks out over the Dudhatoli hills, the Trisul massif and western Garhwal peaks as far as Bandarpunch. A winter fair, Kalinka Jatoda, draws thousands.