Travel Wallahs

Sri Lanka - an easy cruise

2010-05-03T15:25:00.026+05:30

After almost 10 months in India and Bangladesh we boarded a plane and made our way to the tropical isle of Sri Lanka. After the huge Indian subcontinent, travelling around an island about the size of one Indian state was an easy cruise.

We headed straight to the beach at Negombo from the airport rather than into the steamy capital of Colombo. Negombo was nice - although the beach was a bit India-style dirty - and we relaxed there for just a few days before heading into the hills, away from the pre-monsoon heat.

Our first stop off the super-cheap, rickety buses was Kandy, a tea-producing, hill station town nestled in a forested valley around a lake. There we stayed in a beautiful old colonial-style house filled with antique furniture and artworks, clusters of family photographs spanning the generations down to our host's great-grandchildren and odd knick-knacks including huge elephant tusks on either side of throne-like chairs, fit for a King. His grandfather was the nominated representative of the Sri Lankan people at the coronation of Edward VII and he had loads of interesting tales that he proudly shared over the lovely cups of tea we enjoyed on the porch overlooking the pretty garden.

The view from the hills surrounding Kandy

During a few chilled out days in Kandy we visited the very holy Temple of the Sacred Tooth Relic which purportedly houses one of Buddha's teeth that was rescued from his funeral pyre. Unfortunately, you don't get to see the actual tooth so it was really just another temple visit, not very much different from the many others we'd seen before.

Although it is just a 20 kilometers across the sea from India, Sri Lanka is a very different country. 70% of Sri Lankans are Buddhist (Sinhalese) and just 15% are Hindu (Tamil). These two groups fought a vicious war for 25 years where both Buddhists and Hindus committed horrific atrocities. The Hindu Tamil Tigers have the claim to shame of inventing suicide bombing while the Buddhist government brutally persecuted the minority Tamils. If you believe Buddhism to be some sort of unique, peaceful religion, you'd be sad to know that in Sri Lanka militant Buddhist monks wield significant power and, during the war, actively encouraged a military solution to the conflict. One can see AK47 symbols on Buddhist temples here!

The military solution came last year when the government defeated the Tamil Tigers. The actual events that transpired at the end of the war are still shrouded in secrecy but it seems that there were large massacres of civilians as well as militants and much of the northern parts of the country, as we were to discover, is still very much off limits to foreigners.

This bloody recent history was not evident in the lush mountains around Kandy. In fact, Sri Lanka has a much higher standard of living than India and the towns and villages in the south matched or exceeded what you'd find, even in the wealthy Indian state of Kerala. The status of women in Sri Lanka is also considerably better than in India with women far more visible in all lines of business and in most kinds of jobs. Women tourists are also hassled far less.

We jumped onto a series of local buses and made our way to Adam's Peak, the highest climbable mountain in Sri Lanka. This mountain is holy to most religions as it has - what is believed to be - Adam, Shiva or Buddha's (take your pick!) footprint at its apex.

Adam's Peak

Every night at 2am hundreds of Buddhist, Hindu, Christian and Muslim pilgrims begin climbing the peak so as to reach the top just around sunrise. We joined them on this surprisingly tough climb made up of over 5000 concrete steps. The view from the top was nice (though once you've been in the Himalayas...) but the sunrise that morning was a bit clouded over. The walk down was hot and sweaty and the cumulative 10 000 steps meant we both walked funny for the next 3 days (a common problem for Adam's Peak climbers)! We couldn't feel too hard core for having completed the mission as our fellow climbers included loads of old timers of over 70 years in age and one guy whose whole left side of his body had been paralysed in a stroke!

Colourful villages seen from the train

Next we hopped onto a train to the village of Ella, spoiling ourselves with first class seats in the special carriage at the back of the train that has giant glass windows all round so you get beautiful 180 degree views of the tea plantations and forests through which the train meanders.

Ella is a tiny village perched higher up in the hills from Kandy and so was cool and quiet, with views of the lush forests surrounding the area. We found a delightful guesthouse which had a verandah that was just made for us to do absolutely nothing but nurse our sore Adam's Peak muscles, contemplate the views and sip a nice cuppa or two (oh, yes, Rejane did move enough to get herself down to the spa for a full body massage, steam bath and hot oil hair treatment). We stayed 10 days! Once our legs had begun to recover we ventured out and did a bit of walking in the surrounding hills, villages and tea plantations. Our favourite mission was to walk along the railway tracks - used as a walking path by locals - and visit the lovely little villages along the way while dodging the train when it came past a couple of times a day. After a morning of walking we'd catch the afternoon train back to Ella just in time to avoid the daily afternoon thunderstorms which we enjoyed, again from our lovely verandah with the pot of wonderful Ceylon tea.

Walking the train tracks in Ella

here comes the train!

We met a number of different travellers in our time in Ella and got to know all the little restaurants and tea stalls in town. Another difference between Sri Lanka and India is that Sri Lanka only has a handful of traditional food dishes. The main one is known simply as Rice & Curry which is delicious and consists of (wait for it) rice and a mix of up to 10 veggie curries and one meat curry. The curries are not as rich and saucy as the Indian curries but were a nice change... although after a few weeks it did get a little boring. Perhaps due to the war (we don't really know why) there isn't much of a street food or eating out culture and sometimes just getting a chai could be a challenge. One favourite meal was the Muslim-made Kottu roti which consists of stir fried meat and veg to which a chopped up roti is added, this is all diced up rapidly with two giant knives making the famous sharp clanging, chop-chop-chop sounds heard when walking by. As with India, one has to be fast to avoid the dolop of salt or chilli powder on your fresh fruit and the sugar on your avo! I mean, SUGAR ON YOUR AVO!!!!! (Ja-sis, that definitely qualifies as the most unpleasant surprise to one's taste buds when you're not expecting it!)

On the train back to Kandy

After our long chill in Ella, we caught the train and a couple of buses to the town of Dambulla where we visited the famous caves with giant carved Buddhas inside. We stayed in a beautiful homestay/guesthouse called Little Dream out in the rural paddy fields near the lake and once again got stuck for a week...

Sleeping Buddha in Dambulla cave

We used Little Dream as our base from which to explore the historical sights scattered in the region. One of the most famous is Sigiriya ("Lion's Rock"), a giant stone amidst landscaped water gardens with the ruins of an ancient temple at the top. This giant complex dates back to the 5th century and was occupied as either the nation's capital or as a temple until the 14th century when it was abandoned. Although the buildings are mostly ruins now, there are still beautiful paintings in the rock's caves and the view from the top was great.

Sigiriya - gardens below and temple ruins on top

Sigiriya cave paintings

the steps up to Sigiriya temple - lion paws on either side

View from the top of Sigiriya onto gardens below

During our time in Dambulla, we decided to explore the area around the lake. What was supposed to be a quick stroll around the lake turned into a 5 hour mission when we got lost in the forest! After about 2 hours we were getting peckish and walked in the direction of what we thought was the main road for a snack. This just got us deeper into the forest with little water and no food. After another hour or so, walking aimlessly, getting hungrier and running out of water, we were very pleasantly surprised to stumble upon ancient ruins that had not been referred to in any guide books. Although the ruins themselves were nothing of the scale of Sigiriya, wandering among them deep in the cool forest was wonderful. We subsequently found out that these were the ruins of a monastery complex called Kaludiya Pokuna and dated back to the 9th century when a wealthy man gave 23 containers of gold to provide food for the monks "as long as the sun and the moon last." There was certainly no food there now, a fact our grumbling bellies could attest to, but we were given some water by the caretaker of the ruins who lives all by himself the forest. The information about the ancient, wealthy benefactor along with other very detailed instructions are all engraved on cave walls which, amidst the overgrown forests, gave us a bit of an Indiana Jones feeling of adventure! We enjoyed this mission so much that we returned with a travel buddy a few days later and discovered a stream and rock pool where we swam while having our skin exfoliated by nibbling little fish.

Wandering in the forests

Indiana Jones and The Forest Stupa

The girls getting exfoliated

We missioned off to other forest ruins in the area called Ritigala which involved busing and then walking for about 12km, the last stretch of which was through the forest along a road just swarming with beautiful white butterflies. These ruins, scattered all through the forest were made from giant stone slabs, linked by winding stone paths.

Butterflies everywhere - on the way to Ritigala

Ritigala ruins

We finally left our friendly Little Dream family and headed north to Anuradhapura where we visited the oldest tree in the world called the Sri Maha Bodhi which was planted in 288BC. It is now incorporated into a temple where Sri Lankans pay homage to the sacred tree.

Oldest tree in the world

The city of Anuradhapura was founded 3000 years ago and the ruins extend over 16 square km. We spent a scorching day wandering around these extensive stone ruins, visiting ancient baths, temples, giant stupas, castles and monastries... All pretty amazing, but by this stage of our trip we were completely templed-out and unfortunately the knee-high ruins of Sri Lanka just don't compare to the epic sights of India... it was time for something different...

Giant stupa in Anuradhapura

Stone baths in Anuradhapura ruins

We decided to head towards Jaffna, the main Tamil city, which had been off limits during the war. After a bit of searching we found a bus and headed north on the road. The further north we headed, the road and the surrounding towns became increasingly dilapidated and bombed out buildings became the norm with military posts almost after every 100m. After 2 hours or so on the bus we arrived at a large military complex where the soldiers spotted us and hauled us off the bus demanding to see our Ministry of Defense permit which we didn't have (apparently no-one has ever managed to get one of these). Despite the government's claims, the road to Jaffna is certainly NOT open to tourists - and the rumours that they have atrocities to hide will continue until it is.

So, more hot, rickety buses until we eventually arrived exhausted in Trincomalee, the scene of heavy fighting during the war but now a steamy, dilapidated coastal town. We spent a horrible sweaty night there at a dirty hotel on the beach before heading straight out to the first decent place we could find. Just 6km north we found the village of Uppuveli where we splashed out on a nice Italian guest house. This north eastern coast seemed like a different country to the southern half of Sri Lanka... dirty, bombed out buildings, military everywhere and added to all that, it got hammered by the 2004 Tsunami, like much of the Sri Lankan south and east coasts. Click here to get a sense of the destructive power of the Tsunami which killed over 250,000 people (not for the faint hearted!).

Snorkeling on Pigeon Island

The Uppuveli beach was ok, and we did some nice snorkeling at nearby Pigeon Island. We were still feeling the itch to see what was going on in the forbidden north, so we snuck onto some buses heading to Kokkilai Lagoon and even made it onto a boat heading for the island in the lagoon before, sadly, the military got us again. This is a beautiful area with huge tourist potential once all the bloody military stuff gets sorted out.

On Kokkilai Lagoon before the military turned us back

We made some lovely friends along the way and were invited to a lunch of rice and curry by a local Muslim family who treated us like royalty.

Our friendly family who treated us to lunch, near the Kokkilai Lagoon

The Trincomalee heat got too much for us so we headed south again, first to the nice seaside village of Kalkuddah and then on to the surfing village called Arugambay. We found ourselves a beautiful beach hut on stilts overlooking the beach and chilled for a week or so watching surfers and suicide-sunbathers (no matter how red and sore, they never give up!) and enjoying the large amounts of the local Arak spirits at a Full Moon Party that we and some friends managed to instigate...

Is that a tsunami coming?

Arugambay

Who's a lucky boy then?

After a fun week at Arugambay we headed back to Ella village where we met friends from Cape Town and a very long earth worm! We spent two night catching up on news from home and another day walking the train tracks before heading to the southern coastal town of Galle.

Big earthworm in Ella

Our last beach in SriLanka, Unawatuna

We spent a couple of nights in Galle, an old colonial British town with charming guest houses and restaurants which is fast becoming an "in destination" for foreigners with money to invest in property. We did a daytrip Unawatuna, a lovely beach spot where we relaxed for a day before heading to Colombo airport...

We had intended to spend 10 weeks in Sri Lanka, but after 6 weeks we decided that we needed something completely different - so we jumped on a plane and headed to...

(to be continued)

Meeting the Family

2010-04-02T10:27:00.026+05:30

As Dave has been promoted to Editor-in Chief, a position in which he will be charged with setting up and running centres of excellence that will produce unique, original and compelling content for this blog, Rejane will start to write the blog content in the first person. Dave's promotion has come as the well-deserved reward for having mastered the art of driving a motorbike on Indian roads. To demonstrate the level of intellectual ability required for this task, a sample multiple choice question has been prepared for anyone thinking of attempting this task anytime in the future.

Instructions - Before attempting the test, please note the following in the diagram below, from top to bottom:

the arrows pointing in the direction of the traffic flowing south
below that, the location of Lane#4, followed by Lane#3
next, the position of the Solid Concrete Barrier/Divider shaded in, in the middle of the diagram, with Gap#1 and Gap#2 in the Barrier/Divider
then Lane#2 appears, followed by Lane#1
next, the position of Vehicle X
finally, the direction of traffic flowing north

MULTIPLE CHOICE QUESTION:
Vehicle X wants to travel south. What are his "legal" (i.e. permitted by police) options... does he:

A. Enter the highway immediately towards Gap#1 in the solid concrete divider, without looking to determine whether or not there is any traffic coming towards him on the highway, as he has right of way.

B. Enter the highway immediately against the direction of the traffic flowing north, aiming for Gap#2 in the concrete barrier/ divider, without looking as he has right of way and because Gap#2 is closer than Gap#1.

C. After departing from Gap#1 or Gap#2 he should then join Lane#3 or Lane#4 immediately and without looking as he has right of way (nose in front rule).

D. Enter the highway immediately, as he has right of way, turning directly into Lane#1, against the traffic that is traveling in a northerly direction and then continue in Lane#1 on his journey traveling south until reaching his destination 10kms away.

E. Enter the highway immediately, as he has right of way, turning directly into Lane#2, against the traffic that is traveling in a northerly direction and then continue in Lane#2 on his journey traveling south until reaching his destination 10kms away.
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**ANSWER: AT BOTTOM OF PAGE/POST

Although many of you may have some difficulty with passing this test, not Danger Dave, oh no, he passed with flying colours: A clean Indian driving record, with not even an itsy bitsy scratch to speak of by the time we delivered our faithful vehicle back to Lalli Singh in Delhi on 9 March, after 8 exhilarating motorbiking months and 13,000 km. But I'm getting a little ahead of myself here...lots still to tell before that day.

After the 11 glorious days in Hampi we headed to Goa. We had no idea where to start, Goa was developing a reputation for being filled with package tourists and the chilled out, bohemian, backpacker vibe was reportedly now a thing of its past. We wanted to try the beaches in northern Goa as we had seen some of the southern ones when we first arrived in June last year and hadn't been impressed. We headed to Anjuna first but the hotels on the beach were quite expensive and the restaurants were definitely catering to a rather well-to-do class of (Russian) tourist. We decided to try Arambol next but alas, those halcyon days were indeed over, Goa had gotten itself all grown up with the hotels and restaurants out of our budget range and the package tourist vibe not to our taste.

So after spending just 2 days in northern Goa we decided to give the southern beaches one more try. We were hesitant because we had seen the very littered and unattractive southern beaches when we arrived in June but that was during the Monsoon season and we'd been assured by other trusty travelers that the beaches were very different now. We tried Gokarna first which is just over the southern most point of Goa and immediately decided to stay.

Gokarna was completely different from what we had experienced in June. The water had receded from their Monsoonal levels so you could actually see the beach, the rubbish had been cleared up and pretty bamboo and banana leaf huts had been erected for cheap but cheerful accommodation and restaurant venues. From our first day we met some cool travelers that set the tone for long, lazy afternoon lunches, warm ocean dips and afternoon strolls around the area.

Our beach-side home in Gokarna

Om Beach

Om Beach, where we lodged and spent most of our time hanging out, is so named because it resembles the holy "Om (Aum) Symbol". The symbol, when written in Hindi, looks like the number 3 written backwards. We settled in for a week of indulgence marred only by the groups of Indian men that irritatingly take weekend trips to the beach just to stare at foreigners in bikinis. India really needs to sort out its conservative attitudes towards women and normalise its male/female relations or Indian men might explode with frustration.

Paradise Beach

When we could drag ourselves away from our hangout on Om Beach we took 30 minute strolls to Paradise Beach (so named because, well, it resembles Paradise).

Hanging on Paradise beach - read a little, snooze a little, have a spot of lunch...

Whiling away the hours turning coconut shells into very useful mixing bowels

Kudlee Beach

Kudlee Beach was another one of our afternoon stroll destinations from Om Beach (no idea what it resembles or is named after). After a wonderful week or so, it suddenly dawned on us that we had only a couple of weeks left before our Indian visas were to expire and we'd literally have to haul ass to get through the rest of our must-dos before 17 March.

The first stop was 1200kms away (3 hard days of traveling on the bike) on the find-the-family mission. My grandmother was born in Gujarat. Her father was one of 4 brothers of which 2 left India in the early 1900's. Contact with Indian family had eventually been broken as the old people had all long passed on, making this a bit of a mission in the dark. We had no information about my Indian family except a photograph of a young woman and a child with a letter written in Gujarati that we could not read. On arrival in the town of Baruch in Gujarat, our hotel manager kindly translated the letter and offered to help us find the area (there was no house number just a street name). We decided to go the very next morning not knowing what kind of people they'd be or how they would receive us. We arrived in the area mentioned in the letter and started to ask some ladies standing in front of a corner store if anyone recognised the people in the photograph when a young woman walked up to us and exclaimed: "What are you doing with my picture?"! I responded: "I am your cousin from South Africa!"

Baruch - the street that the family home is in

The young woman immediately embraced me and introduced herself as Aaisha. She took us straight to the family home where we met her mother and 2 of her 8 sisters.

Aaisha in front of their house - where my grandmother was born

Although Aaisha was the only one in the family who spoke any English, we managed to communicate and immediately started trying to work out the family tree while her mom prepared tea, snacks and later a lavish lunch that we enjoyed when her husband returned home from his job as a rickshaw driver.

Tea and snacks and working out the family tree

My apprehension about how we'd be received was completely unfounded and we had a lovely time chatting about the family back in South Africa and being taken around to the homes of the extended family in the area.

Meeting the rest of the family

We enjoyed ourselves so much that we spontaneously decided to invite everyone to dinner at our hotel that night.

Dinner with the family, Rejane with all the ladies and children

Although we thoroughly enjoyed the reunion and promised to keep the revived family connection alive, time was tight and we had to scoot off the following day for a whistle-stop tour of Rajastan. Rajastan is a well traveled part of India, part of the "Golden Delhi-Jaipur-Agra Triangle" that forms the most visited area in India. We had enough time for only a couple of nights in 3 Rajastani cities: Udaipur, Jaipur and Pushkar.

In Udaipur the main attractions are the "floating" palaces (actually just islands that look like they're floating) that have been converted to luxury hotels charging the equivalent of about R10000 a night, incredible in a country where a 3 year university degree costs R3000 in total and thus a one night stay would see 3 kids through university.

The Floating Palace in Udaipur, now a fancy hotel

The majestic City Palace

In the lavish gardens of the floating palace

More than the majesty of Udaipur's palaces, we were pleasantly surprised to bump into some friends we'd made in Hampi, which was a lovely breather amidst our now frenetic and increasingly exhausting traveling pace.

Next stop was Pushkar which we were not very impressed with. We'd hit our temple-viewing saturation point and the markets were nothing we hadn't seen before.

The Pushkar marketplace

Our last stop was Jaipur which is a surprisingly attractive city with buildings all gaily painted pink and the women all beautifully adorned in saris, in all the colours of the rainbow. Sadly we'd left the camera in the hotel room and with no more time to spare, we couldn't go back for any pics :-(

Leaving Rajastan behind, Agra was next on the must-do-before-you-leave-India list. And, yes, we got the obligatory Taj Mahal pics.

The Taj at sunset

While it is, admittedly, a very attractive building designed and constructed with precision symmetry, it is nothing but a tomb that cost the equivalent of US$2 billion to build. You walk in (without your shoes), circle around 2 coffins (an area with a circumference of about 10meters) and you walk out again. The romantic story of Shah Jahan being so heartbroken at his wife's Mumtaz's death that led to the building of the tomb notwithstanding, we couldn't help but speculate how far US$2 billion would go towards alleviating the sheer squalor of the living conditions just metres outside the walls of the monument. Shah Jahan also had a few thousand concubines to console him while mourning...

Video: The Gardens at the Taj

After Agra, it was straight to Delhi to deliver the bike back to Lalli and to catch a train to our last must-do stop at Varanassi. Varanassi is one of the holiest places in India, situated on the banks of the Ganga (Ganges) River. It is considered to be the most auspicious place in the world for Hindus to die and to be cremated. If you die in Varanassi you supposedly skip the endless cycle of re-incarnations and go straight to "heaven". The waters of the river are said to cleanse one of all bad karma past, present and future.

Washing off all that bad karma

Varanassi is a busy place with lots of activity from sunrise to well past sunset when thousands arrive for the daily ceremonies. Sunrise pujas (ceremonies) are performed with chanting and bell ringing reaching a crescendo as the sun pops over the horizon with scores of people arriving all day for a bath, even brushing their teeth and drinking the holy water. The atmosphere is festive throughout the day with tea, samoosas, fresh chappatis and other snacks on sale. After sunrise the large funeral pyres that will burn all day are are built and scores of bodies are cremated, giving the air a distinct smell of braaied meat with the sight of burning bodies and the sound of exploding skulls not for the faint-hearted. Ashes and charred remains are sent down the river along with the whole bodies of children under 10 years old and pregnant women who are never cremated.

The Indian government recently put 18000 scavenger turtles into the river to clear the dead bodies on the river bed and restrictions are increasingly tightened on factories that dump industrial waste although little seems to have been done to provide more appropriate places for people to use as latrines other than the banks of the river...

Video: Daily activity on the river

Video: A sunset paddle down the holy river

Video: Fires burning during the nightly funeral pyres along the shore

After that wonderful, overwhelming assault on all the senses, it was straight back to Delhi where we met up briefly with our good friend Glynnis from South Africa before boarding our flight to Colombo, Sri Lanka.

And so, it was Namaste and Salaam to India...

**ANSWER TO MULTIPLE CHOICE QUESTION: ALL OF THE ABOVE ( :-o)

Unpainted Speed Bumps

2010-02-12T15:23:00.108+05:30

Besides the unrivaled views you get from traveling India on a motorbike, there is the added excitement of the unpainted speed bumps on the national and state highways. While many of the roads in the mountains are too curvy for speeds above 30kms/hr, further south, where the weather and landscapes are not as harsh, the roads are smoother and straighter and can comfortably accommodate speeds around 60-75kms/hr. While this may get you to your destination faster, the many unpainted speed bumps can give your already pulverised bottom a hard whack and leave you with (not altogether mild) sensations of whiplash. After cruising on our delightfully smooth trip from its beginning in mid-June to early in December, we were to discover that, in this region, these unpainted speed bumps are a feature of more than just the road networks... Having spent 6 wonderful weeks in Bangladesh (a definite trip highlight) we were hit with our first large and momentum-slowing speed bump when we were inexplicably turned away by the Indian Embassy in Dhaka when applying for our visa renewal. We decided to head for Kathmandu to try our luck there. The Indian Embassy in Kathmandu is well organised and processes scores of foreign visas daily. We submitted our application for a 6 month visa and decided to check out the city and Kathmandu valley while holding thumbs furiously.

One of the many temples in Kathmandu

Kathmandu is filled with fascinating temples and ruins. Just walking the city streets, you constantly stumble over ancient temples at every turn. The Durbar square, in the centre of the city, which has been the site for royal palaces, housing several different dynasties, is thought to date back to the 10th century. It has now been declared a world heritage site. But interesting or not, we decided we needed some fresh air and off to the valley we went.

Another old temple

We explored the villages of Nargakot, Dhulikhel and Namabuddha in the Kathmandu Valley. These villages, connected by beautiful, indigenous forests are largely inhabited by small farmers - a lovely rejuvenating way to spend a few days. Dave was most interested in the small tractors used here that would suit small South African farmers. They cost the equivalent of about R5000 and would be fantastic for the small farmers in South Africa who have only large tractors costing hundreds of thousands of Rands to choose from. This access to equipment and skills reminded us, once again, of the significantly more fortunate position the Asian farmers are in relative to our own small farmers back home (these mini-tractors are also strong water pumps, can mill maize/wheat and can be used as electricity generators).

Hiking from Nagakot to Dhulikel

The terraced farmlands around the Kathmandu Valley

The mini-tractor Dave would love to import into South Africa

In between exploring the beautiful forests of the Kathmandu Valley we sought out hotels with spectacular mountain views where sunrise over the Himalayas comes with your morning tea in bed.

The Himalayas from our bedroom window in Nargakot

Although it is largely a Hindu country, Nepal is dotted with many modern and well built Tibetan Buddhist monasteries. With many financial supporters worldwide, the monasteries are large and well maintained. In Namabuddha we stayed in a monastery where the rooms are comfortable (single beds only) and the vegetarian food bland with a few western spiritual tourists padding solemnly and quietly around the beautifully sculptured gardens.

The Tibetan Buddhist monastery complex in Namabuddha

Then it was back to Kathmandu to find out about our visas and negotiate our next (albeit smaller) unexpected speed bump. We'd been issued with new visas for India but only for 3 months. Because a 3 month visa would only take us to mid-March, we decided to book tickets to fly to Sri Lanka for what would be the remaining 2.5 months of our traveling year. Whew! That one didn’t leave too much whiplash but we needed to get going. The 3 month reduction in our time in India meant we had to start cutting out large areas that we’d plan to visit. Just as we were reconciling ourselves to the change in plans there was one more speed bump in the road: a nationwide strike or ‘bandha’ had been declared by the Nepalese Maoist party which completely shut down the entire country…and REALLY shut it down. No motorized transport of any kind – public or private, no schools, government offices, companies, shops or restaurants were to operate for 3 days. So we were stuck in Kathmandu for another 3 days twiddling our thumbs, searching for food with other starving tourists and hanging out in the streets with the kids playing cricket. It became a treasure hunt with other tourists to see who could find any hidden restaurants or street vendors that might be open and serving food… “Around the corner, down the little alleyway, find the freshly painted red fence and knock twice…”

Filling up when you can!

"Score! I found the dessert!"

Although the strike slowed us down when we'd already lost a significant amount of time, we symphathised with the position of the Maoist party. After a tumultuous period in the country's political history, they were trying to assert themselves in a government where the respect for democratic processes was still rather less than optimal.

No rubbish collection during the strike

After the 3 day strike we made our plans to head back to India after seeing a little bit of the Pokhara valley in the west and experiencing some good views of Everest. Only because climbing Everest would take just a little longer than our Nepali visa would allow, we decided to see Sagarmatha (the Nepali name for Everest which means Goddess of the Sky) in a quicker (and slightly more relaxing) way on a 60 minute mountain flight tour. We were lucky with the weather and the views in flight were clear and spectacular. Everyone is allowed a visit to the flight deck – I won’t even try to describe the views from there, my writing abilities just don’t stretch that far. Sagarmatha was beautiful and graceful in her trademark white silk scarf – a plume of cloud that forms at the apex of the peak when winds reach over 80kms an hour and form icicles in the cold air.

Sagamartha, her silk scarf billowing in the wind

Next we took a bus ride west to see Pokhara, the second biggest city in Nepal, this would be our last stop in Nepal. Pokhara is a laidback town, surrounding a pretty lake. We even managed to find some roast chicken and pudding for Xmas dinner while watching a live performance of traditional Nepali dance and music.

The lake in Pokhara

After Pokhara, that was it for Nepal and we headed straight back to India. We arrived back in Darjeeling the following day. It was lovely to see our friends again from the Hotel Tranquility, who had so kindly been taking care of our bike while we were away. Because we'd been moving from place to place for so many months, it was wonderful to return to a familiar place where we were warmly welcomed by so many friends, knew the best breakfast spot (Sonam's Kitchen) and the cafes with the fastest internet. But it was freezing... FREEZING! We'd long discarded the warm clothes we'd had in the North and with all the speed bumps we were now in Darjeeling a lot later than we'd originally intended. Only gnawing hunger drove us out to find dinner before rushing back to the hotel and our 5 blankets. It just got unbearable and while we would have liked to spend new year's eve with our friends there, we decided to just get to the South quickly! The snow was thickening on the hills when we left and with chattering teeth we gratefully bordered the train to Kolkata (Calcutta) and welcomed in the new year in our warm sleeper carriage.

Our favourite spot for delicious street food in Kolkata

Kolkata was another familiar city to us and we spent the 2 days we had to wait for the train to Chennai revisiting our favourite street food spots and meeting up with our friend Mishrah, who you'd remember from our very first blog.

Hanging out with Mishrah

The Botanical Gardens in Kolkata are well maintained and filled with families over the weekends. Its most fascinating feature is the massive banyan tree in the centre of the gardens which, with a circumference of 420 metres, is the world largest. We learnt that banyan trees have branches that grow into the ground like tree trunks so that what looks like a forest of trees is really just one tree with hundreds of branches. It is an awesome sight and the pictures, that can show only small sections, do it little justice.

This 'forest of tree trunks' are all branches of the same banyan tree!

A small part of the massive tree from a distance - yes, it's all one tree!

After 2 days we boarded the train to Chennai in Tamil Nadu that would take us to the heart of South India where the landscape, food and culture seems as different from the North as if we'd gone to another country altogether. Because there was some political upheaval in the state between Kolkata and Chennai, our bike, which we'd loaded into cargo, wasn't due to arrive for another few days. We decided not to let this slow us down again and left the busy and fairly uninteresting city of Chennai for the coastal town of Mamalapuram, just 60 kms south. Although it is mainly a tourist resort town today, Mamlapuram was a major port a thousand years ago with a stone carving tradition that has survived since the 5th century. The old stone carved ruins are as fascinating as the contemporary idols still hand carved carved today for the many temples around the area.

Stone carvings in Mamalapuram

While the ruins and temples in Mamalapuram were interesting, the beach was pretty uninspiring so, as soon as our bike arrived, we left to pick it up in Chennai and start our exploration of the south in earnest. Our first stop was the old French colonial town of Puducherry (Pondicherry) where it is common to hear French spoken around you while enjoying your breakfast of fresh croissants in quaint old heritage buildings. It is a well maintained and clean town but after filling up with croissants and visiting the museums, it has little else to delay a traveler except for a trip, 10kms south, to the now fairly well known town of Auroville. Although Aurovillians are said to dislike this fact: the town, that was founded in 1968 by the "Mother", has become a de rigueur stop on the South India travel circuit.

The Matri Mandir temple at Auroville - a place for 'concetration' only open to Aurovillians

A new way of living along eco-friendly principles, forsaking the world of politics and the money economy was envisioned by the "Mother" a French national who is considered the spiritual successor of Sri Aurobindo Ghose, a leading spiritual figure in his lifetime (1872-1950). It is now inhabited by over 2000 people, of which about a third are Indian and the rest mostly European. The aim is to grow the township to around 50 000 like minded inhabitants. We were most interested in finding out about the technologies they employ that convert solar energy into steam that powers the cooking stoves. When we visited the township we were also fascinated at the claim that no money was used in financial transactions, no talking was allowed at meals and politics is specifically forbidden as a topic of discussion. We tried to find a guesthouse to stay for a few days and explore this new age experiment in living but the some 200 guesthouses were fully booked and would be for months. Living and volunteering on Auroville's many farms and various community centres has become very popular indeed.

In retrospect, we were probably quite likely to make some faux pas breaking a sacred rule like talking at dinner or bringing up a forbidden political topic for discussion! So we happily headed south west to check out some of Tamil Nadu's many temples. The first of which was the awesome temple complex in Trinivanumalai, that is said to have been built over a period of a thousand years. The temples are busy with long queues of devotees making pujas (offerings) to their gods and getting blessings from elephants, considered to be the incarnation of the elephant-headed god, Ganesh. This is a rather entertaining process where the elephant takes the money out of your hand and taps you on the head for your blessing.

The temple complex in Trinivanumalai

Lord Ganesh in his temple

With blessings duly received we hit the road towards the Western Ghats enjoying the typical Indian rice meals served in the local restaurants. A mound of rice is served on a banana leaf plate with a range of mouthwateringly delicious curries of lentils, coconut milk, chickpeas, beans, carrots, potatoes and pickle that has to be eaten with your hands - you are rarely offered cutlery of any kind. The rice and curry sauces keep coming until you submit with a swollen belly - all for a total sum of about R6 (for an extra R2 you can get a piece of fresh fish cooked in a masala batter).

Our first stop on the Western Ghats was Udhagamandalam, a hill station town with a Dravidian tongue twisting name, that the locals have mercifully shortened to "Ooty". The Western Ghats are a mountain range that form the border between Tamil Nadu and Kerala and are thought to be the fault line along which the Indian subcontinent broke away from Africa millions of years ago when it began to drift towards Asia.

A typical South Indian 'rice meal' served on a banana leaf plate (curry still to be poured over the rice)

Being an elevated hill station town, Ooty was cool and refreshing after the sweaty bike rides on the plains around Tamil Nadu. Our next stop was to the very badly run, albeit beautiful nature reserve, the Indira Ghandi Anamalai Wildlife Sanctuary. There we met other tourists frustrated by the government run resort where the employees are rather annoyed by any guests arriving and making them open the guest rooms or actually cook any food in the restaurant. So we cut that visit down to just one night and headed to our last stop in the Western Ghats, Kodanaikal.

A view of the Ooty hill station town

View from the bike of the Kodanaikal valley

Before leaving Tamil Nadu for good, we decided to fit in one more temple site at Madurai. Although similar in architecture to the temple at Trinivanumalai, the temple in Madurai differed spectacularly in the colour added to the figures on the buildings. Madurai's splendid temples and architecture was admired as far back as 300BCE by visiting Europeans and they still come to admire it today, in their droves.

The colourful temple at Madurai

From Madurai we crossed the state border to Kerala. Our first stop was Kumily where we enjoyed novel elephant rides and very educational tours of the spice, tea and fruit plantations around the area. Indian elephants are tame and gentle with a look in their big eyes more like that of a Saint Bernhard pet than anything like their wild African cousins. We saw: a tea factory in action, what coffee beans look like when they're ready for picking, that turmeric spice is ground from the stem of the plant and that almond oil is good for reducing black marks under the eyes.

Riding a big friendly giant

Catching falling oranges on a small fruit and spice plantation in Kumily

Picking coffee beans

A traditional bamboo hut in the forest at Kumily

After all that education, we were ready to cool off at the beach. We headed straight for the Keralan coast to Varkala where the beaches have (clean) black sand and coconut-laden palm trees line the red cliffs that plunge into a warm and gentle sea. Nothing to do but watch the fisherman haul in fresh fish for your dinner while resting in between hours of body-surfing fun.

Paradise

What more can I say...

After bodysurfing for 3 hours: "well really, it's a tough job, but someone's got to do it..."

Waiting for breakfast to be served at our hotel in Varkala

Having spent a few glorious days working hard at those body-surfing skills, we reluctantly left Varkala for the Keralan backwaters. We were well rewarded for our sacrifice by the serene beauty and interesting life of the villages that dot the area. The backwaters are made up of water from 38 rivers that pool into 5 lakes, connected by numerous canals. This is the setting of Arundhati Roy's book "The God of Small Things". We found a delightful and amazingly well preserved guesthouse in a hundred year old colonial heritage home. We took some time to enjoy the luxury of the our room and the beautiful garden before organising to explore the backwaters by canoe.

Our beautiful heritage homestay in Allepey

Kids off to their waterside school

Quiet life on the Backwaters

A typical Backwaters' homestead

Exploring the small canals by canoe

Our Backwaters guide with his wife outside their home

At the northern most point of the Backwaters lies the entertaining town of Fort Cochin. An important European trading town in the 16^th century, it has well preserved old buildings (and some not so well preserved) that tell the tale of a past with a vibrant Jewish community, trade with the Far East and Dutch architectural influence. The museums relay a fascinating history of a royal dynasty of matriarchal control where the eldest woman in the family had absolute control over the property and the line of monarchs was passed to their sister's children. Women covered their bodies only from the waist down, a practice that was to continue into the 19^th century until it was changed through European puritanical custom.

The photogenic seaside area in Fort Cochin is lined with Chinese fishing nets, said to have been brought by traders from the court of Kublai Khan, and are still used today in exactly the same way they were then. In the evenings we were entertained with Kathakali plays, traditional Keralan theatre that involves elaborate costumes and make up sessions that take hours are done on stage for the audience before the show begins. No words are spoken between the actors who interact instead with a complicated series of facial and body gestures to tell the story.

Video: Chinese fishing nets

The 2-hour long make-up session in preparation for the evening's theatre performance

Video: A scene from a Kathakali play

Satisfied that we’d fully explored Fort Cochin, we headed north towards the popular backpacker town of Hampi, with a short stop on the way at Mysore. Mysore takes first prize for the loveliest Indian city we’ve experienced. The roads are large, well laid out boulevards with little of the lung choking pollution and traffic jams we’ve come to expect from Indian cities. Its markets are vibrant and colourful and a pleasure to explore. The city is dominated by the beautiful and opulent Wadiya palace that descendants of the royal family still lay claim to. As museums and monuments go in

India,

it is perfectly preserved with no flash photography allowed to spoil the many intricate paintings and there are audio guides (nogal!) available for foreigners with a level of quality and quantity of information comparable to that of any major European museum.

The opulent Wadiya palace

Video: The very busy flower and spice market

Next stop, and the place where we’ve written this blog, was Hampi, a town of many contrasts. Semi desert hills covered in mounds of giant boulders, like stones that have been dropped off at a building site, incongruously form the backdrop to water logged rice paddies and a large fresh water lake and reservoir. Hampi town reached its peak between the 14^th and 16^th centuries when its inhabitants constructed buildings and laid infrastructure said to rival that of Rome. 2600 temples were built in its heyday from a government tax budget that spent 50% on the army, a whopping 25% on temples and only 25% on the general well-being of the population. Few temples remain intact but the exhausting number of ruins provide much archeological entertainment for tourists who can bear the swelteringly hot days touring around the town.

On arrival in Hampi we were shocked to learn that the bridge had collapsed and the only way to cross to the river was in a woven bamboo basket – motorbike and all. We were doubtful that our 250kg bike would make it in this makeshift vessel and when our turn came to cross, we were further alarmed by the boatman loading yet another bike onto the flimsy looking vessel and then 6 more people!

Video: River crossing in a woven bamboo basket

Whew! made it!

Chilling out in Hampi

Hampi’s chilled out vibe, backpacker filled restaurants and fresh water lake that provides the perfect antidote to the afternoon heat, has proven very hard to leave and the days have easily, and very pleasurably, just been slipping away. We hope to drag ourselves away tomorrow after 11 glorious days. Most nights have been spent socialising into the early hours with only one early wake up day for the pilgrimage to Hanuman Temple, the birthplace of the Monkey God, to see the sunrise. The temple is inhabited by very naughty monkeys that are very entertaining – especially when trying to search you for any bananas you may have hidden in your pockets. The only protection from which are the temple dogs that the monkey in the picture below is hoping Dave will protect it from.

Stone chariot sculpture (Hampi)

The Lotus Mahal - a mixture of Hindu and Muslim architecture

The Ugra Narasimha, a representation of Lord Vishnu - the biggest idol in Hampi

Another one of the 2600 ruins and temples in Hampi

Sunrise over Hampi town at Hanuman temple

"Can't get this monkey off my lap.."

Hanging out at the lake

Sunset at the lake with the girls

Cooling off in the fresh water

Cool banana!

Next stop Goa...

Bangladesh - Land of the Bangla-speaking People

2009-12-07T17:51:00.051+05:30

In 1947, when British colonial India was partitioned into the Islamic Republic of Pakistan and the Republic of India, Pakistan consisted of West Pakistan, which is Pakistan as we know it today, and a separate piece of land thousands of km away called East Pakistan that became present day Bangladesh.

Bangladesh literally means: "land of the Bangla-speaking people" which is a reminder of one of the main factors (recognition of Bangla (Bengali) as an official state language) that led to the build-up of resistance to being joined as one country with West Pakistan. This resistance culminated in a bloody war that eventually led to an independent People's Republic of Bangladesh in 1971.

typical Bangladesh village scene

The Bangladeshis are very proud of their culture, language and history. There is even a Mother Language Day that has been observed since 1952, and is still observed today, to commemorate the struggle to establish Bangla as the national language. When speaking to people we've met here, we've found that, although there is an acknowledgment that they are still a very poor country, there is much pride in Bangladesh having come a long way since gaining independence. The population explosion since the 1970's is attributed to significant improvements in child mortality rates and improved quality of life. Women are still more likely than men to be illiterate and girls now have free schooling all way through senior school while boys are only subsidised for their junior school years. We have also been told several times by very proud Bangladeshis (mostly men as we have rarely encountered women who speak any English) that their current Prime Minister is their second female Prime Minister since independence and that the Home Minister and Foreign Minister are also both female too, a fact that somehow seems incongruous with the absence of women in public areas and the strict purdah dress observed by the few that you do see around (except in Dhaka).

"Okay, listen now, if you kids don't get this one right - there'll be trouble!"

More than any of the sites we've seen (and we've seen many wonderful ones), the greatest asset this country has to share with tourists is the hospitality of its people. It is not uncommon to be invited home for a meal by someone you've met randomly on the street (although the price is often being paraded around like a celebrity to meet the entire village). There are only two guide books available for Bangladesh, The Lonely Planet and the Bradt Guide, and they both list the Bangla people on the list of the country's Top Ten attractions and we concur wholeheartedly.

Tea with Rupa and Mom at their home in Srimangal

That said, there have been plenty of great sites to explore. One of our first was in Putia, near Rajshahi, that boasts some of the country's oldest Hindu temples still standing after the 1970's war.

1823 Shiva temple in Puthia

From Rajshahi we took our first Bangladeshi train journey to Khulna near the Sundarbans. Although the rail network is not huge, the trains that do operate are efficient and first class travel is comfortable with private compartments and waiters that serve tea in real china cups.

While Bangladesh is poor in some ways, it is incredible to see that unemployment is unheard of (less than 3%) and EVERYONE is doing some sort of mini-business/service. The villages are a hive of activity and you can get anything made or fixed very cheaply and quickly. The village economies are light years ahead of ours at home: in SA you can't find a tractor for love of money, while in Bangladesh most farmers share these mini-tractors that double up as water pumps, threshers and electricity generators. Villages can have a borehole sunk for less than $100 (R700) while in SA you can pay 100 times that! One downside of this full employemnt is that invariably hotels employ double the number of people they need and then you have service staff bursting into your room every hour to check if you "need anything?" or if "I can help you". We quickly learnt to lock the doors, but then they just knock loudly, you get out of bed, and they ask "need anything?" Evil glares do not dissuade them!

In Khulna our primary mission was to book a boat trip around the Sundarbans, the large delta of rivers and mighty mangrove swamps in southern Bangladesh where the water from the Himalayas flows into the sea. There aren't many boats that tour the Sundarbans and the few that do were all booked for the dates we wanted. The only thing we could do was book a private boat tour, just for the two of us. Although a little more expensive, it turned out to be a pretty good option as we had the guide all to ourselves to answer our million questions, lots of flexibility as to where we went and no other noisy guests to scare off the animals. The boat was small but very comfortable and our crew cooked up the most delicious meals while we lazed about on deck and kept our eyes pealed for Bengal Tigers. We didn't see any tigers although the fact that a person is eaten by a tiger in this area every 3 days kept us alert all through our 3 day tour. We had two security guards with very big shot guns follow us everywhere we went.

Chilling on out on our boat in the Sundarbans

The view from our boat while cruising the mangrove swamps of the Sundarbans

Let's go get those tigers! - our very brave security guards in the Sundarbans

We took some lovely, messy walks - security guards in tow - through thick, gooey, glistening, chocolate pudding mud in the mangrove forests that sucked in our every footfall. The mangrove forests were teeming with life: loads of birds, crabs, lizards and 5 different species of snakes that Dave kept trying to pick up in between (unsuccessfully) trying to catch mud skippers. We saw a green vine snake hanging from a tree while it was also trying to catch mud skippers, an unidentifiable snake basking in the sun, and a Dog Headed Water snake lying in the mud, and best of all, a Monocled Cobra swimming across the river in a hell of a hurry to get to the other side. We cooled off with a swim in the sea of the Bay of Bengal although it is not advisable to attempt a bikini-clad dip being, as we are, in a conservative Muslim country. Having little experience with which clothes are best for a fully-clothed swim, Rejane at first made the unfortunate choice of a t-shirt that became very clingy and revealing once wet and then had to quickly scramble to put on something a little more modesty-preserving.

Getting nice and messy catching crabs in the mud

Stomping around in the muddy mangrove forests

No bikinis allowed in the Bay of Bengal! (Our hosts couldn't bare to look!)

From Khulna we took the very luxurious early 1900's "Rocket", a paddle steamer that cruises slowly down the river and harks back to the days of the British Raj. Meals are served at a long, wooden, 30-seater dinner table with white table-cloths and uniformed waiters who serve your afternoon tea in delicate china tea sets (they really know how to serve tea in this country, I say, Old Chap, What?)

Afternoon tea and cookies while floating down the river on the old Rocket steamer

Just couldn't resist doing the Leonardo and Kate pose while on the steamer...

View from the Rocket...villages that dot the river banks

We reluctantly disembarked from the luxury of the Rocket in Barisal where we explored the busy markets and picturesque villages. One fun part of Bangladesh is the vehicles: the most common is the bicycle powered, 3 wheel rickshaw which are everywhere and are used by everyone to go even short distances. In Dhaka alone there are supposedly 600,000 rickshaws! Then you get the Ban which is the bakkie/pickup version of the bicycle rickshaw which has a flat bed and can load unbelievable quantities of goods piled meters into the air. Then there is the auto rickshaw (aka baby taxi or CNG) which is a motorbike version of the rickshaw which normally runs on compressed gas (CNG = Compressed Natural Gas). You also now get an electric rickshaw (see photo below) which has a battery and is charged up at night, and then can cover 120km the next day, almost silently as it has no engine. Lastly, of course, there are cars. In Bangladesh, 90% of cars are expensive Japanese models which is unusual when one considers that in India 90% of cars are cheap Indian brands (Tata, Maruti Suzuki and Mahindra). The reason for this we're told is that Bangladesh has no middle class: just a very rich class and a poor class while India has a huge middle class...

Electric baby taxi - Bangladesh leads the way in green transport!

All aboard the school bus! (another type of bicycle rickshaw)

Around Barisal - busy markets

"Let's show these locals what an African man can do... ok I'm tired now"

"Haa, but can you carry bricks on your head, while walking a plank and looking cool at the same time?"

After Barisal we boarded another less luxurious cockroach boat further down the river to explore the little islands that dot the Bay of Bengal. These islands don't appear in any guide books or even on the internet so as expected this was quite an adventure. Our first stop was Hatia Island where we took on the 4 hour mission to get to its very southern most tip and cross over to the even smaller island of Nidjim Dwip. After a noisy and bumpy 2 hour auto-rickshaw ride, an hour wait for the ferry, another hour on an even bumpier bicycle rickshaw and yet another hour of walking - with our backpacks - in the sweltering heat, we finally made it to the one "hotel" on Nijum Dwip Island.

On the mission to Nidjim Dwip: "Okay, that's it - I've had it with this heat, the boats, the crowds..."

The next morning, at breakfast, we were offered a live crab by the restaurant owner. With much sign language we managed to negotiate for a crab curry to be cooked for our lunch which we ate very messily and with relish while trying to ignore the open-mouthed stares of about 30 local guys. In rural Bangladesh we've been stared at with undisguised fascination a whole lot more than we've stared at the local people and surroundings. The two most common reactions are the "stop dead in your tracks call your friends and stare" and the "stop dead in your tracks, jaw falls open and stare" - extra clever people follow these moves up with a "how are you my friend!" which means you can get invited to their house if you smile back...

On a trip where we have been more than just impressed with the culinary delights, Bangladesh wins first prize in the great food category. The Achilles heel in this subcontinent's repertoire, however, is definitely breakfast. A fried egg with a roti or chapati is the closest you can to a vaguely recognisable breakfast while cornflakes, only very very occasionally available, are a mystery to chefs (we were once served cornflakes that had been boiled up like jungle oats!). We have at times given up and gone local by ordering mutton and vegetable curries with rotis for our breakfast. Another potential minefield is ordering drinks - if you're not fast enough to prevent it, you are likely to get a dollop of salt in your fruit juice or yogurt drink - Dave has even been asked if he preferred a sweet or salty chocolate milkshake!

And the prize for the best meal eaten in Bangladesh goes to...Freshly cooked crab curry.

After a couple of days of lazing around Nijum Dwip we missioned back to Hatia to catch the steamer to the next Bay of Bengal island, Sandwip. The trip back to Hatia was crowded with people, bicycles and even a cow that proceeded to vacate its bowels in the tiny boat but Rejane was well protected from getting messy on the women's side of the boat where she was looked after like a special guest.

On the boat from Nijum Dwip back to Hatia with the cow with the loose bowels

On arrival at Sandwip Island we were told that there weren't any hotels at all and were taken to the government offices by a rickshaw driver who had no idea what on earth to do with two foreign tourists. The perplexed government officials took a few minutes to inquire as to why the hell we'd want to see Sandwip Island and, while failing to understand our explanation that it was all very interesting to us, kindly invited us to stay at the government guest house for a nominal fee, the equivalent of about R4 ($0.50). We were very comfortable at the guest house and the next morning had the pleasure of meeting the Island's magistrate who allowed us to sit in on his very speedy court proceedings (20 cases in 45 minutes!) after which we were invited to a local wedding lunch. While at lunch we mentioned that the steamer to Chittagong, our next stop, would be leaving soon to which the magistrate said, "Don't worry, relax, I am also taking the steamer to Chittagong today and they can't leave without me..."

The very photogenic villages on Sandwip Island. Every house has a pond like this used for bathing/washing (behind the orange curtain)

At the wedding lunch with the magistrate

Our next stop was the Chittagong Hill Tracts, the one area of Bangladesh that's not as flat as a chapati. The history of this "tribal" area is quite complicated and the politics is still somewhat unstable. During the war in 1970/1, the governor of the area supported West Pakistan and fled to Pakistan after independence. The indigenous people of the area are ethnically closer to Burmese people than to the ethnically Indian Bangladeshi majority. The source of the current political tension seems to stem from the influx and growth of the ethnically Indian Bangla population into the area and the displacement of the indigenous tribes by large dams built recently.

In Rangamati, the first of the Chittagong villages we visited, our boatman wouldn't take us to any of the indigenous Chakma villages as communities here have kept themselves pretty much separate from one another. It was also a little difficult to get much enjoyment from the main tourist attraction, the beautiful lake, which was created when the dam was built causing the loss of farming land and of many indigenous village communities and led to many being displaced.

On the lake in Rangamati

After Rangamati we headed to another Chittagong Hill Tract village, Bandarban. Here the communities, while preserving their own ways of life, do not seem to have the issues that Rangamati suffers from as there was no displacement from dam building. We stayed at the Hillside Resort which has lovely traditionally built bamboo cottages. We spent a few lazy days exploring the markets and the beautiful indigenous Marma villages set in the thick forests. We also indulged a few times in the number one local desert dodi/dui which is a delicious cross between creme caramel and yoghurt and can be found everywhere at giveaway prices - yummy!! Bangladesh generally has good food - the only challenge is ordering it as the Bangladeshi's don't believe in menus... you just sit down and they say "what do you want" (in Bangla), and you say "what do you have" and they look at you confused, and then we say, with our hands, "bring everything" and then all sorts of plates arrive of mostly meats and a few veg dishes and we pig out and send back what we can't eat, and after a main course extravaganza, dessert (dui!!!), cold drinks and tea it comes to around R25 ($4) for both of us! Rejane hasn't cooked in 6 months... I wonder why?!

Meeting a Marma tribal person (left) and a Bangla guy (right) in the Bandarban forests

Cruising the river on a local boat in Bandarban

Shopping for a nice fat cow for Eid ul Adha

VIDEO: A typical day in the market in Bandarban

"Tribal" women smoking cigars while bargaining at the Eid market in Bandarban

Outside our traditional bamboo hut in Bandarban

View from our hotel in Bandarban

From Bandarban, it was straight north to Sylet, the tea-growing region of Bangladesh. We didn't spend anytime in the capital city of the Sylet region but headed directly to Srimangal, a lovely village where lots of tea is grown. There we met Roni, a lovely guide, who took us around to tea estates, introduced us to Srimangal's many-layered tea and showed us around his village (if you're planning to spend any time in Srimangal, we'd highly recommend you contact Roni on: 01719239367)

The many-layered tea made in Srimangal is a well guarded secret and the layers really are completely distinct in colour and taste (see pic below).

With Roni, our guide, at a Srimangal tea estate

Enjoying 5 and 10 layer tea

After Srimangal we had no choice but to head to Dhaka to apply for our new India visas - it was the reason we came to Bangladesh, after all. We were a little apprehensive as we'd been told several times that Dhaka was noisy, polluted and traffic-jammed. Well that it is, but the craziness grows on you and Old Dhaka is a labyrinth of interesting market streets that offer a complete assault on all your senses, a real must-do experience.

The crazy streets of old Dhaka

At a perfumery in Old Dhaka

Typical Bangladesh/Indian wiring... an art not a science.

After a week waiting for the India embassy to issue our Indian visas so that we can continue our bike journey there - they turned our visa application down! Bastards! They rudely said we must go and get new visas in South Africa - and then chased us out of the embassy and wouldn't allow us to enquire why our visa was rejected.

So that curveball means we're on a flight tomorrow to Nepal to try and get an Indian visa there - apparently that Indian embassy is more helpful. And then we'll be back on our way to Darjeeling to fetch our bike and our luggage and to carry on our Indian travels... unless of course we are seduced by some Nepalese adventures...

The 57 hour Express to Calcutta

2009-11-01T13:56:00.022+05:30

From Manali we took two days to get to Kalka, from where we were to catch the train to Kolkata (Calcutta). Rejane had done some very diligent research and managed to figure out the fairly complicated but surprisingly efficient Indian Rail booking system. Being in the middle of school holidays, the time of Diwali and a very big festival dedicated to the Goddess Durga, all we could get were waitlisted tickets for our Kalka to Kolkata train ride. We’d been assured that since we were high up on the waiting list, we’d have no problem getting seated on the day of travel.

We arrived at Kalka train station around 5pm and spent a hot, sweaty hour getting the bike wrapped and packed for the train trip. Then we settled in for the 3 hour wait until the waitlist charts were prepared and we’d know whether or not we had seats on the train. At around 9.30pm, when the waitlist sheets were released, we were told we had not been granted seats – it was the middle of holiday season afterall. We were then told to wait until 11pm to speak to the train station manager who might be able to organise something. At 11pm, the train station manager was nowhere to be found. Now what? The bike was already booked, packed and paid for to go onto Kolkata.

That was when the chaos kicked in: our enquiries as to whether or not there was any way at all that we could get onto the train led to us being surrounded by several people, including the packing department guys, some police/military officers, porters and a couple of other random people all with very little English and each confidently claiming that he’d organised everything for us and knew what would happen next... each had a different story...:
1. we would be getting 2nd class tickets straight to Kolkata.
2. we would get 3rd class tickets to Delhi (about one third of the way to Kolkata) and would be given new tickets there to go immediately onto Kolkata.
3. we would get some ticket to Delhi and would have to wait there for a few days to get a new ticket to Kolkata.
4. we had to buy new unreserved class tickets for Kolkata (this option meant being squashed with an uncountable number of people on hard wooden seats for the 33 hour ride).

Better not misplace those elephants...R1000 maximum liabilty claim

By 11.45pm we were sitting (listening at various times to whichever one of our ‘organisers’ was not running around at that point organising our tickets and/or tea) on the train station platform, hot, exhausted, hungry, not knowing whether or not we’d get on this train or not or have to find a hotel room at midnight in a small town we’d never been to before. About 5 minutes later and with 5 minutes to spare before the train was to leave and still with absolutely no idea as to what our eventual fate was to be, Dave was ushered to a desk on the platform, ordered to buy new unreserved class tickets (the class with the wooden benches that always has space for just one more) and we were ushered into comfortable 2nd class seats ...??? ...but we were not complaining... – this only took us to Delhi though. To have been in various states of limbo and confusion, surrounded by chaos for 7 hours and then for everything to turn out OK in the last 5 minutes is, well... what can I say... just a very special, very Indian experience...

Our bike-packing wallahs

We arrived in Delhi at 6am in the morning tired, lugging our backpacks, helmets and all the heavy bike stuff. No tickets to Kolkata were available for that day but we managed to get tickets to leave for Kolkata the following morning so we were forced to enjoy the Delhi chaos for a night. We arrived in Kolkata two days later – having taken 57 hours to complete what was meant to be a 33 hour express train journey.

The Victoria Memorial and Museum - Kolkata

As big Indian cities go, Kolkata is one of the nicest. It’s still an Indian city though, so after enjoying some especially lovely high teas and getting our Bangladeshi visas, we hightailed it out of there and headed north for Darjeeling.

Stopping for tea under a very big, old tree on the way to Darjeeling

The bike ride to Darjeeling was beautiful. The lush, tropical landscape is a dead ringer for Port St, Johns on the Transkei Wild Coast. Darjeeling itself is prime tea growing area surrounded by the snow-capped Himalayas, with views of Kanchendzonga, which at 8600m is the world’s 3rd highest mountain. We got a great hotel room with panoramic views of the surrounding landscape and mountain tops and all we had to do for spectacular sunrises was to stretch over, pull open our curtains and wha-la!

Beautiful views from the road of rice-paddies and farmers at work

A view from our hotel room in Darjeeling - Kanchendzonga in the distance

From Darjeeling we were on our bike again and up to the magical province of Sikkim. This used to be a kingdom under India’s protection, but a referendum in the 70’s resulted in the abandonment of the monarchy and Sikkim’s absorption into India. Sikkim is thought by many to be the true location of the fabled Shangri La, which is thought to be a derivative of Sikkim’s “Wild Alder Pass” or Sangali La. True or not, this is definitely one of the most beautiful regions we’ve ever seen (ja, we know we’ve said that before but this country just keeps on surprising).

Sikkim is mountainous, but most of it is below 3000m above sea level and so it is covered with lush, pristine, indigenous forests dripping with vines, streams and rivers – some a startling bright blue, as well as all sorts of colourful flowers, butterflies and birds (including the Red Jungle Fowl – the original chicken). Towering in the west is the snow-capped Kanchendzonga.

We headed first to the capital Gangtok which, despite being a bustling city, is still enclosed by forest – most cities are quickly deforested but somehow Gangtok’s forest has remained intact. There we spent a night before heading to nearby Rumtek the home of one of Sikkim’s most important monasteries. We stayed 3 nights at a beautiful lodge in a wood-panelled room with a balcony overlooking the forested valley.

The lodge offered good food comprising of Tibetan/Ladakhi vegetarian meals including the ever-popular momo’s which are steamed dumplings filled with minced veggies and a lovely balcony with spectacular views from which to enjoy our meals. After a few days of veggie food, we located a non-vegetarian restaurant in the village and feasted on chicken and fish. The funny thing with many parts of both Buddhist and Hindu India is that eating meat is frowned upon and thus often only available at equally frowned upon alcohol bars. These bars generally consist of small curtained cubicles where you can secretly drink your beer and/or eat your chicken safe from the disapproving stares of the general public...

The working Buddhist monastery in Rumtek

In Rumtek we decided to explore the forest and ended up semi-lost for a few hours clambering through the thick vegetation beneath towering trees, wondering about the prevalence of tigers and king cobras in the area, until we emerged in tiny village where we walked back to Rumtek along the road. We also visited the Rumtek monastery which was colourful and filled with the usual Buddhist imagery of crazy fire-breathing monster-things and a huge statue of Buddha - for a religion without a god, Buddhism certainly incorporates a lot of other magical beings... The monastery did have a lot of positive environmental messages and was doing some good recycling work.

Getting lost in Sikkim's lush forests

Breakfast and spectacular forest views - on the balcony of our hotel room in Rumtek

From Ravang La we travelled on to the town of Pelling which faces the mighty Kanchendzonga mountain. Here again we were blown away by the beautiful hotel room - complete with ensuite bathroom, balcony looking straight at the peaks and satellite TV - for just R80 a night… We did a couple of day trips from Pelling doing some of the best biking so far on empty roads through dense forest with the odd waterfall on to the road to keep you cool. First we visited Khecheopalri Lake, a beautiful peaceful lake filled with fish and surrounded by forest littered with prayer flags. Prayer flags are basically flags with prayers or mantras written on them that are thought to spread good vibrations to all livings beings when fluttered by the wind – nice thought, though like most superstitions completely illogical and can lead to beautiful natural places becoming defaced with millions of flags fluttering.

We visited another temple called Tashiding, which was interesting, but far surpassed by the beautiful scenery on the ride there and back. After 4 days in Pelling we headed to our favourite spot in Sikkim, a brilliant homestay on top of the steepest road we’ve seen, in the village of Chakung.

VIDEO: The road to Khecheopalri Lake - forests, waterfalls, snow-capped mountain views, landslides..

Khecheopalri Lake - surrounded by thick, indigenous forest

The Kazi Koti homestay (www.kazikoti.weebly.com) is the old home of one of Sikkim’s democracy leaders who fought the monarchy there. It is surrounded by a beautiful flower garden and working organic farm and is managed by his Grandson, Bhaila. The rooms are comfortable and the view of Kanchendzonga breathtaking. We ate meals with the family in the kitchen – with meat! - and enjoyed millet beer, a clearer version of umqombothi back home. The home had beautiful hanging chairs where we chilled drinking tea and reading books. Great spot!

The stunning front garden of the Kazi Koti homestay

Relaxing in a garden swing chair

More swinging chairs, breathtaking views and beautiful organic gardens

Making our contribution to the Kazi Koti gardens - two guava trees

Our very hospitable family in Chakung

After about 2 weeks in Sikkim we headed back to Darjeeling, where we left our motorbike at our friendly hotel and hopped on a bus to Bangladesh. We entered at the very north of the country at a little-used border so we were the centre of attention, attracting lots of crowds, as tourists are virtually unheard of here.

Our first night we slept in a basic hotel with big spiders and then headed to Rangpur, the first large town. Bangladesh is a very flat country with thousands of rivers in every direction. The giant Himalayan snow peaks and glaciers we visited in north India melt and flow down mostly towards Bangladesh with a third of the country looking like a giant river delta… one of the reasons why Bangladesh is so prone to flooding.

Bicycles and 3-wheeler rickshaws everywhere - a welcome relief from the noisy, polluted traffic-jammed Indian towns

It is a beautiful country which feels like it is how India must have been 30 years ago. There’s very little motorised transport and the towns are filled with many thousands of 3-wheeler bicycle rickshaws which transport everyone all over the city for between R0-50c to R2 a trip. It is almost eerie travelling silently on a rickshaw amongst hundreds of others along road devoid of the very noisy traffic that India has, like a silent travel movie. Rangpur also has a new phenomenon which is the electric three wheeler taxi, a smart looking car-thing with a motorbike front which can take 4 – 6 passengers and runs on electricity. To buy, this taxi cost just R10,000 (US$1,300) and takes 8 hours to charge on a normal household socket and can cover 120km on a single charge. It’s made in China and is definitely something that other countries, including South Africa! should consider for inner-city transport.

The rural landscape is lush green with endless rice paddies as far as the eye can see, with the odd banana grove here and there and tree-filled villages.

VIDEO: Cruising on the back of a 3-wheeler rickshaw taxi in Rangpur

Rangpur is a bustling university town with an awesome night bazaar filled with all sorts of weird and wonderful delights and it is where we began our street food fetish, kebabs, mini curries, breads, fruits, chai, sweetbreads - all costing just a few cents - is our standard dinner these days. While India is heaven for vegetarians, Bangladesh would be hell, there is meat in almost everything (which suits us carnivores just fine) although you have to look into the pots carefully or you could be in for a lung and tripe surprise...Other than the bazaar, though, Rangpur didn’t have much to detain us so we bordered another bus and headed to Rajshahi, another large town on the banks of the Padme river. In the evenings the riverside has a dilapidated boardwalk vibe with chai and food stalls which we’ve visited while watching the sun set across the river with India visible in the distance.

This country is just one massive, beautiful rice paddy!

Bangladeshi’s are friendly people who have a standard series of questions:
What is your name?
What is your country?
What is your occupation?
What is your qualification? (Bachelor? Masters?)
What is the purpose of your visit?

And Dave seems to be the man (or the badboy) for having a Bangladeshi girlfriend although sometimes Rejane is thought to be his interpreter… Dave has great novelty power here and can stop traffic by just crossing the road and can turn every head in the market with his (good? white?) looks!

Darling I like you but not so fast

2009-09-29T17:34:00.030+05:30

While walking around the main bazaar, a couple of days after reaching Leh, Dave says: "You know, with all these backpackers around, I wonder if we'll bump into anyone we know" ... well, this is the land where serendipity, fate and kismet actually work and about 5 minutes later, we bumped into Carlos, a Bulungula regular and Bridget, head of Eco-schools in South Africa. That was the beginning of many social lunches, teas and dinners we'd have in Leh during our 3 week stay. We used Leh as our base, stored most of our stuff at our guesthouse and explored the interesting and very beautiful mountainous region from there.

Hanging with other travellers at Shanti Stupa - the town of Leh is in the background

17th century Palace in Leh, modelled on the Potala Palace in Lhasa, Tibet

After a lot of aaauummmms and sun salutations at our medidation course, our first adventure was on a 5 day homestay trek in the Sham valley area, just west of Leh. The homestays are organised by the Snow Leopard Conservancy who have turned this natural home of the snow leopard into a tourist attraction and money earner for the villagers who were exterminating the leopards because of the threat to their livestock. A portion of the homestay earnings goes into a conservancy fund that provides insurance for any livestock lost to the snow leopards. In the 6 years since the programme began, the attitude towards snow leopards has changed markedly and their numbers have been growing.

Ladakhi women in traditional dress at the Leh Festival

Our first homestay was in the village of Ulley which has only 7 households and is situated at about 4200 metres above sea level. We planned to do some walking the following day (Rejane's birthday) but it snowed all day and we ended up huddled in the kitchen with the family eating traditional Ladakhi food, drinking lots of tea, playing cards and fooling around with the kids. We decided to stick to English tea after experimenting briefly with Tibetan butter tea, which is not a tea at all but a rich, salty, buttery soup that congeals in your cup as soon as it starts to cool. Trying to do the polite thing and gulping it down quickly is not much of a solution as it is Tibetan custom to keep the visitor's cup constantly topped up...

Don't look down! - on the way to our homestay in Ulley

The kitchen, the warmest place in the homestead - Ulley Village

Stone-throwing competition - with a 5 year old...mmm

Wow! it's cold up there and it's still a way away from the winter months. All we had for washing was a basin of ice-cold water in the open courtyard and in the snow!

The following day was bright, although still chilly, while we hiked up to Tso Rangan - a holy lake at around 4500m above sea level. On the way back, we met the mama (ama-ley) of our house very busy in the fields getting her barley harvested - they only have a few more weeks before they get completely snowed in - bringing the short 3/4 months of growing and harvesting to an end before about 9 months of bitter cold sets in.

The holy lake, Tso Rangan, after a day of snow

After Ulley we had a much easier walk down to the village of Hemis - which is considerably larger (about the size of Nqileni village). There we met a group of travellers and walked with them onto our next homestay in the village of Ang where there was lots of chang, the local barley beer, being brewed. The walk to Ang turned out to be particularly challenging because we'd missed the path up the mountain slope and had to traverse a very slippery sand and skree slope on all fours! ...a bit of an adrenaline rush that makes you forget completely about how tiring the climbing is and makes you concentrate on just trying not to fall!!!

Rejane (2nd from the front) on all fours climbing the slippery skree slope...

Back at home base in Leh, we were pleasantly surprised by bumping into some more friends from home: Mike and Laura from Buccanneers - it was a real shock and such a treat - just what were chances of meeting up with some Wild Coast neighbours here in the Himalayas! After spending a couple of sociable days with the all new people we'd met around Leh and old friends from home, we headed to Nubra Valley - over Khardung La - the highest motorable road in the world at 5602 metres above sea level (18 380 feet). The drive was fantastic with more entertaining road signs dishing out good advice to motorists: "Darling, I like you but not so Fast", "Better to be Mr. Late than Late Mr.", " Love your Neighbour, but not while Driving" and some, sharing the philosophical musings of the state's authorities, like: " Without Geography, You Are Nowhere" (good point).

On the way to the top of Khardung La

On the top at Khardung La - highest motorable road in the world

There was lots of snow at the top of the mountain pass but that was no problem for Dave's new, finely honed biking skills. Having reached Nubra valley we headed for Hunder, a village surrounded by desert sand dunes, for a short two-humped camel safari.

Two-humped Camel Safari

Beautiful flower garden at our guest house in Hunder

After Hunder, we explored Panamik, another beautiful village in the valley and, having met some interesting people, decided to socialise and just chill for an extra day before heading back to base in Leh.

A few AAAaammmss on the river at Panicker Village to rebalance those chakras

Then, after more socialising and enjoying Leh's great restaurants, we decided to explore Pangong Lake on the Chinese border. It is the highest salt-water lake in the world that lies 25% in India and 75% in China. Because we'd already been over Khardung La, the highest motorable pass in the world, we figured that going to Pangong Lake, which was on the other side of only the third highest pass in the world, would be a piece of cake. It certainly didn't cross our minds that it could possibly be colder - big mistake! Well, before we had even reached the top of the pass, we were freezing and hungry - having left without having had any breakfast. There are no villages for miles on the way to the pass and nowhere to get a cup of tea or anything to eat. In desperation, we stopped at an army base, manning the sensitive India-China border, to ask how far the next village was and to our surprise the soldiers treated us to hot tea and snacks - they must have been concerned about losing a couple of tourists to hypothermia!

On the road to Pangong Lake

Pangong Lake

Pangong Lake was breathtakingly beautiful but cold, very cold and the following day, as we got ready to return to Leh, it starting snowing... and we'd thought the previous day's trip had been cold... The road over the pass was covered in ice, making the bike ride a slippery one and Rejane had to get off and walk the downhills while Daredevil Dave enjoyed the slip-and-slide.

Enjoying the icy slip-and-slide back down to Leh

Leh was starting to look like a ghost town when we got back, the buses and flights were chocoblock with tourists hightailing it out of there before it got completely snowed in. We started to make our own plans to leave but not before saying goodbye to all our new friends and enjoying our last Himalayan cuisine and fruit. In our 35 years on this earth, we have simply not tasted apples until we'd tasted the organic, homegrown apples of the small farmers of Ladakh and that's not an exaggeration - Woolies kan gaan slaap. So, finally we left Leh, Ladakh, our home for more than 3 weeks and headed south, via Tso Moriri, yet another stunning lake set in a cold and stark Himalayan rural village, the scenery taking over first place for the most beautiful we've seen on the trip so far.

VIDEO (press play!): Purple road on the way to Tso Moriri

The road from Leh, south to Manali, has a voracious reputation that didn't disappoint; our bike was duly ravished and it took three days, one flat tyre and two busted shock absorbers before we reached Manali. The road although beautiful was, once again, stark and devoid of any settled villages. We overnighted in a tented camp without any toilets and little privacy afforded by the desert landscape - challenging even for a couple of Transkei locals.

VIDEO: Snow Road on the Leh-Manali road

VIDEO: No river is wide enough...small river crossing

After 4 of our hardest travelling days yet, the landscape started to become greener and the air more moist. Our bodies were parched after the dry desert air in Ladakh where we'd had nosebleeds and skin rashes that only pure Vaseline petroleum jelly, applied twice a day (to our entire bodies) made any difference - we'd really tried everything and, yes, good old fashioned Vaseline was the only solution.

Back below the tree line

In Manali we had a good rest, watched lots of cricket and planned the way forward. We have to leave India at the end of October to renew our Indian visas. Tomorrow we start heading east to explore the region called Sikkim & Darjeeling before crossing over to Bangladesh to get new visas and to explore that country for about 6 weeks.

From a Backpacker's Paradise to Paradise on Earth

2009-09-01T19:18:00.014+05:30

After a very relaxing time indulging in Shimla's good food and beautiful promenades, we headed off to Daramsala, the Dalai Lama's residence in exile. In Daramsala we stayed in the little town of Macleod Ganj, a backpacker's paradise. So far, our route has taken us on the Indian pilgrimage routes and to Indian holiday towns, like Shimla, so it was nice to experience the foreign backpacker circuit for a little while. Macleod Ganj has the typical backpacker chillout-type restaurants with Tibetan, Japanese, Chinese, Indian, Korean, Italian, Thai and Israeli food, several German bakeries, English breakfasts (the real deal with all the works - not easy to find in India), Continental breakfasts with croissants and lots of the local bhang going around. So we did the backpacker thing and sat around for hours talking to Tibetan monks about China’s actions towards Tibet (Dave taking the provocative side of the argument, of course), the history of Tibet and all our past and future lives. It was a busy social calendar having met up with our friend Glynnis from back home and Anke, another lovely South African, who spoilt us with our first home-cooked meal in 2 months, introduced us to their local mates and to some lovely restaurants and hang-out spots.

Delicious dinner with Glynnis and Anke at a Korean Restaurant in Macleod Ganj

Having managed to finally escape from Daramsala (a couple of days later than originally planned) we were off to a whole new world in Kashmir - Paradise on Earth - as we were told by one of the thousands of army guys posted there, who stopped us to take all our details on the way in. There's no need to be nervous going to Kashmir, India has literally posted personnel every few 100 meters on the 250km road in - in full army gear. In Srinagar, the capital of Kashmir, we planned to find a houseboat on the lake - it's the thing to do there. There are hundreds on the lake (it's a big lake so there seems to be plenty of room for all) but with tourism still a little slow post the trouble between Pakistan and India, you have to be prepared to handle all the touts trying to get you stay on their houseboat (the first tout followed our motorbike - 8kms from the lake - shouting at us from his bike!).

Flipping through Satellite TV channels in the luxury of our houseboat

With Dave's tough negotiating skills we managed to find a great houseboat at a ridiculously low price - 100ft long, very luxuriously decorated with a personal butler at your service 24/7 - all for about R250 per day for both of us including fantastic Kashmiri meals! It was strange having the butler, Rajah, ready to get us anything we needed – all we had to do was shout (like the manager of the boat did) at the top of our lungs: “RaaaaJAAAAAHHHH” and tea or laundry or dinner would appear but - being boring South Africans - we’d wait around until he happened to walk by and then, having caught his eye, we’d politely enquire whether or not a cup of tea was at all possible…

Dal Lake at sunset from the veranda of our houseboat

The houseboat thing on the lakes in Srinagar was started by the British because the Maharaja of Kashmir wouldn't allow them to buy property there - and they really decked them out well: our houseboat was lavishly decorated with hand-embroidered Kashmiri curtains and bedspreads, hand-carved walnut-wood furniture, hand-painted vases and lamps, thick maroon carpets, fine china tea-sets and satellite TV.

Lillies on Dal Lake

The lake is peaceful and beautiful - especially at sunset although you do get bugged a lot by salesmen coming around to the boats selling vegetables, flowers, saffron, Kashmiri shawls and fabrics, painted artwork and all sorts of other things. They're really tough businessmen and you have to have your negotiating skills finely tuned - it can be pretty hard work - Dave's really good at it but Rejane just gets skinned!

Boat tour on the lake

After enjoying days on boat tours around the lakes and being thoroughly spoilt by Rajah and the family who manages the houseboat, we headed off to the eastern half of Kashmir, following the ancient silk route that crossed through Asia to Europe, passing wild looking mountain nomads with their huge herds of goats – tough looking people who traverse mountains thousands of meters above sea level to graze their animals in the short summer months and who you probably wouldn’t want to challenge to a game of Survivor!

Herdsmen and their goats on the old silk road

After a tough day of bike-riding, we reached the town of Kargil, an important town during the time when the silk route was the main trading road through Asia. It’s largely populated with very devout Shia muslims – girls as young as 3 years old are covered up in burkhas. The next day, we took a detour south to the Suru valley and got our first puncture. Being a little inexperienced at motorbike tyre changes, it took a couple of hours to get it done, surrounded by curious, snot-nosed kids and very helpful local guys.

Changing the flat tyre on the Suru Valley Road

In the morning we took the first shot at our mission in the Suru valley – to see the majestic snow-capped Nun-Kun peaks and glacier fields. We got very lost and had to try it all again the following day – but it was worth it! The views of the peaks and the valley below were just breathtaking. The villages during these summer months are just idyllic with families very busy harvesting barley and wheat crops in a breathtakingly beautiful setting. The winter months are tough, though, with the villages under snow 6 feet deep for 9 months of the year and the only way in and out is to walk on the frozen river.

Views of the Valley from the mountain top

The Nun-Kun Peaks

We planned to carry on further into the remote Zanskar Valley, to see its ancient Buddhist monasteries but we busted a shock absorber on the motorbike and given the atrocious state of the roads, it was best to head back to Kargil to get it fixed. Despite its claim to fame as having been a major town on the old silk route, there isn’t much to see in Kargil itself so, having fixed the shocks, we headed to our next big destination –Leh, Ladakh, in the eastern, undisputed, half of Kashmir.

Dry desert stretch on the Kargil-Leh Road

Breathtaking views of the desert Himalaya mountains

On the 234kms stretch of road, the towns became less Muslim and more Buddhist, with pure white Stupas (Buddhist shrines) gleaming against the stark desert landscape. We were well above tree-line now and crossed a mountain pass 4019 meters (13479 feet) above sea level. The views were undoubtedly some of the most beautiful we’ve ever seen. We were lucky to have just missed a landslide and managed to wind our way cheekily through the traffic jam of hundreds buses and trucks, backed up while the landslide was being cleared – one of the biggest advantages of being on a bike! The mountain pass is so narrow that the huge trucks had to pass each other literally inches from the edge of the pass in order to clear the traffic jam.

Psychedelic trucks passing each other with inches away from a tumble down the mountain pass!

Dave on the mountain pass at 4019m (13479ft) above sea level

Having arrived in Leh, gob-smacked by the spectacular drive, we were further impressed by the fantastic value of the accommodation – lovely, bright rooms with beautiful flower and veggie gardens and views of the snow-capped peaks in the distance. Leh is also teeming with environmental, cultural, womens’ rights and other NGO’s that have managed to ban plastic in the town and who have made interesting documentaries about the changes (good and bad) that tourism has brought to the region. We participated in some fascinating and thought-provoking discussion groups before heading to relaxing meditation classes...

Let the travels begin!

2009-08-11T19:52:00.031+05:30

India is a busy place, anything you need to buy or sell is possible, just find your local specialist or 'wallah'. Need a cup of tea? find the chai-wallah. got a flat? tyre-wallah. hungry? samoosa-wallah...so we're the travel-wallahs specialising in travelling this year.

We arrived in Bangalore on the 17 June smack-bang into one of India's big, busy, polluted and noisy, noisy, noisy cities. But we were exhausted enough to just pass out when we got to the hotel, despite the constant city din: the sound of hooters, loud street conversations, things (not sure what) banging in our hotel all night long. Having side mirrors on your vehicle is not compulsory but having a super-loud horn, that is in constant use, is.

Public gardens in Bangalore

Still in get up and go mode from our previous lives, we set off the very next day to find the Enfield motorcycle showroom. We wanted a new bike to give ourselves the best chance of survival on the crazy Indian roads we'd been warned about. And since neither of us has ever owned (or even driven) a bike before, we figured best try and reduce the potential for breakdowns, at least, with a brand new bike.

So we arrived at the Enfield showroom, credit card in hand, ready to scoot off with our new purchase - but it was not to be. We had our first encounter with Indian bureaucracy - in order to buy any new vehicle, a permanent Indian home address, work address and permission from the Police Commissioner are required. A little research on the internet and we found our answer: Lalli Singh. He did long-term leases on motobikes for foreigners but he was in Delhi, a long way from Bangalore. We decided to head that way but break the journey halfway in Goa and at least get some holiday time for a start! During our lunch soujourn in the park in an attempt to escape the exhausting hustle and bustle of the city and to plan our journey, we met some guys from the Kinder caste who smacked us about the heads with their dupatta scarves, muttered something that was apparently a blessing and demanded money from us. Kinder are transvestites, who are supposed to be hermaphrodites, and who demand cash in exchange for blessings. It's very bad luck to refuse them and if they pitch up at weddings, they make big bucks from families wanting to avoid evil vibes.

Having decided to postpone the bike mission to Delhi, there was no reason to hang around in Bangalore any longer. So we left Bangalore that same evening on the overnight bus to Gorkana, a beach village outside of Goa. The overnight buses are sleeper buses so we got a proper double bed and the journey was relatively painless. Gorkana was a disappointment though; the beaches are polluted, full of plastic litter and the water is uninviting. On the second night, we met two lovely Indian guys, Mishrah and Neeraj, who were on their way to Goa the following day and offered us a lift there. On the 3 hour drive we quizzed them on everything from acceptable tipping practice to caste conventions and arranged marriages. They introduced us to Idli, a breakfast rice cake dish and a variety of delicious lunch and dinner options we may have been nervous to experiment with on our own.

Mishra, Neeraj and Rejane at our breakfast stop on the way to Goa

We had a swim in the very warm Indian Ocean, hung out at the beach bars and stayed in a classic Goan beach hut. It was too hot to stay for too long on the beach, though, and the next day we moved to the cooler and very beautiful palm-lined streets of the village. We got our own little apartment with a kitchen and balcony for 400 Rupees per night (about 70 Rand). Dave hired a motorbike – to get some practice before we got the real thing - and we spent our days cruising around the villages, having sundowners on the beach and watching old Michael Jackson memorial music videos on TV (surprised at all the ads for skin whitening – Indians seem to have an obsession with fair skin).

Beach hut in Benaulim, Goa

Dave learning to ride a motorbike in Goa (and getting a cool blow-dry look at the same time)

After a 9 day chill-out in Goa, we took the train to Delhi, with temperatures starting to hover in the late-30's we opted for the luxury of an air-conditioned carriage (it was a 36 hour train ride after all). The trains are very organised, with fresh, clean linen and lots to eat! In addition to the train catered meals - there is a constant stream of chai-wallahs, samoosa, chips, chocolate, noodle-wallahs shouting chaaaiiiiiii, mmmmasallah - chhhhaaaaaaaaaaaaiiiiiii, sssaaaaaammmmmmmmooooosa, noooooodle, chips, chocolate, numkeen......accompanied by the burps and constant munching sounds of our fellow passengers - Indian is snacking country!

Delhi is the quintessential crazy Indian city, it's really hard work just walking around; you constantly have to watch out for cow shit, holes in the road and pavements, cars, motorcycles, rickshaws, gobs of phlegm (Indian men seem to have alarmingly large amounts of phlegm that they need to get rid of all day), lots of people, water (running in the street and falling from the buildings above) and look for the place you're trying to find all at the same time…but we eventually found Lalli Singh's shop and he organized a brand new – off the showroom floor Enfield 500cc motorcycle for us to lease from him – all in one afternoon. He needed a few days to get the paperwork sorted and suggested we head to Rishikesh for the weekend.

The bus ride to Rishikesh was hot with the bus packed with families and babies with diarrhea. We arrive tired and irritable lugging our backpacks around the town looking for a hotel while dodging deposits from cows (also with diarrhea)…Rishikesh is a holy city built around the banks of the Ganges (Ganga) River, but a dirty one. The cows have the right to life and to be worshipped but only garbage dumps with lots of plastic waste to eat from, hence their rummy tummies (this is just not the same stuff we have on our floors at Bulungula!). Also our visit coincided with the annual spiritual pilgrimage to Haridwar and Rishikesh which are significant as the last places the Ganges flows through before heading from the mountains to the plains. Every year, at this time, the towns are swamped with thousands of people dressed in holy orange, saffron coloured clothing and blessings are on sale for whatever you heart desires. Evenings on the river are beautiful, though, with lit pujas (offerings) floating down the river while the devout purify themselves in the holy (but not so clean) water.

Rishikesh on the banks of the Ganga

Then it was back to Delhi (on another very hot bus ride - 41 degrees, no aircon and lots of passengers) to shop for motorbike accessories and get the bike on the road! We wanted to get out of Delhi as soon as possible to escape the over-40 degree sweltering heat. We shopped well, negotiating hard and finding good prices and quality for helmets, elbow and knee protectors, rain suits, gloves, goggles, riding boots and even balaclavas for the cold Himalayan mountains: “Airbriting is posseeble hin Hindia, saar” we were told, with a head-wobble and a big smile, while trying to find the long list of essentials Dave compiled during his thorough internet research.

Doing a good luck "puja" for our new bike and upcoming journey

Then we were ready to go! We were up at 4 am the next morning heading due north to get out the heat and the craziness. There is only one rule of the road in India (the only one that anyone bothers to follow anyway): the biggest vehicle always has right of way! Trucks and buses are at the top of the food chain, then tractors, cars, auto-rickshaws and finally motorbikes (pedestrians never have right of way). The one exception to the road pecking order is the Holy Cow – which trumps all. We’ve had trucks come at us on our side of the road, in which case we’ve been advised to pull over and just wait for them to pass. Indian cars come fitted with a device that allows the driver to see past blind corners - unfortunately, this device is not for sale to South Africans... After a 12 hour day on the bike, getting a little lost and with a couple of very sore arses we finally got to Nanital, 2300 metres above sea level – it was like someone had just turned on the aircon…

Rejane on the bike on the way to Nanital

Nanital is a pretty little town built around a crater lake and we got a hotel room with a view of the lake and a family of monkeys with a brood of naughty little babies that lived just outside our window. We indulged in some lovely curries and took a few days to recover from our long first day on the road…

Monkeys outside our lodge window in Nanital

From Nanital we took a short drive up to a beautiful small town called Almora, where our hotel balcony overlooked valleys and mountains. The town had a cool bazaar filled with all sorts of weird and wonderful things. The next morning and we took a short bike ride up a winding mountain road to Jageshwar, a rural village surrounded by Cedar forests. You might get a sore arse but nothing beats a bike for enjoying the views along the way. Jageshwar has a 10th century Hindu temple, and a steep 3km walk up the hill takes you to the, mostly abandoned, old village on the edge of massive cliff looking way down on tiny villages below and the snow-capped Himalayas in the distance.

Jageshwar village

After two days there we set off on a two-day mission up into the Himalayas through beautiful villages surrounded by terraced, bright green rice paddies in one stunning valley after another. The roads signs provide additional entertainment on the long road. From sensible advice: "If you sleep, your family weep" and "Blow Horn at Curves" to philosophical: "Life is a journey, complete it" to completely incomprehensible: "Fist is Always Fist, Then Why Fist" and my favourites: "Don't gossip, let him drive" and "Don't nag him, let him drive"!

Generally, in the two months we've been here, and having only seen a bit of the south and one province in the north, the rural poverty situation in India doesn't seem to come close to what you find in Africa or even poorer parts of South America. People have nice houses, clean water, (unreliable) electricity, decent roads and there's loads of farming going on. Also everyone is doing some sort of business/service, so whatever you need, you can find almost anywhere - and cheap too. The other day we needed to adjust the brakes, fit a missing bolt, grease the chain and check the clutch fluid at an official Enfield dealer, the total cost: R10! This means that a rural person can get things made/fixed affordably but also that there are lots of jobs to fill, tyre-wallah, bike-wallah, seat-wallah, laundry-wallah...

After a day's winding our way through these villages and then up high into the mountains we arrived in Badrinath.

Badrinath town with Ganga river and hot springs in centre

Badrinath is in quite a spectacular setting with giant snow-capped mountains rising on all sides and was our first experience of 3000m+ altitudes. We seemed to avoid any serious symptoms of altitude sickness but on our first day we did a 10km walk up to a sacred waterfall - which was slow going with the lack of oxygen. Badrinath is one of a number of sources of the holy Ganga (Ganges) river and this waterfall represented the religious source that Hindu pilgrims visited. Many would catch the water in bottles and take it home with them.

We hadn't intended to stay long in Badrinath as we wanted to head 20km down the road to hike up to the Valley of Flowers. However when we got back from the waterfall, we were told that a massive landslide had destroyed the road and a bridge and so everyone was trapped in Badrinath until further notice! This was our first of many experiences of landslides on this trip... Trapped with little entertainment - no English TV, no internet, no bars and we were fast getting through our books. Little to do but eat the town's limited range of vegetarian food.

We waited another day until a police truck came round with a loud hailer announcing that the road would open the next morning. At the crack of dawn, we and hundreds of others jumped on our bikes and rushed in excitement down the road only to find that the road was still very much closed with giant bulldozers and trucks trying to clear the huge boulders off the road and make some sort of bridge plan. July and August are monsoon season in India when heavy rains lash the whole country. Because the Himalayan mountains are so incredibly steep - sheer cliffs in many places - the heavy rains (in some places they get 10 meters of rain in a season!) wash away sand, which dislodges giant, house-sized boulders that then cause an avalanche of rock and mud that can smother whole villages. The 50+ landslides we've seen so far seemed to have all been natural occurences - part of the natural erosion of the Himalayan peaks - although in some parts of the country, human activity has exacerbated it. It's an interesting feeling driving past rocks in the road on a motorbike knowing that one could easily dislodge at any moment!

Landslide - there was a bridge there...

Anyway, there we were stuck at the landslide for hours watching the military's heavy equipment at work, wondering how long it would take to open, when suddenly the mad Indian bikers start hooting and revving their bikes and the military guys start blowing their whistles and the bikers begin a mad dash straight through the icy river filled with massive boulders where a giant truck had been stuck minutes before. We ran to our bike and Dave with the help of a couple of Indian guys got it and our luggage (about 250kg of weight including the bike) through the river without any damage - just a bit wet.

Safely across the danger zone

Another one!

A few more landslides and we were at the dirty fly-ridden town of Govind Ghat at the foot of the trail leading up to the Valley of Flowers. The next morning we began hiking the steep 14kms to the small village of Ghangariya where we slept and in the morning hiked another 10km to visit the Valley of Flowers, climbing from 1800m to 3500m in altitude. The Valley is incredibly beautiful, it is surrounded by snow-capped Himalayan peaks and the green, lush valley floor is filled with a dense, varied range of bright flowers, quite different to what one would see in Namaqualand (SA). We spent the day there exploring, returned to Ghangariya to sleep and returned again to the valley the next day. Beautiful place.

Hiking up to the Valley of Flowers

Valley of Flowers

Our next mission was to go to Kedarnath, another Hindu holy place, also a source of the Ganga river. Unfortunately we were trapped by another landslide and were forced to stay one more day in horrible Govind Ghat. Then, having got through that one, happy to be on the road again, we were trapped the following morning, yet again! We were forced to stay in the town of Joshimath where we got attacked by bed bugs - itched like crazy for days. After four or five days dodging landslides on our bike, moving through spectacular countryside and cliff-side mountain roads and we found ourselves at Gaurikund. We pulled on the hiking shoes again and did a 40km hike, over two days, climbing up to a height of 4000m where we found the lake where some of Ghandi's ashes are scattered. After a bit of rock clambering we found the mouth of a giant glacier feeding the river. Above the lake and glacier loom massive 7km high peaks - breath-taking.

Kedarnath Temple

Hiking to Hindu holy places is quite cool because the paths are generally really good - cement and stone walkways most of the time - and there are chai and food stalls every 30 min or so. Thousands of pilgrims hike up daily, some on horses (lots of horseshit to dodge along the path) and others being carried by porters - all to visit the sacred Kedarnath temple. We visited the temple briefly where the centre-piece is a square rock which is linked to one of the most important Hindu gods Shiva: quite a cool god, he had dreads and smoked weed! Pilgrims get into quite a frenzy touching the rock with their heads and covering it with various ornaments and offerings.

Ghandi's ashes were sprinkled here

After visiting Kedarnath and hiking down to the base town again, we were off on another two day mission on our bike through some insane mountain roads - a bit like Chapman's peak, just 100's of km long, with cliffs that fall down 1km below you on a road that is wide enough for one truck and blind curves ever 100m... we're quite used to confronting giant, psychedelicly painted trucks coming round the bend straight at you just 5m away, with a cliff on one side and solid rock on the other.... fortunately this is all happening at 30km/h as the roads are so steep and windy so it all works out ok, no worries.

After some hectic driving on roads that were mostly not there, we got to Gangotri, considered by the spiritual to be the holiest source of the Ganga where we did our 3rd high altitude hike (35km) up to Gomukh ("Mouth of the Cow"), which is the mouth of the massive Gangotri Glacier (27 cubic kilometers of ice), one of the largest in the Himalayas. It is framed by giant 6 - 7km high peaks and is another spectacular place. The river has giant people-size blocks of ice roaring down the steep river course and smashing into giant boulders on the way, with a constant rhythmic thudding. The Himalayan rivers aren't lazy winding things, they're raging, freezing rapid-filled torrents which would kill you in seconds if you fell in... At Gangotri town the river running through the centre of town is spectacularly ferocious which makes for some exciting bathing for the Hindu pilgrims who try to wash in the sacred water. The river is so loud that on the balcony of our hotel room which overlooks the river, we couldn't have a conversation without shouting at one another.

Hiking up to Gomukh

Some kind of wild goat-thing

Small shrine, with glacier in distance and Himalayas overlooking all - freezing morning!

Close up of Gomukh "the cows mouth" - mouth of giant glacier (brown from mud)

All the high altitude hiking has made us pretty fit, the only downside of visiting this part of the world is that there is no meat or alcohol on sale at all, not a smidgen - not even in the larger towns... So we've been vegetarians for a month, and explored the full range of dishes available - which is extensive, varied and delicious - this is vegetarian heaven! Although after a month one does crave a little chicken curry...

After Gangotri we decided that it was time for some civilization, i.e. meat and beer so we spent days cruising through more spectacular countryside until we reached the old summer capital of the British Raj in India, Shimla. It's a big city, spectacularly situated across forested mountains. The centre is a place known as The Ridge which is a wide pedestrianised boulevard that stretches along the top of one of the highest hills, flanked with shops and restaurants and lower down vibrant bazaars selling everything you can imagine. We feasted in the best restaurants on a lot of delicious, dead animals as well as a healthy amount of beer, while stocking up on good books. Tomorrow we're on our bike heading off to Daramshala, then on to Srinagar and Leh in Kashmir.

The British Viceroy's former home and offices, Shimla