For years, Srinagar and its environs provided the most iconic images of a holiday in the hills for Indian tourists: beautiful houseboats in the Dal Lake, flowers in the Mughal Gardens, the red foliage of the chinar trees and the alternately grassy and snowy slopes in the nearby margs (meadows). Even in the time of the Mughals, Srinagar was a favoured summer retreat for royal tourists, and they left behind some sumptuous (and legendary) gardens to prove this. Then came the British who were not allowed to buy land here, and consequently adapted local boats into the now legendary Srinagar houseboats.
The city was the summer capital for the erstwhile Jammu kingdom and continues to be so for the modern state of J&K.
