You take the narrow road branching off Naggar. There are no signboards or cafés en route, but also none of the summer traffic that bogs down Manali just over 20km away. You move past terraced fields and into groves of ancient oak, revered and carefully tended for centuries, and the kathkuni homes marking hairpin bends. By the time a four-storey wooden house rises from the hillside, you already know that this is not going to be your usual mountain getaway.