Trip costs, and thoughts

Jodhpur

Annapurna Circuit Trek

In total, we spent exactly seven months (to the day) in India and Nepal. Not too bad for a honeymoon, we like to brag to each other. We’ve since met a few recently married people who spoke loftily about having taken two weeks for their honeymoon, “because the typical one week just wouldn’t do, ya’know?” We know. So how did it feel to be living out of a carry-on size backpack for such a large amount of time? Absolutely wonderful. We loved the total freedom and independence of going anywhere we wanted, whenever we wanted, with no set itinerary other than a general desire to see certain places when they had decent weather.

Bakhtapur

South Asia really is a perfect backpacker-style travel destination, and not just because of the minimal costs. We saw such a variety of scenery and cultures that looking back it’s hard to believe we only visited two countries. From the Buddhist monasteries and high alpine scenery of Ladakh, to the Himalayas of Nepal, to deserts of Rajastan, and the tropical beaches of Goa and palm-lined waterways of Kerala, and so much in between, this part of the world has so much to offer. Wonderful ancient history and art are spread throughout the subcontinent, the culture is fascinating, and you really have to work to be bored in most places. Of course not everyone would enjoy the subcontinent; you have to be able to look beyond the dirt and frequent stench, the poverty, crowds, the hassles, and you’d better have a sense of patience and humor. But if you’re able to embrace the lifestyle here and not get hung up on the more difficult aspects, you’ll find a place that is absolutely exploding in color, music, tastes, and a wonderful enthusiasm for life. We miss it.

Varanasi

We know many of you are curious about how a young couple, without the types of careers (and salaries!) that would preclude dropping off the US map for seven months, could afford such a trip. Well, it’s quite simple: India and Nepal are cheap. Very cheap. We found that we could enjoy ourselves just fine on an average of about $30 USD a day (as a couple, so $15/day per person). Honestly that was without really worrying about the budget that much, at least by our dirtbag standards. That’s not to say India can’t be expensive; there are plenty of luxurious options for dining and hotels where the sky is the limit for costs, and trains that cost more than flying. We just happen to be happy eating in local style restaurants and sleeping in, uh, “atmospheric” hotels. Take the dirt cheap and not too bad sleeper class trains to get around, learn not to get ripped off too egregiously by the rickshaw drivers, and you’re set. There were plenty of days when we spent less than $10, and we probably could have averaged that if we’d really scrimped, plenty of people do. I just don’t think it would be very fun. We spent about $3400 on airfare, consisting of two sets of one-way tickets purchased through Kayak.com. Visas ended up costing about $400 ($100 per person for one year in India, and $100 p/p factoring in extensions for 90 total days in Nepal), and we spent about $600 for (unused, but you really need to have it) medical and evacuation insurance from Worldnomads.com. Immunizations were a few hundred bucks, but most last a long time and we wanted them for future trips also; I’m still factoring them into the total trip cost, which is: about $11,000. We made it a priority to save travel funds and lived very frugally (we were lucky in that we had parents who let us crash with them for that time rent free) for about five months while working a couple jobs each. We were able to save enough for the trip and some money to come home to without much difficulty, and we consider travel a better investment than a new car or plusher lifestyle.

Elephant top Safari in Chitwan, Nepal

Last time at Alta

I have certainly wondered many times if we’re being irresponsible by not starting our “real life.” This year will mark yet another that I’ll be putting off going to graduate school, and a great many people would snort upon reading my previous sentence equating “travel” with “investment.” But it’s hard to put a price tag on freedom and personal growth, and the opportunity to travel and see so much while spending so much time with someone you love. We’re really not interested in home ownership at this time; a mortgage sounds like a huge and unwelcome anchor, the investment value is uncertain, and the taxes and insurance alone would pay for a decent apartment in many parts of the world that we’d like to live in. We’re not interested in most material goods, so that leaves saving for retirement, but the financial events of the last year have convinced me that security in this age is an illusion, and there really is no “safe route.” Had we invested our money in the stock market we could easily have lost half of it, and not experienced a trip of a lifetime. There is no telling what the future will hold, so we’re planning for it as best we can while living life as fully as we can at the same time. We’ve spent the last five months saving up a nice sum of money working as servers out here in New York, and we’re spending this winter living in Alta, Utah, where we’ll ski everyday in some of the best snow in the world. After that, who knows, we’ve got some extended sea kayak journeys in mind, and South America is sounding pretty good.

Mumbai

Victoria Terminus

We entered Mumbai early in the morning through the Gothic architectural masterpiece that is the busiest train station in India, the Victoria Terminus. To understand the sheer size of the building try to imagine two million commuters filtering through each day. That’s half of the population of Oregon. Even though we were a little tired from the train ride we were exhilarated to finally be in Mumbai. It was a city that both of us had been excited to see since the beginning of our journey and we eventually found our way outside where we celebrated with a quick cup of chai.

We hailed a cab to the Colaba area of town and wandered

The Taj Hotel

around for quite a while searching for a budget hotel; a difficult task in one of India’s most expensive cities. Finally we stumbled upon a nondescript and somewhat strange but reasonably priced hotel called the Al-Hijaz. We would have been happy with any moderately clean room as long as we had a working ceiling fan- it was pretty hot. After a quick rest and a shower we walked through the throngs of people packed into the sidewalks of the Colaba Causeway. Every step we took there were new sights to see. Tourists and locals slowly weaving past one another in between store fronts and booths filled with wares from all over India. Not to mention the touts constantly offering us paid extra roles in Bollywood movies.

Gateway of India

We spent time at the Gateway of India, which in true Indian fashion was partially covered with scaffolding, and tried to avoid having our photo taken by people who would later try and sell us the photos. We could see huge ships off in the distance and the sea breeze was a nice respite from the heat and humidity. Even with the breeze we soon found ourselves ducking into Leopold’s Cafe for a couple of iced coffees. Sitting at the tables we were able to look around and see multiple bullet holes in the walls from the terrorist attacks that had happened five months previously on November 26^th, 2008. At least 173 people were killed when organized gunmen started shooting at people in southern Mumbai and setting off timed bombs then taking hostages in the prestigious Taj Hotel. It was especially strange for us to visit the Taj Hotel. Months ago we had watched news broadcasts showing the hotel on fire while people were held hostage inside for four days after a long closure the hotel was open when we were there and there was no sign of what had happened except for a nicely done memorial dedicated to all those who passed away on November 26^th.

We walked up past Oval Maidan, the University of Mumbai, into the Modern Art Museum, and past a lot of old British buildings. The streets in this part of town were different from those we had seen everywhere else in India, they were wide with large sidewalks under tall leafy trees. It was possible to actually walk down the sidewalks without being bumped or surrounded by people. Despite the grandeur of the buildings and the obvious wealth that flows through Mumbai there were still signs of the poverty that exists in India on every street corner. Mumbai is a city where the world’s fifth richest man Mukesh Ambani is building the world’s most expensive home; a twenty-seven story skyscraper complete with three heli-pads, a “cool room” with man made snow, 168 parking spaces, and will employ 600 servants when finished. Mumbai is also a city where the workers who are building Ambani’s skyscraper most likely live in one of the slums, where seven million other Mumabi residents live, and the average income is about $2 US per person.

Washing ghat

We got a chance to see behind the glitz of Mumabi when we went to the Dhobi ghat where most of the linens for Mumbai’s hotels are washed and beaten by hand, starched, and hung up to air dry before being delivered clean back to the hotel. It’s an impressively large operation and incredibly hard work for the wage these laundry men make.

One of the more amazing experiences we had while in

Haji Ali walkway

Mumbai was when we stopped by the Haji Ali mosque. The mosque was built in 1431 on an island and is reached by a five hundred yard walkway which gets covered up by the high tide and becomes walkable in the low tide. We went at low tide and it was fun to walk on the damp concrete past vendors with hundreds of Islamic worshipers. We weaved past people who were crippled and calling out prayers while worshipers gave them coins and made our way to the actual mosque. We were happily greeted and after watching people chanting and drumming for a while we made our way back to the mainland.

Chowpatty Beach

One evening we took a taxi to Chowpatty Beach which is far too polluted to swim at but has a really fun carnival atmosphere at night. One entrepreneur had a pink “power wheels” type vehicle that no longer worked but he had put a small boom box in the back and pushed around children for a few rupees. Every now and then he would turn off the radio and take a cigarette break. We sat in the sand and attracted a very large crowd of interested male youth who had a bunch of questions for us. After we started feeling a little claustrophobic we wandered over to the food vendors and I had my last- and possibly best- pista kulfi ( a delicious pistachio gelato-like thing). There were small Ferris wheels which are spun by having two or three carnival workers climb to the top one at a time and, holding onto the bars, used their body weight and gravity to keep the wheel spinning. We watched the sunset and headed back to Colaba.

The hustle and bustle of the Crawford Market was fun. There were stacks of all kinds of fruits and meat

Crawford Market

butchering areas, and Andy and I stocked up on spices and metal ware to take with us back to the States. Our time in India was coming to a close and we spent every spare moment walking up and down random streets and filling up on thalis, fresh ginger sodas, and delicious chicken tikka rolls.

Delicious chicken tikka rolls

There was a heavy Muslim presence in Mumbai which resulted in many wonderful meat dishes to sample- some of the best street food we had anywhere in India. Every morning when we’d stumble out of our hotel we’d grab a couple of juices from the stand on the street, and contemplate the fact that we were about to leave the country. The heat, the constant crowds and sensory overload, the colors, the food… all the things that had come to define India for us, that we’d grown accustomed to and fond of, all soon to be over with. Of course we weren’t going to miss everything; the hassles of India are plentiful, and we were definitely looking forward to returning to a place where we could blend into a crowd and not be constantly stared at and approached. All our time in Mumbai was filtered through this kind of bittersweet lens; swinging us from feelings of sadness to excitement depending on whether we were having a good or bad time at the moment, and taking the good with the bad is probably the single most definitive aspect of a trip to India.

Mumbai is one of the world’s largest cities with a population of around 19 million people in its metro area, so

Thalis and fresh ginger sodas

driving from Colaba in the south to the airport in the north of the city took a few hours. Our driver tried to overcharge us when we parted ways; a fitting farewell to India that made us smile. A fairly easy fifteen hour flight then took us to Newark, NJ, where our connecting flight was delayed several hours, causing us to miss our next connection in Atlanta. Eventually we landed in Portland, a tiring 48 hours after we’d stepped into the cab in Mumbai. We’d crossed more time zones than we were capable of remembering, so Andy purposefully kept his watch on Mumbai time so we’d know what time our bodies thought it was. Somewhere over Texas a seatmate had asked him what time it was; I watched him look at his watch, pause and consider some math and an explanation, and then just shook his head and say he didn’t know.

Goodbye India

Patnem

The far south of Goa’s coast has a reputation of being more laid back and undeveloped than the rest of the state’s beaches. It sounded good to us, so we caught a bus south from Panaji, headed for a place we’d been hearing about called Patnem beach. The minute we stepped off the bus something seemed different. Three different local shopkeepers saw us, smiled and said “welcome to Patnem!” Consider that the normal Indian shopkeeper’s sales pitch feels something like a body slam and you’ll know why we felt a little taken aback, and we suspected that an unusually smart chamber of commerce type thing was going on here. As we made our way down the short main street and walked onto the sand and looked around, we began to think that coming there had been a very good idea.

This was just outside our door

Patnem is a fairly small and curving stretch of beach, hemmed in on either side by headlands and forming a small exposed bay. Beach huts and restaurants sit back in the palm trees on shore completing the tropical paradise look, and I have to say the place is very nice. The water was perfect for swimming, the beach was just right for lazing, and in general conditions were perfect for complete relaxation. We found enough cheap and tasty restaurants to keep things interesting with both Indian and western food, and we ended up staying in a homey and clean plywood hut with it’s own bathroom, right off the beach for about $10 USD a night. There were a couple internet cafes and a barber up the street, and that’s about all we needed.

Patnem was…. perfect. That restless and bored feeling that occasionally overtook us in Arambol just never manifested in Patnem, and we were there for an entire month! During our stay the place was never crowded, ranging from moderately busy to just shy of eerily quiet. There was no techno music, and no weird hippy groupie scene. There were almost no roving trinket sellers on the beach to bug us, and even the shopkeepers stayed pretty mellow. For the way we were feeling at the time, the beach had that elusive balance between quiet, natural beauty and having plenty of places to get a good meal, and enough book exchanges to keep up our one or two book a day habit we soon found ourselves in.

Home sweet home

Our hut was painted light blue inside and out and had great light, and the place came complete with two huge and beautiful German Shepherds that hung out with us a lot. We positioned our little table and chairs outside the hut so that they weren’t directly under the coconuts that would occasionally fall with a scary sounding thud, and we learned to hug the eaves as we went in and out of our door to stay out of their trajectory.

A typical day went something like this: Wake up around 9 or 10am, and wander out to the ocean to take a little morning swim. Dry off in the shade with some coffee and oatmeal or fruit for breakfast (maybe $3 for both of us) at our hut hotel’s restaurant, while we read or play cards and discuss plans for today’s strenuous activities. Go for a walk/swim along the beach, maybe climbing over the headland to the adjacent beach where a five star hotel is set back in the palms, it’s guests paying hundreds of dollars a day. Suckers. It’s starting to heat up so maybe go read in the shade for a while at our hut, or hide in the AC for an hour at the internet cafe ($.75/hour) while we catch up on Google news and emails. Try to remember to wear sandals when we walk to our favorite lunch destination up the beach, the sand gets hot this time of day! Order that delicious hummus plate and salad, maybe a couple kingfisher beers (for a total of about $5), and read and relax for two or three hours in the cushioned floor seating area, running out for a few quick swims whenever we get hot. Take our books back to our hut and then go for another swim, doing some body-surfing if the waves are big enough. Play with Cookie and Cashew (the German Shepherds) for a while. Play some more cards. The sun is setting so it’s time to head to Papaya’s restaurant for their King’s beer (a good pilsner) happy hour, an incredible 12 rupees (less than a quarter) a beer between 4pm and 9pm, and either eat there or at one of our other favorite restaurants while we look for that elusive green flash sunset, never spending more than $10 and usually a lot less. Enjoy dinner and the cool nighttime temperatures with our toes in the sand, listening to the surf and watching the candles flickering up and down the beach. Go for another walk, then head back to the hut to read and a restful nights sleep under our mosquito net. Big plans for tomorrow, we need our rest.

Anyway, we averaged about $30 a day here in paradise, and man did the time ever fly by. We almost never left our little beach; one day we walked over the nearby and better-known Palolem beach, which was larger and much more crowded with tourists, and we immediately found ourselves wishing we were back at Patnem. We took a rickshaw a couple times to a nearby town to use the ATM, but never really had the impulse to explore; we were pretty spoiled in our little beach cocoon. Our most active days were when we rented the tandem kayak ($1/hour) from up the beach and paddled out through the surf to look for dolphins, which we always found. They would arc up past the surface of the water with a surprisingly loud puff of air, gracefully wowing us as they swam around. It was so cool to be out in the totally quiet kayak, rather than the stinky motorboats that took tourists out on expensive “dolphin cruises,” and we paddled a long ways up and down the coast on several occasions.

Before we knew it our time in Patnem, and Goa, was up. We were flying out of Mumbai in a week, and we had to get there to make sure we had enough time in that great city. I vividly remember walking toward the road and the bus stop as we left, and then deciding to have one more wade into the water. Standing there in that warm water with my backpack on, I wondered how we could actually leave our little paradise. I’m still wondering that as I write this now…

Panaji and Old Goa

We've since seen a travel show where the host sat exactly in this spot

Panaji is Goa’s capital. The town is small by Indian standards, with around 60,000 people, and it’s Portuguese heritage is evident from all the great European and Latin looking architecture as you wander around. The place is very walkable and atmospheric, there are tons of excellent restaurants, and it made for a nice place to spend a few days. With all its food and entertainment options we’d probably have stayed longer, if only it was on the beach! There’s a beach a few miles away, but being in a place like Goa but not right on the water, especially in the heat of March, was just too difficult for us.

Actually we were in Panaji with a purpose. Maybe you’ve heard of the rise in “medical tourism” over the last few years? Denae and I wanted to jump on that bandwagon. After not having been to the dentist in quite a while, we found a recommendation on an Indian travel forum online for a local dentist in Panaji and made an appointment.

First, though, I wanted to find a doctor to check out a minor but persistent lower left quadrant abdominal pain I’d been ignoring for the last few weeks. Our guidebook mentioned a public hospital just outside of town, so we took a cab there and proceeded to waste a couple hours wandering around trying to figure out where to check in. It was incredibly confusing, and keep in mind that India is at least a partially English speaking

cheap dentistry

country so it wasn’t just a language barrier issue. There were no signs, everything was maze-like, and I guess the people we kept asking for directions were just unusually bad at it. When we finally found the right place we were charged about 50 cents for some documents with my name and date of birth typed on them, and directed up to a crowded lobby. There were hundreds of people milling around waiting to see a doctor, and we were feeling pretty discouraged- this could easily be an eight hour wait. But after only a few minutes some officials hustled us to the front of the line and into the next room. In here were four doctors sitting at a long narrow table, and they would talk a few minutes to patients and then send them on their way. We figured this was some kind of initial check to see where to send patients next, but when it was my turn we found out differently. The doctor asked a few cursory questions, I briefly described my symptoms, and he wrote out a description for a couple medications and sent me on my way. That was it. He didn’t ask if I had any allergies, he didn’t examine me in any way, he barely even talked to me. When I said, wait, is it possible to get an ultrasound or something, he sighed and scribbled something out. Show this to the people downstairs, he said. They’ll probably fit you in in two or three weeks.

Wow. We bought the drugs from the pharmacy for about $1.50 before we left, but I decided not to take them. As we left we reflected on the fact that by comparison to the locals, who’d faced an eight hour wait for the same non-treatment, we’d just been treated like royalty. So if you’re planning on doing a little medical tourism of your own in India, plan on paying the still amazingly inexpensive (compared to the US) rates for a private hospital. The Indians who have to depend on the public hospitals for care have a difficult road to follow.

The next day we went to the dentist. Thankfully it seemed clean and modern, the dentist seemed competent although

Pepper

maybe a bit cursory, and we had a good experience. He gave us a cleaning and a clean bill of dental health, for about $10 each. He also gave us a recommendation for a local doctor, who I made an appointment with for the next day. I’ll spare you all the details, but over a couple days I ended up seeing a good doctor, getting an ultrasound and blood/urine/stool analysis all for about $30. Each test was in a different area of town and the logistics were more than a minor inconvenience, but everything seemed to be done well and it was cheap. The result? I had giardia and E. coli, both of which tend to produce much worse symptoms than the minor stomach pain I experienced. The treatment? Pretty much the same pills prescribed to me by the public hospital doctor. Draw your own conclusions.

While we were in Panaji we also took a day trip out to a nearby “spice plantation” called the Tropical Spice Farm, near the town of Ponda. There are several of these spice farms in the area, and they’re popular tourist attractions. We paid an entrance fee and took a guided tour around the grounds, where they had an impressive selection of spices growing, including pepper, cinnamon, cardamom, vanilla, ginger, beetle nut, and others. They also grew cashew nuts and fruits, which were pretty good and the source of Goa’s famous (and delicious!) cashew feni liquor. The tour was definitely a touristy experience, but fun, and it was cool to see all those spices in their original form. Included in our admission fee was a buffet style thali meal, and it was one of the best meals of our trip.

The Basilica of Bom Jesus in Old Goa

On the way back to Panaji we stopped in Old Goa, a former capital of Portuguese Goa. Now it mostly consists of some interesting old buildings and churches, and a couple so-so museums. The most famous building here is the Basilica of the Bom Jesus, a large ornate church built in the 1600′s. It houses the remains of St. Francis Xavier, who died back in the 1500′s. He was buried for two years before being exhumed to be moved back to his preferred resting place of Goa, when it was supposedly discovered that his body had not decayed in any way. It was/is considered a miracle, and to this day many people are attracted to this place because of him. His remains are displayed every ten years.

Arambol

Arambol's beach

After visiting the Ellora caves we didn’t stay long in Aurangabad. There was more we could have seen, but we were anxious to head to our long awaited next destination: the beaches of Goa! We’d been waiting a long time to get some beach time in, so we were pretty excited. Goa is a small state in India, unique in many ways compared to the rest of the country. It was actually a Portuguese colony until 1961, and it’s primarily Christian rather than Hindu or Muslim. Back in the 60′s and 70′s it was a major destination on the hippie trail, and over time much of the state’s coastline has developed into quite a mainstream tourist destination. Many of the various towns draw in a crowd of package tourists and travelers looking for the techno raves that the area is known for, although authorities have apparently been cracking down and the party scene is dying. Even though many (most?) Americans have never heard of the place, Goa is a well-known hotspot for Europeans, sort of like Cancun is for Americans. If you’ve seen the movie The Bourne Supremacy, Goa is also where Jason Bourne’s girlfriend was killed.

Anyway, we weren’t interested in going to any packaged tourism spots or techno parties, so we headed to Arambol in the far north of Goa, which are guidebook said was a laid-back place with an enduring hippie vibe. It sounded good, so from Aurangabad we caught a night sleeper bus to Mapusa, Goa, and from there took an absurdly crowded local bus on to Arambol. That local bus reminded us of a contradiction of physics that often occurs in India, in which spaces are filled to capacity- and then far beyond. We were standing in the aisle with so many other people that it seemed impossible to pick up anyone else, yet the bus kept stopping and people just kept shoving their way in, until nobody could move at all. It’s no exaggeration to say that without seeing it him or herself, anyone in the US would not believe how many people can crowd onto an Indian bus.

We never did see a green flash, but we kept looking for one every evening

Looking out the windows we kept seeing white skinned tourists zipping around on motorcycles and scooters, and tourists walking along the road. A lot of them were pretty skimpily clothed, and it felt strange to see all this fair skin and be back in a place that was touristy enough for women to walk around in a bikini top and not be mobbed by local men. Eventually the bus driver yelled that we’d reached our destination, and we elbowed our way off the bus. We asked directions toward the beach, and after a short walk down another road we found ourselves on the main street of Arambol. It was a fairly long road packed on both sides with restaurants and shops, most of them selling clothing. Lots of tourists were walking around, and there were a lot of dreadlocks and people dressed in hippy backpacker clothes. We still hadn’t made it to the beach, and all of the motorcycles and crowds were starting to get to us, so as soon as we could we took a turn off and walked straight down to the ocean.

Standing ankle deep in the warm water, with our backpacks still on, we both breathed a sigh of relief. We’d made it. After almost six months of sometimes chaotic and stressful traveling around India and Nepal, we felt that we’d earned some lazy beach time. It doesn’t tend to be too culturally meaningful, but doing nothing on a beautiful warm beach for a while can be absolutely wonderful. We’d given ourselves over a month in Goa to soak in the sun and relaxation, and give ourselves a break from long journeys and hard traveling. First, though, we had to find a place to stay. We checked out a variety of charming looking thatch huts at the edge of the beach, but they all seemed a little too expensive (most of you reading this would probably still consider them dirt cheap; it’s all relative) so after a while we went inland a bit and found a decent and inexpensive hotel room. On the beach it’s also nice to have a concrete structure with barred windows and a secure door, because we wouldn’t be carrying our passports and money belts with us while we were swimming.

Not a bad place to be a cow

Arambol’s beach was wide and long enough that when we hiked south for an hour and a half one day we turned around because the sun was frying our skin, not because we’d reached the end. There were lots of beach hut restaurants where we could grab a meal and a kingfisher, and at the north end of the beach was a headland with lots of permanent buildings containing hotels and some excellent and cheap eateries. We ate really well in Arambol, and there was a good mix of Indian, western and other Asian fare to choose from, so we were never bored with our options. There was even one restaurant that served good Mexican food (tex-mex really, but we like that too), the only decent Mexican food we found on this trip in fact. Lots of tourists were around but it usually didn’t feel overly crowded, and we could always find some relative solitude if we looked for it.

We spent our time swimming in the nice warm water, strolling or laying on the beach, reading, and hanging out in restaurants. Most evenings we’d catch a movie being shown for free with our dinner. We kept saying maybe the next day we’d rent a scooter and go explore the area, but just never got around to it. After a few days we moved to a beach hut accommodation that was better located near the sand and restaurants we liked. In general it was really nice to kick back and unwind. That might sound funny to some readers, who are probably thinking about the fact that we hadn’t had a job for six months at this point, but this was a vacation, and while budget backpacking is almost always fun in some way or another, it definitely doesn’t always feel like a vacation.

So in general we liked Arambol and had fun there, but not everything about the place was endearing to us. For one thing there was a lot of techno music, and we’re not fans. I mentioned earlier that Goa is kind of known for techno, but we’d expected more of a laid back Bob Marley type soundtrack at a place known as a hippy hangout. At night there would usually be a loud techno rave-type party somewhere on the beach with a hundred or so travelers dancing druggily to the beat. Not our scene. And the whole “hippy vibe” thing ended up being a bit of a turn off for us, because it mostly seemed to consist of a bunch of travelers wearing variations of the same pirate clothing that was for sale at every shop along the road. It felt contrived to me.  And it was pretty crowded at times.  In general the place didn’t quite suit us perfectly, and in the middle of most days while we were there we’d find ourselves feeling kind of antsy and bored, but only for an hour or so. Anyway, after eight days we decided to move on.

If you happen to be a Chaco sandal rep, yes we will sell you this photo

Ajanta and Ellora caves

Ajanta

From Ahmedabad we took an eight hour or so night train headed east to the hub town of Jalgaon, and upon arrival immediately made our way to the bus station to catch a ride to the famous Ajanta caves about two hours away. The bus drivers know where to drop you- basically a wide spot on the highway- and from there you just walk through the parking area into a kind of tourist mall filled with vendors and food shacks. There weren’t many tourists around when we were there so all the vendors were pretty desperate for business and we felt like we were running some kind of gauntlet making our way through. We bought our tickets for the transport bus that takes visitors the few miles further to the cave area entrance, checked our backpacks, and suddenly found ourselves walking up the long flight of stairs to the Ajanta Caves.

A typical interior

Beautiful carvings

We were pretty exited, as we’d been hearing rave reviews from other travelers about these caves for months, and we weren’t disappointed. Ajanta is a complex of 29 separate caves cut into the cliffs of a curving river gorge. Walking up and seeing the first dramatic views of the area was an incredible experience, which only got better as we explored inside the various caves. The oldest ones date from the second century BC, and are primarily of Buddhist origin. Some of the caves have beautiful original artwork and murals that are still in remarkable condition, and almost all of the caves are filled with amazing sculpture and architecture. There was restoration and preservation work happening in various places, and many of the caves had surprisingly good low level unobtrusive lighting that allowed us to see just well enough inside the otherwise dark interiors. All in all an amazing place that is well worth seeing.

After several hours of exploring we headed back to the entrance, grabbed our backpacks, and made it back to the highway where we flagged down a bus to take us the few hours further down the road to Aurangabad. Our guidebook had a list of what sounded like semi-interesting historical sights for us to visit here, but the only one we had the energy to visit was the Bibi Ka Maqbara, more often referred to as the “poor man’s Taj Mahal.” As you can see from the picture, the nickname describes it rather well.

The poor man's Taj, a little run down but still pretty cool

Inside the Kailash temple complex

We’d come to Aurangabad to use it as a base to visit the Ellora Caves, about 20 miles outside of town. They were built between the fifth and tenth century, and in our opinion these caves were even more incredible than Ajanta. Ellora is a group of 34 caves and excavated structures, the highlight of which was Kailasanatha Temple- for us this astounding temple ranks right up there with the Taj Mahal. It’s a huge, multi-story building designed to resemble Mount Kailash, intricately designed and executed. It’s twice the size of the Parthenon in Greece, but its most amazing aspect is that this structure was actually carved out of a single piece of rock. That’s right, this is the largest monolithic structure in the world; the builders removed 200,000 tons of rock from the sloping cliff face over a period of 100 years, leaving a freestanding temple surrounded by a large courtyard and intricate caves. We wandered around here for hours, feeling absolutely awestruck.

Kailash temple from the front

Kailash Temple from above

I just can't stop uploading photos of that darn Kailash temple...

The rest of Ellora was almost equally as amazing. There are Buddhist, Hindu and Jain sections all built in different eras,

and the scale and craftsmanship of some of the structures is mind-boggling. In general, Ajanta and especially Ellora were true highlights of our time in India. They’re a little out of the way and hard to get to, but anyone in India who has the time should make sure and see them.

Hey, what's making that squeaking sound?

good times...

Ahmedabad

After a few days in Udaipur we parted ways with Mark and Allison, who caught a flight to Mumbai and then out of India. We stuck around for a while and then boarded a train for Ahmedabad. It’s a very large city, pretty far off the tourist trail, with a high percentage of Muslim residents that lends it a different feeling compared to most other places we’ve been in India. We only spent a couple days here, but enjoyed spending time in a place where tourism doesn’t feel like a major factor. The food was great, the wandering interesting, and we especially liked our visit to Gandhi’s Sabarmati Ashram.

Our train arrived in Ahmedabad at about 4am, so we knew finding a hotel was going to be a bit of an issue. Our auto-rickshaw driver made it even more challenging when he proved to be determined to try and “help” us find a hotel so he could get a commission for taking us there; a commission that we would pay in the form of higher room rates. We asked him to drop us off at a theater as a neutral starting point, and had to repeatedly yell at him to not take us to the hotel he had in mind. Then when we got out the driver parked and tried to follow us on foot to whatever hotel we’d end up finding. He was persistent, even sticking around outside when we sat in a restaurant for an hour to kill time. In the end I had to really confront the guy to get him to leave us alone. That kind of thing happens all the time in India though, and by now we were used to it. Eventually we found an open hotel with a reasonably priced room (after waking up four guys sleeping in another hotel’s lobby, and then leaving them pretty irritated when the room was too expensive and we walked out) and had ourselves a nice nap.

Walking around the city was fun and exhausting. It was hot and very busy with tons of traffic and people walking

Gandhi's simple ashram

everywhere, and there were lots of interesting shops and restaurants to check out. We ate some good street food from some of the many carts around town, and found an Afghani restaurant that had curries and paneer so delicious that we went back twice. The portions were big and we wrapped up our leftovers and gave them to a man begging on the street; his extreme gratitude was humbling. So many experiences in India make us realize how lucky we are to be from a place and situation where we can save up enough money in several months to be so wealthy compared to so many people here. Even in they don’t realize it, Americans and folks from other first world nations are incredibly privileged. Later that evening we went to a night market where there were lots of neat textiles and clothing for sale, and we ate some more great street food. We also enjoyed some kulfi, one of our favorite Indian desserts. It’s a frozen milk treat similar to ice cream, but denser, and it comes in flavors like pistachio and cardamom that are not often seen in the US.

The highlight of our stay in Ahmedabad was Sabarmati Ashram, which was founded by Gandhi in 1917. Many of the tourists who come to Ahmedabad are drawn almost solely by this place, where Gandhi lived for many years and worked towards Indian independence. Now the place is a museum commemorating this amazing man, and it was a powerful experience to see exhibits and artifacts from his life.

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Udaipur

View from our hotel

Our last stop in the state of Rajastan was Udaipur, home of the famous Lake Palace Hotel and reputed to be a great place to relax for a while. It’s under-served by trains so we booked a sleeper bus to get there from Jodhpur, a fairly

A local musician selling copies of his CD. We bought one.

comfortable way to travel and vastly worth the few extra rupees over a local style bus. A lot of the travelers we’d met previously during our trip had raved about Udaipur, with it’s comparatively mellow atmosphere and beautiful architecture, set around a picturesque lake with scenic hills in the background. Most of the buildings are painted white, and the blue of the lake is found all around as an accent color. The lake level varies a lot according to how much rain has fallen, and apparently the partially full level that we were treated to was pretty good; it has been completely dried out in the past. We found a nice hotel near the lake for about 500 rupees ($10 usd), and sat at the rooftop restaurant (every place has a rooftop restaurant, and we love them!) and drank in the views, and Kingfisher beers.

Udaipur is very scenic. Of course there is the famous lake, in the middle of which is the Lake Palace Hotel, exclusive destination of the rich and famous. All we can say is it looks pretty

The City Palace

from the outside, because only guests and diners are allowed in, and its way to expensive for us. The place is built on and completely covers a natural island in the lake, making it look like its floating. It really is gorgous and no one can help but take way too many photos. There is a second island on the lake, also housing a luxury hotel, but this one allows tourists to take a look around for a few minutes during a boat tour of the lake. We took the tour and tromped around the pretty and well-manicured grounds. The place seemed nice, expensive, empty and kind of soulless, but had great views. The ride around the lake was great fun and well worth the inflated price. In addition to the lake, Udaipur is filled with neat old buildings, some of them well maintained and others charmingly crumbling. Many of those buildings are former Havelis, private mansions of the former aristocracy, most of which now are used as hotels, restaurants and shops. Udaipur also has a very famous and well preserved City Palace, a huge series of connected buildings, the oldest of which were built in the 1500′s. The complex is really giant; we spent hours exploring it’s excellent museum and only saw a small portion of the palace.

The Lake Palace Hotel, forever immortalized when James Bond swam up to it in a crocodile suit

The main tourist area was filled with the typical array of shops and services, and a less typical selection of surprisingly upscale retailers; Udaipur obviously draws in a more affluent crowd than average. There were quite a few tourists

Denae, Allison and Mark, taking it all in. Looking at this picture makes me wish we were back there now!

around, but like most of the places we’d been on our trip it was apparent that tourism was way down and the shopkeepers were hurting for customers. Denae, Mark and Allison all did their best to support the local economy by loading up on Rajastani goods like patchwork cloth hangings, handicrafts, clothing and shoes, while I sat outside the stores and tried not to look bored. Actually I picked up a couple of really cool camel leather journals with handmade paper, so I can’t complain.

Udaipur was Mark and Allison’s last stop before their flight to Mumbai and out of India, so we spent a lot of time hanging out with them. We went to a bunch of restaurants, none of them anything all that special in terms of food, but most of them had great views. Our most memorable dining experience was the evening we participated in what has become one of the most classic Udaipur experiences: watching Octopussy on a rooftop. Octopussy, of course, is the 1983 James Bond film starring Roger Moore, and a good portion of the movie is set right in Udaipur. Around 7:00 pm every night half the restaurants in town have a free showing of the movie to try and lure in diners. Eating on a rooftop, drinking Kingfishers, looking out at the lights of town and the floating palace, watching Roger Moore swim through the lake and run around the city we were currently exploring, while simultaneously hearing the same soundtrack from a slightly earlier or later portion of the movie from the adjacent restaurants, was a surreal, cheesy, and wonderfully enjoyable experience.

The Lake Palace Hotel at night, taken from our hotel's roof

Some of our best times in Udaipur were spent in the evenings wandering around town, half lost and randomly choosing which way to go, sampling street food and juice stalls. We found a cool Hindu temple where the locals seemed very

Hooray for street food! I think Mark and I may have made this guy nervous with how excited we were to see all those fresh potato chips.

happy to show us how to do the offerings and prayers, and in general everyone seemed very friendly. Denae and Allison had a great experience at another temple that they wandered into, where they found an all-female group of worshipers chanting and praying. At some point I gave up and along with a haircut trimmed the Abraham Lincoln beard that I’d been cultivating. All in all we enjoyed Udaipur quite a bit. It is definitely a touristy place and can feel a bit contrived and commercial sometimes, but like most touristy places all you have to do is get off the main drag and you’ll find plenty of locals going about their day to day business, and they’ll probably be happy to talk with you.

Jodhpur

Where’s Jodhpur?  Click Here

The blue city

Keeping with the colored city themes of Rajastan, Jodhpur is known as the blue city. Blue is the color of the Brahmin caste (the highest of the four Hindu castes) and Brahmins would distinguish themselves by painting their houses blue. Eventually non-Brahmins also painted their houses blue believing that the color kept away mosquitoes. The color of Jodhpur is much more striking than the small area of pink buildings in Jaipur or the warm golden glow of the sandstone in Jaiselmer, and the different bright blues make for a gorgeous background for everyday activities.

The old town can be a little nerve-wracking to walk around in due to the

The market around Jodhpur's clocktower

very skinny streets and buzzing traffic trying to fit through them but after picking our way through gutters and over trash we eventually made our way to the clock tower where we treated ourselves to refreshing Makhania lassis. We spent the next few hours walking around the area surrounding the clock tower through the bustling market place admiring handmade rat traps (like miniature raccoon traps at home), smelling spices, and wondering how so many eggs could be stacked on one another at the omelet kiosk.

The following day we made our

Inside the fort

way over to the Mehrangarh Fort which could be seen towering high above the city from our hotel. If the best palace we’ve seen in India is in Mysore, then the best fort we’ve seen in India is in Jodhpur. The fort is located at the top of 400 foot cliff and surrounded by walls which when combined with the huge spikes protruding from the gates and the narrow entry way made it very difficult for enemies to penetrate. Not to sound like a nerd, but the audio tour for the fort was very interesting and informative. It was fun to get a comprehensive history of the place while looking through its rooms and artifacts. One of the stories told of how when the site for the Mehrangarh Fort was chosen the hermit who lived on the hill was kicked out of his home by Rao Jodha, the ruler at the time. The hermit was naturally pretty mad and he put a curse upon the fort to ‘suffer a scarcity of water’. Rao Jodha was worried about the curse and decided that to counteract it a human sacrifice was needed and a local man volunteered to be buried alive in the foundation. The audio guide never did fill us in on whether or not the human sacrifice worked.

Our time in Jodhpur flew by and before long we were on a sleeper bus to Udaipur.

A cannon on thte fort wall.