Kashi: how to visit Varanasi as a seeker rather than a tourist

Kashi — Varanasi, Banaras, depending who you ask and when — is among the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world, and has been a destination for seekers for longer than most civilisations have existed. It is also loud, crowded, physically demanding to move around, and completely indifferent to whether you enjoy it.

That last part is worth saying plainly. People arrive expecting either a spiritual experience delivered on schedule or a photogenic riverfront, and Kashi obliges neither. What it does offer is available to anyone prepared to be there slowly.

Three names, three things

Kashi

The oldest of the three, from a root meaning to shine. This is the name used when the city is meant as a spiritual reality rather than a place on a map.

Varanasi

From the two rivers that bound the old city — the Varuna and the Assi. The administrative name.

Banaras

The vernacular form, and the one you will hear most in the lanes.

The ghats

Some eighty-odd ghats — flights of steps down to the Ganga — run along the western bank. They are the city's spine, and walking them end to end in the early morning is the single best thing a first-time visitor can do.

Dashashwamedh

The principal ghat and the site of the evening Ganga Aarti. Busiest by a wide margin.

Manikarnika

The main cremation ghat, where fires burn continuously and have done for centuries. Approach with restraint — see the note below.

Harishchandra

The second cremation ghat, smaller and older.

Assi

The southern end, quieter, where the Assi meets the Ganga. A good place to begin a morning walk northward.

Kashi Vishwanath

One of the twelve Jyotirlingas and the reason a great many pilgrims come. The corridor project has substantially changed the approach in recent years, and both the access route and the queue arrangements differ from most older accounts — check current arrangements rather than assuming.

• Security is strict. Phones, cameras, leather and bags are generally not permitted inside; lockers are available nearby.
• Queues are long at festival times and on Mondays, which are associated with Shiva.
• Early morning is calmer than any other hour.

Ganga Aarti, and the better alternative

The evening Aarti at Dashashwamedh is elaborate, choreographed and genuinely striking — and it is also thoroughly a spectacle, with several thousand people and a great deal of commerce around it. Worth seeing once.

The one most seekers end up preferring is the morning: Subah-e-Banaras at Assi ghat, before sunrise, at a fraction of the scale. Or simply a boat on the river at first light, which costs little and is the version of the city everyone remembers.

When to go

October to March

The comfortable window. Cold mornings on the water in December and January — take more than you think.

April to June

Very hot, frequently above 40°C. Difficult for walking the ghats in daylight.

July to September

Monsoon. The river rises, lower ghats flood, and boating is sometimes suspended.

Festivals — Dev Deepawali, Mahashivratri, Kartik Purnima — transform the city and fill it completely. Extraordinary if that is what you want; unmanageable if it is not.

Practical things

• The old city is a warren of lanes too narrow for cars. You will walk, and you will get lost. Both are fine.
• Wear modest clothing — shoulders and knees covered — at temples and around the ghats.
• Shoes come off frequently. Slip-ons save a great deal of time.
• Unsolicited guides, boat touts and 'the temple is closed today' are all routine. A polite, firm no works.
• Fix boat prices before getting in, not after.

How to actually be there

The most common mistake is treating Kashi as a list. Three days of temples and ghats and cremation grounds, photographed and ticked off, and home. That version of the city is genuinely underwhelming, which is why some people leave puzzled by its reputation.

The alternative costs nothing: go early, sit somewhere on the steps, and stay put for an hour without doing anything. Watch the river and the people who are simply living there. Kashi is not a place that reveals itself to someone in motion.