SHIMLA
A flat green shelf about 4km below the Ridge, historically the racecourse and cricket ground and now Army-managed. The Army Heritage Museum here (uniforms, weapons, regimental silver) is a decent half-day stop paired with Summer Hill and Tara Devi; not worth a detour on its own.
Annandale's valley was named in the early 1830s, according to local tradition, either after Anna, an early explorer's romantic interest, or after the Annandale valley in Dumfriesshire, Scotland, home region of many British officers stationed here. Under Lord William Beresford, Military Secretary to Viceroy Lord Dufferin, the ground was developed with funding partly contributed by Indian maharajas into a polo field and cricket pavilion, hosting gymkhanas, dog shows, and fancy fairs (the first held in 1839) as the social heart of colonial recreation. Post-independence it passed to Indian Army control, which established a war museum on its periphery in 2006.
