Himachal Pradesh has a great tourist value. We have to know details about it before our trip or journey started. It is a state of Indian hill area. The northern part of India is covered from East to West by the great Himalayans. Himachal Pradesh is placed in the western Himalayas and it covers a region of 55,673 square kilometers with altitude variety from about 350 meters to 7,000 meters above the mean sea level.

(Himachal Pradesh Subdivisions map)

Himachal Pradesh is lying between North latitude 30°22'40" to 33°12'40" North latitude and 75°45'55" to 79°04'20" East longitude. The adjoining states of Himachal Pradesh are Jammu & Kashmir on North, Punjab on West and South-West, Haryana on South, Uttar Pradesh on South-East and the China is the only east neighboring country of it.

Himachal Pradesh is built with 12 separate districts. They are Shimla, Kangra, Hamirpur, Mandi, Bilaspur, Una, Chamba, Lahul and Spiti, Sirmaur, Kullu, Solan and Kinnaur. Among them Shimla district is the capital of Himachal Pradesh. The administrative of a district is controlled by a Deputy Commissioner or a District Magistrate who is an officer belonging to the Indian Administrative Service. Each district is subdivided into several Sub-Divisions which are controlled by sub-divisional magistrate. Every subdivision is built with a number of Blocks and a block is built by several panchayats and municipalities.

Districts (12)	Area (sq km)	Head quarter	Population
Bilaspur	1,167 sq km	Bilaspur	382,056
Chamba	6,528 sq km	Chamba	518,844
Hamirpur	1,118 sq km	Hamirpur	454,293
Kangra	5,739 sq km	Dharamsala	1,507,223
Kinnaur	6,401 sq km	Reckong Peo	84,298
Kullu	5,503 sq km	Kullu	437,474
Lahaul & Spiti	13,835 sq km	Keylong	31,528
Mandi	3,950 sq km	Mandi	999,518
Shimla	5,131 sq km	Shimla	813,384
Sirmaur	2,825 sq km	Nahan	530,164
Solan	1,936 sq km	Solan	576,670
Una	1,540 sq km	Una	521,057

The complex variations of height have made the climate of the land a unique characteristic. You will be find different temperatures in different districts of Himachal Pradesh. The weather of Himachal mainly depends on the geographical height from the mean sea level. We know, the decrease rate of temperature is proportional to the increase rate of height.

The average temperature of Himachal Pradesh is 28°C in summer (from April to the end of June) and 7°C in winter (from late November till middle of March). But, there have some region, with a height above 7,218 ft, always covered with snow and the temperature of those areas are stayed always bellow degree centigrade. Basically this zones are in the Higher and Trans-Himalayan region. There are three main seasons noticed and they are winter, summer and rainy season. The rainy season of the state has come after the summer season from July to September. But, some northern districts (Lahaul and Spiti) of the state are almost rainless and cold throughout the year. Other hand, the Dharamsala district has receive very heavy rainfall.

The rivers of Himachal Pradesh mainly had created the glaciers of Himalayans Mountains. Those mountains provide water not only smalls rivers of Himachal but also two great rivers of India, Indus River Ganges basins. The important rivers of Himachal Pradesh are the Chandra Bhaga River, the Ravi, the Beas, the Sutlej and the Yamuna River. These rivers are perennial and are fed by snow and rainfall of that region.

Himachal Pradesh largely covered with forest. The forest of the state is divides in six types, namely they are Moist Tropical Forests, Dry Tropical Forests, Montane Sub-Tropical Forests, Montane Temperate Forests, Sub-Alpine Forests and Alpine Scrub forest. 21,325 Sq. Km. of the state is covered (about 38.3 % of the total area of the state) with forest. The southern part or the lower most parts of the state are covered with tropical and subtropical dry broadleaf forests and tropical and subtropical moist broadleaf forests. Mainly Sal and Shisham trees are found here. In the middle parts of the state are covered with mosaic broadleaf forests and subtropical pine forests. Mainly Oaks, Deodar, and Blue pine trees are found here. The upper most parts of the state are covered with Himalayan alpine plant. The rhododendron trees can be seen along the hillsides around Shimla. Himachal Pradesh has a great value for producing various sweetest fruits. It supplies orchards and apple throughout the nation.

In the state, Himachal have near about 1200 birds and 359 types of animal. They are the Leopard, Snow leopard, musk deer, ghoral and the Western Tragopan. There have 12 major national parks and sanctuaries. The Great Himalayan National Park is in the Kullu district which was built to save the flora and fauna of the Himachal Himalayan range and the Pin Valley National Park was built to save the flora and fauna of the cold parts of the state.

Economically Himachal Pradesh is most important state of the country. The main sources of the state income are highly dependent on agriculture, tourism & hotel and hydroelectric power plants. According to the survey of 2011, the state has placed fourth ranks in respect of per capita income among the other states of India. The people of the state near about 45% are directly connected to Agriculture as their main source of income. The main cultivated crops of the state are rice, wheat, maize and barley.

You will found a number of small industries in Himachal Pradesh. These companies are famous for their unique handicrafts. The district Kullu is well-known for its Pashmina shawls with top designs and vibrant colors and the district Kangra and Dharamshala are well-known for it's Kangra paintings. All productions of their unique handicrafts are woolen and Pashmina shawls, carpets, silver and metal ware, embroidered Chappals, Kangra and Gompa style paintings, horse-hair bangles, wooden and metal made goods and many more. There have hydro electric resources which provide 25% of total electricity of India. So, these hydro electric plants have a great value in India. It provides near about 20,300MW of hydro electric power in the State by some mini or micro hydel projects on the five river basins.