01Lightning and butter
Before the temple rises a wooden staff some 60 feet tall. The people of the valley say that Mahadev draws the lightning to himself here so that it does not fall on the villages below, and that every so many years a bolt strikes and breaks the linga to pieces. The pujari gathers the pieces and sets them together with makkhan, butter, and the linga is whole again. Visitors are shown the butter-bound linga in the small sanctum. The hill itself is called Mathan, and the Kullu telling connects it with a serpent asura, Kulant, whom Shiva slew here, from whose name some derive Kullu.
02The climb
A road climbs from Kullu by Chansari to the foot of the ridge, and from there it is a steep walk of about 3 km through deodar forest to the open meadow on top. From the meadow you see the Kullu valley one way and the Parvati valley the other. Snow closes the path in winter; Shravan and the summer months bring the crowds.
About 22 km from Kullu by road to the base, then about 3 km on foot. Open roughly March to November.
