One wall of mountains. Two kinds of weather.

Drag the cloud from the Kangra valley to Spiti. Watch how much rain it still has left. Every number comes from the India Meteorological Department or a source named below.

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Reading here

2,905mm a year

Dharamshala

IMD observatory · normal for 1951–2000 · checked 16 Oct 2026

What is left in the cloud

100% of Dharamshala's yearly rain.

You are 11 km along the line, about 1,350 m up.

Rain: IMD / UNESCO, readings above. Height: AWS Terrain Tiles (Mapzen). Our interpolation · checked 16 Oct 2026.

How the year falls here · each bar is a month

Monsoon (Jun–Sep)Winter (Dec–Mar)

80% falls in Jun–Sep. 13% falls in Dec–Mar.

Cloud fullness is each reading as a share of Dharamshala's. Between readings it is eased, not measured. Heights are exaggerated and peaks look lower than the real summits (about 250 m terrain cells).

How the year falls

Same state, different calendars. Dharamshala is a monsoon place. At Keylong in Lahaul and Kalpa in Kinnaur, winter brings nearly twice as much as the monsoon.

Dharamshala

2,905.1mm a year

IMD, Table V(a) · 1951–2000 normals · checked 16 Oct 2026

Palampur

2,696.1mm a year

IMD, Table V(a) · 1951–2000 normals · checked 16 Oct 2026

Kothi

2,225.3mm a year

IMD, Table V(a) · 1951–2000 normals · checked 16 Oct 2026

Manali

1,431.0mm a year

IMD, Table V(a) · 1951–2000 normals · checked 16 Oct 2026

Koksar

1,281.9mm a year

IMD, Table V(a) · 1951–2000 normals · checked 16 Oct 2026

Gondla

990.9mm a year

IMD, Table V(a) · 1951–2000 normals · checked 16 Oct 2026

Keylong

740.4mm a year

IMD, Table V(a) · 1951–2000 normals · checked 16 Oct 2026

Kalpa

670.3mm a year

IMD, Table V(a) · 1951–2000 normals · checked 16 Oct 2026

Sources

Checked 16 Oct 2026.

Place	Yearly mm	Period	Source	Note
Dharamshala (observatory)	2,905.1	1951–2000	IMD Climate of Himachal Pradesh (2010), Table V(a)	A second IMD entry, Dharamshala (Lower), reads 3,722.5 mm
Palampur	2,696.1	1951–2000	IMD Climate of Himachal Pradesh (2010), Table V(a)
Kothi (observatory)	2,225.3	1951–2000	IMD Climate of Himachal Pradesh (2010), Table V(a)	Location to confirm
Manali (observatory)	1,431.0	1951–2000	IMD Climate of Himachal Pradesh (2010), Table V(a)	Newer IMD table (1991–2020) reads 1,239 mm; to confirm at IMD
Koksar (observatory)	1,281.9	1951–2000	IMD Climate of Himachal Pradesh (2010), Table V(a)	Location to confirm
Gondla (observatory)	990.9	1951–2000	IMD Climate of Himachal Pradesh (2010), Table V(a)	Location to confirm
Keylong (observatory)	740.4	1951–2000	IMD Climate of Himachal Pradesh (2010), Table V(a)	A second entry, Keylong, reads 606.8 mm. IMD places the observatory in Lahaul and Spiti
Kalpa (observatory)	670.3	1951–2000	IMD Climate of Himachal Pradesh (2010), Table V(a)
Spiti valley, average	about 170	Not stated	Government of India, UNESCO Tentative List no. 6055 (footnote); also Kapadia (1999)	Valley average, not a station reading. Other sources say "below 200 mm"

What we could not confirm: a rain reading for Kaza itself (the 170 mm is a valley average and its period is not stated); the newer IMD normals for 1991–2020, which we have only second-hand; where the Kothi, Koksar and Gondla observatories stand.

Terrain: AWS Terrain Tiles (Mapzen), built from open elevation data including SRTM and GMTED2010, sampled along 32.22°N from 76.20°E to 78.25°E. We spot-checked it against published heights at three places: Rohtang Pass 3,984 m (published 3,978), Kunzum Pass 4,544 m (4,551) and Kaza 3,642 m (3,650).

Sources: India Meteorological Department, Climate of Himachal Pradesh, Climatological Summaries of States Series No. 15 (Jan 2010), Table V(a); Government of India, UNESCO World Heritage Tentative List no. 6055 (Spiti valley, footnote); Kapadia (1999), Spiti: Adventures in the Trans-Himalaya; Wikipedia infoboxes for station positions. Checked 16 Oct 2026.