Amaya is a truly special place in the evening twilight. The sun sinks beneath the horizon, the light softly fades, the shadows of the pine trees stretch across the forest floor, and the air fills with the sweet fragrance of evening flowers and Himalayan honeysuckle. It’s the perfect time to take a little walk and witness a thousand little stories unfolding before your eyes.
A hawk-moth, drawn in by the warm golden glow of the marble windows, hovers almost motionless over a native forest wildflower, her wings a silent flutter while she sips its nectar. She soon flies off into the growing darkness, braving vesper bats on the hunt overhead, to scour the forest floor for the endemic Himalayan nettle (Girardinia diversifolia), the perfect plant upon which to lay her eggs. Once hatched, her caterpillars will eat their fill of its distinct large, knobbled leaves, burrow beneath the soil to pupate, and emerge anew, unfurling silvery wings of their own.
On a clear night, the twilight’s quiet is pierced by the song of the blue whistling thrush, who greets the night after a busy afternoon spent hopping along the forest floor, turning over leaves and stones in search of the choicest invertebrates. Then, once darkness has truly set in, the sound of a mellow hoot could even betray to the keen-eyed observer a collared scops owl perched among the branches overhead, his eyes wide in anticipation of the first mouse or beetle unlucky enough to cross his gaze.
The state bird of Himachal Pradesh is the western tragopan (Tragopan melanocephalus), and the International Union for the Conservation of Nature estimates that currently only 3,300 individuals remain in the wild. These pheasants are mostly situated along small pockets of Himalayan forest whose closest point is some fifty miles to Amaya’s east, but many years ago, its striking black and crimson plumage may well have been a common sight here. They are arboreal by nature, and it is exciting to think that the trees we grow and care for could one day provide cover for a winter foraging ground that will be visited by this stunning bird or any of its several endangered sister species.
The relationship between sustainability and the hospitality industry has long been fraught with tension, and the conflict often seems irreconcilable. We aim to lead by example, and show the world that when you are given the gift of time spent in symbiosis with the space you inhabit – when you become a part of the little stories – you experience luxury without equal.