Wah Tea Estate — Local services in Himachal Pradesh

Visited the place on strong recommendation from friends. The tea estate no doubt is pristine but right from the moment we entered the place the staff was a bit not so welcoming but the most harrowing experience and an uncouth, uncivil personality was waiting right inside the cafe , Ms. Kaveri. I forced my self to add the prefix but the person doesn't deserve an iota of respect give the behaviour we were subjected to. I visited the place with my cousins and their kids. We had 2 toddlers with us ( my toddler son running mild fever) hence we were carrying some home cooked food with us just incase we didn't get kids menu which is difficult to get in most of the places in India like this one too. The person who was taking our food order informed us that we may avoid outside food. We checked with him on the kids menu options which they didn't have and we explained our need to then serve our kids with the home food we were carrying with us and the discussion went well. We were then shocked to hear a shrilling, nasty voice from another table making rude , unpleasent remarks towards us. we initially thought it was a fellow guest but to our shock she was the cafe owner. She wanted us to avoid outside food inside cafe which was still understandable but the manner in which she spoke was beyond imaginable. The lady didn't care to even get up from her workstation to pass on the communication. She kept sitting on her workstation howling at us infront of all the guests and even advised us to take our kids outside the estate and feed them in the car and only then get them in the cafe. How can anyone discriminate kids to this extend and treat customers in such uncivil, discourteous manner. Im a localite from Dharamsala and I have my family in the hospitality industry too for more than 2 decades and this behaviour is unheard, unseen and unimaginable. We were shocked, my kids were terrified and hungry and we had no option but to exit the place right away hungry and extremely disappointed. it was a horrendous experience and the lady was unapologetic aboutall of it. she didn't care when we even told her that my son was running fever. She was just worried about holding her rude crown high I guess. Anyone planning to have a good family time, with elders or kids ... please please avoid this place and this lady for sure. Dharamsala is a beautiful place and has many , even better options, tea estates too . please explore them. Horrible experience at...

Among the many tea plantations in the area, the WAH Tea plantation was recommended.Paid a visit to the WAH tea plantation and Tea factory on 25 June 25. One of the first things you notice are Catchy slogans, naturally, about the "tea". Next, you enter a fairly large room, reception, showroom, billing counter, tea testing room and information centre all in one. The owner of the plantation, Mr Agarwal, is personally present to welcome the visitors. Ambiance and atmosphere very visitor-friendly is such that the visitor must feel at home and are put in a mood to BUY  Tour of the plantation and tea testing was on offer for a fee of R 200. We opted for it.The plantation tour was conducted by Rajesh. The history of "tea" and its arrival in India through the 'tea-seeds' being smuggled by monks from China, till the present day, was covered quite well with a bit of humour sprinkled in the narration. He seemed to know what he was talking about. Equally interesting were his titbits of information and their medicinal properties about local plants growing among the tea bushes. Also told us that the owners were planning to enter hospitality business.After about half an hour of the 'tour', we were taken to the tea factory, where plucked tea leaves are sorted out. Here, a group of women workers were sorting out collected tea leaves to separate the buds, a bud with a leaf and a bud with two leaves are carefully picked and placed aside from about 1000 kgs of tea leaves processed every day. Processed tea obtained from "the Bud" is the costliest, followed by tea obtained from "a bud and a leaf" and "a bud and two leaves", in that order.  After this, we entered the factory proper. Saw the process of withering and Rolling. Exit from the factory and to the Reception room. More than 30 to 40 tea samples were offered for testing. Most of them were very light in colour. I am a rustic kind of guy, with rustic kind of test buds, could not differentiate the difference in test in various varieties. Jayati purchased some exotic types and I took a half kg packet called " Kadak ".Bid goodbye to WAH bye and...

Price:- None or Rs 150. Time:- 40 minutes. In house tea products available for shoppers.

I have been scrupulously reluctant in indulging tea, for all my known folks keep on goading me to have a cup. So when I dived right into this green estate, I was taken aback by the rich taste, burst of aroma, bundle of health benefits, a well made cup could possess.

You can visit the place for free, take some cool photos with seemingly endless amount of tea plants and nice trees, and call it a day.

Unsurprisingly, I am not the only one after the natural elixir and free lunch: the estate is a flowerbud attracting celebrities and industrialists like bees. The tour, however, still is well liked by general public for its low cost of Rs 150 and it's generous package.

The program begins by going through growth of a tea plant through tea leaves, tea buds, and silver needles. The guide is a professional gardener and the queries are enthusiastically entertained.

Moving inwards towards the factory, the man tells how the chief product of the plantation was smuggled by an disguised englishmen from China, how the previous owner fled the estate during partition, and about the current owner, who resides in Calcutta and, is a man of class and here every summer reading lots of books.

In the factory, is a display of distinct wholesale products, that range from powder to small pistachio-like in size. Increasing in taste as in size.

Here, humongous machines run at 277°C in order to evaporate 80 kg of moisture from every 100 kg of really watery plants.

If alone for enlightening the distinctions between tea yields at different levels of the process, the tour would still be worth it. One gets even more.

Yay, one further gets to enjoy drinking decent amounts of Chamomile Green Tea(sleep panacea from Germany), Detox Tea ( skin lovers love this), classics such as Black Tea and Masala Tea, Tranquility Tea, Industrialised-Green Tea, Handpicked-Green Tea, German Rose Tea, Earl Grey Tea ( A Britton's livelong love ), Moroccan Mint Tea, among other...