Mud (village)

Mud (also known as Mudh and Muth) is a small village in the cold desert region of Spiti in Himachal Pradesh, India. Located at an altitude of 3,810 m (12,500 ft) on the left bank of the Pin River, a right bank tributary of the Spiti River, the village is nestled at the base of the Parbati range that towers almost vertically 1,600 m (5,200 ft) above. Mud is near the boundary of the Pin Valley National Park and is a convenient base for treks in the park, and to the neighbouring districts of Kullu and Kinnaur. It is the last village on the Spiti side of the Pin Parbati trek to Kullu and the Pin Bhaba trek to Kinnaur.

Mud became famous among geologists in the 1860s when the Moravian geologist Ferdinand Stoliczka discovered a major geological formation in the Himalayas that he named the Muth Succession, after Mud. This spurred many geologists to do fieldwork in the Pin Valley. The Muth Formation, as it is now known, has a thickness of 258–300 m (846–984 ft). Consisting of white quartz arenite, it is resistant to weathering and readily visible.