Real Aromatherapy in the Indian Hills

Aromatic plants in their natural state in certain Western Himalayan sectors generally under the Uttarakhand Himalaya are so prolific and so intensely secretory in places within this area, that visitors and residents equally have been profoundly affected by the scented air.

Occasionally workers have experienced intense feelings as these odours work their magic by triggering physiological responses on which aromatherapy is based. For many, the odour memories and experiences when trekking in this countryside, together with the picturesque scenery, the tiring physical but exhilarating aspects of journeying, has become part of the lasting major impression of their trips.

This is the surely truest form of aromatherapy, where the purest essences of flowers filling the breezes, have so many traveler’s testimonies to their ability to profoundly affect experiences. Nor is this experience unique to Himalayan traveler’s – I have noted more than once how intense is the sweet coumarinic odour of fields of native clover Trifolium pratense when I am in the exhilaratingly clean air of Scotland, or yet again how it is possible to drown in the sweet floral odour of flowering limes trees Tilia cordata which will even dominate the traffic fumes in the streets of Cambridge UK!

Unfortunately the natural flower and leaf scents are not always available “on tap” in the wrong seasons, or for more remote city dwellers, and so we have to resort to ways of capturing their essences and bottling them for convenience. In spite of technological advances, no processes can ever mimic the perfection and balance of nature, and our essential oils, absolutes and extracts are always a pale shadow of the original (as well as being full of artifacts). Even cut flowers may start to unnatural fragrance components, such as bitter or green notes, when detached from their natural nutrient supply.

So! Value the moments of experiencing real fragrances – these can be the ultimate sensory moments of human perception

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