^{The first time I went up to Jilling, I was a 5-year-old following my parents along the two-kilometre uphill path—cobbled stones, loose soil, the smell of pine and damp chestnut leaves underfoot. Jilling sits in the foothills of the Himalayas and can only be reached this way, through a forest of oaks, pines, chestnuts, and rhododendrons that seem to change colour every time you return. At the top lives Steve Lall, a former Indian Air Force fighter pilot who had served in the ’65 and ’71 wars and had, after retiring, chosen to stay here and protect the 145 acres of forest around him.}






When he returned to Kumaon in the ’70s, he found the land already in trouble; builders cutting through slopes, small fires started by travellers, locals collecting wood because it was the only fuel they had. With limited savings, Steve and his wife, Parvati, tried farming and selling fruit to get by. Hosting a few guests eventually became the only sustainable way to keep the place running without turning it into the kind of tourism that overwhelms a mountain.












Life for the Lalls has meant dealing with whatever the forest throws at them: fires that move quickly in dry weather, poachers skirting the ridgelines, wood thieves who appear after dark. Steve planted orchards and crops on patches of eroded soil, and over time, these brought back insects, birds, and native plants that had almost disappeared. None of this was dramatic; it was slow work. People in the neighbouring villages began noticing these changes. Some shifted to using natural fertilisers, others helped guard the slopes during fire season, and a few families started small forms of eco-tourism that didn’t damage the forest. It was something that grew out of habit, necessity, and watching the Lalls stay committed to a place many others had walked away from.















Today, modern development pushes steadily up the foothills - roads, resorts, new plans promising easier access, but Jilling continues to hold together through the same quiet routines: clearing pine needles before summer, checking water lines after storms, repairing the path each time the monsoon washes part of it out. Steve and the community around him remain focused on the same thing they have been for decades, keeping the balance of this landscape intact, even as everything around it keeps changing. Now the responsibility is shared within the family, with their two children stepping into the same long, uneven work of keeping Jilling intact.