Srinagar in 3 days: what to see, in what order

A small stone Shiva temple on a hilltop about 300 m above the city. From the top you see Dal Lake, the houseboats, the old city and the mountains all round. The road ends at a parking area, and about 240 steps lead up to the temple.

The smallest of Srinagar's Mughal gardens, built in 1632 round a natural spring. Three terraces step down the hill with a channel of spring water running through them. People still fill bottles from the spring.

A ruined seven-terrace garden built in the 1650s by Dara Shikoh, a Mughal prince, as a school of astronomy. It sits high on the Zabarwan hills, with one of the best views over Dal Lake. The arches are lit up at night.

The biggest Mughal garden in Kashmir, laid out in 1633 by Asif Khan, brother of Nur Jahan. Twelve terraces climb from the edge of Dal Lake to the hills, with a long water channel, fountains and old chinar trees.

The Mughal emperor Jahangir built this garden in 1619 for his wife Nur Jahan. A water channel runs through four terraces past black stone pavilions and fountains, under huge chinar trees that turn red in autumn.

A white marble mosque with a dome on the north shore of Dal Lake. It holds a relic believed to be a hair of the Prophet Muhammad, and is the most important shrine in Kashmir. The lawns by the water look across the lake to the hills.

A ride in a shikara, the painted wooden boat with a canopy, from one of the numbered ghats on Boulevard Road. In an hour you pass houseboats, floating gardens and the boat sellers of the lake. Longer rides reach the floating vegetable market and Char Chinar island.

A waterfall in a pine valley a few kilometres off the road at Tangmarg, below Gulmarg. In winter it freezes into a wall of ice that draws as many visitors as the snow above.

One of the highest cable cars in the world. Phase 1 goes from Gulmarg up to Kongdori at about 3,000 m; Phase 2 continues to Apharwat at about 3,950 m, with snow on the top for much of the year and views to Nanga Parbat on a clear day.

Gulmarg's wide meadow, with the golf course, St Mary's Church and, on a small knoll in the middle, the Maharani Temple, a Shiva temple built in 1915 by the queen of Kashmir's Dogra ruler. It is the red-roofed temple seen in the song from the film Aap Ki Kasam.

The plateau round Pampore grows most of India's saffron. For a few weeks in autumn the fields turn purple with crocus flowers, picked by hand at dawn. The rest of the year the stop is the saffron shops and kahwa stalls on the highway.

The ruins of a stone Vishnu temple built in the 9th century by King Avantivarman, right by the highway. The carved pillars and gateway, with river goddesses and Vishnu, still stand inside a walled courtyard.

The great ruined sun temple of Kashmir, built in the 8th century by King Lalitaditya on a plateau above Mattan. Its grey stone walls and colonnade, with the snow peaks behind, are some of the most striking ruins in India.

Pahalgam is a valley town on the Lidder river at about 2,200 m, ringed by pine forest. Betaab Valley, 15 km up, is a green meadow with the river running through it, named after the 1983 film shot there. Aru Valley, 12 km the other way, is a quiet village meadow.