Phek Hot Springs

Phek Hot Springs rise in the territory of the Chakhesang Naga people, whose district in eastern Nagaland is distinguished by the extraordinary Dzukou Valley — a high-altitude seasonal garden between Nagaland and Manipur where the valley floor carpets itself in lily blossoms each monsoon season, drawing trekkers from across northeastern India and beyond to witness a floral display of such unexpected abundance in such remote highland terrain that the valley has achieved near-legendary status among Indian mountain trekkers. The Chakhesang people maintain their own distinct Thüsü Rüsü festival tradition and textile weaving practices that use the shawl as a social communicator — different patterns indicating age, gender, marital status, and social standing — in a textile language as sophisticated as any in the anthropological literature on northeast Indian material culture. The bicarbonate thermal springs provide mineral bathing within a long thermal tradition in a highland district where the combination of extraordinary seasonal floral landscapes, living tribal culture, and the thermal warmth rising from the earth's depth offers an experience of Nagaland's northeastern highlands at their most ecologically and culturally distinctive.