Leaving Delhi for the Last Time & More - jim

Today, the 18Th of January, find us in the beautiful mountains of south western India, west of Mysore. It having been a week since my last update, here I am updating the blog. Better late than never!

Our thirty two hour train trip from Delhi to Bangalore went smoothly, and we arrived within a few minutes of the scheduled arrival time. For me the time went by quickly, between reading, talking, eating, watching India go by out the window, and sleeping, we slept two nights on the train, the trip was over before I knew it. The most interesting part was watching India go by out the window, because it changed a lot as we traveled south. Moving south from Delhi we left the huge plain of northern India behind during the night and in the morning we were riding through upland valleys surrounded by hills, if not mountains, and from what I could tell the population, which was almost overwhelming in the north, seemed to thin. As we continued our trip we moved up and down the hills, sometimes surrounded by hills with little agriculture and sometimes in large valleys with loads of agriculture. In some of the hill areas we even went through areas of forest, not dense forest but forest non the less. Then another night closed in on us and early in the morning we were in Bangalore and loading ourselves and our packs out of the train. We weren't staying in Bangalore, it is a big city and high tech center but, we were told, not very interesting, so we headed to the bus station to catch a bus for the three hour trip to the much smaller and traveller friendly Mysore. We arrived in Mysore in late morning , found our hotel, checked in, got a shower rested a little, got some lunch and headed out to see the city. The hotel arranged for an auto rickshaw driver to take us to some of the spots to see around the city, or at least that is what he said, it turned out most of the stops were shops of people trying desperately to sell us something. The first stop was the exception, the spice market, most of you must have seen the pictures of Indian markets, think National Geographic, that feature dyes piled high and shaped into cones, well this was the place, and they really did sell the dyes as well as many of the spices we think of as coming from India, especially the south, They also sold plenty of local fruits there and we bought some for later consumption, some delicious red bananas, a mystery fruit that was OK, but both of us have forgotten what it was called, and some tamarind, as sour fruit that both of us like a lot. From that market we went to a place that made incense and also sold essential oils, the base for the scents that are in so many perfumes, foods etc., where we got to smell all kinds of oils and hear a pitch about how we really needed these things. Then it was on to a wood carving and furniture maker, the furniture was all the mother of pearl inlaid kind and didn't appeal at all, and the wood carvings, many of which were very well done, but was wildly overpriced. We didn't stay long there and so we soon found ourselves in a shop selling silk and all kinds of fabric. I decided to try to get a few shirts made, they make them up in a day to your measurements and are a lot cheaper than in the states, even at the tourist trade stores, so we were there a while while I picked out material and had myself measured. I would go back the next day to check them out before they were finished. Our last stop on the motor rickshaw trip was a drop off at Mysore's most famous site, the Maharajah's Palace. Many of you have probably also seen pictures of this building, it is the building most off pictured in books when they talk of the great and ostentatious palaces of the raga's of India. Anyway it is huge and it dominates the center of the city and so we paid the admission price and entered the grounds. The building is sited on a huge lawn and is picture perfect, and we took a few pictures to prove that we to could make it look perfect. The surprise, to me at least, was learning that the palace was only built in the early 20Th century. I have always thought of these places as hundreds of years old and drenched in history, not here. It was worth the tour, a huge building with beautiful formal rooms, lots of stained glass, and tile work and even a throne or two scattered around. These people sure had a lot of money and/or free labor with which to fulfill there wildest imaginings. After we left the building we spent a while just wandering the grounds which were very pleasant and well laid out. Then we went off to find an Internet cafe to check in with email and catch up on world and U.S. news. After that we found a place near the palace to eat dinner as we wanted to return to the palace after dark when it would be illuminated. They light it with 100,000 light bulbs attached to the buildings and it is reported, even by the locals to be amazing, and they usually only do it on Sundays, however they were doing it today because it was a Hindu feast day, something about both a Hindu calender New Years and a feast celebrating sacred cows, who were all painted up for the occasion, mostly in yellow. Tell me it isn't something to walk down the street and see a few yellow and black cows wander out of a cross street, you begin to wonder what the tea at lunch was spiked with. Dinner was good but service was a bit slow and we sat and talked for a while, so, to our chagrin, by the time we got back to the palace they had already turned out the lights, we didn't know this at the time but the electric draw is so much that they only keep the lights on for an hour between 7 and 8 PM. Having missed that we walked back to the hotel and went to bed, tired from a long day of travelling and touring.

Our second and last day in Mysore started with a splurge. We went to a very fancy hotel, $100 a night, for their breakfast buffet and it was all we expected. We left stuffed! We went back to the hotel where Adam stayed while I went out to check on the shirts I had ordered. The shirts were OK and done so I picked them up and started back to the hotel, I planned to take an auto rickshaw but just before I hailed one I realized that I didn't remember the name of the hotel, isn't age wonderful, so, being pretty sure I could find it on foot I set out walking, and sure enough after a few missteps I turned a corner and there it was. Adam was in the room and we decided to go out. I wanted to check on some of the eyeglass shops in town, prescription lenses and especially frames are about half the price they are in the states, and Adam wanted to see if he could find any less expensive backpacking sun glass' than he could find in the states. After a few stops I became convinced that they could make me prescription glasses that were as good as those I got in the states and ordered a backup pair for myself. Adam couldn't find the kind of sunglasses he wanted so he put it off until his return to the states. For lunch we stopped in a coffee shop, real coffee, this is coffee growing country, for a drink and a snack. Revitalized we decided to check out the larger general public marked and wandered there for a couple of hours before heading back to the hotel for some rest and reading. That evening we walked a ways to another restaurant and then back fairly early for bed. Tomorrow we had to pack up, check out and catch an early bus, we were going on the road again.

When we arrived at the bus stand about 8:30 AM we lucked out, the first of three buses we were taking that day was just leaving, we jumped aboard and settled in for the first ride of the day. We were heading for a small town northeast of Mysore that had famous hilltop Jain Temples. The Jain's are another of India's ancient religions, they were founded about the time Buddhism was founded in the 6Th century BCE. We got to the second bus station and after a lot of asking around we found the bus that would take us to our next bus station. We were going to be a ways out in the country and travel away from the main areas is always a little more challenging but usually more rewarding. Mysore is in the Indian state of Karnataka and riding through the Karnatakan countryside was fascinating. This part of the south appears to be much richer and much less thinly populated than the north, one certainly influencing the other. The land is well and diversely farmed, rice, coconuts, sugarcane, vegetables, corn etc, and large parts of it are irrigated. It is also physically beautiful, we were travelling through wide valleys with some hills in the distance and round volcanic domes spotted throughout the valleys. After one last bus ride and a slightly poorer road, the roads this day were all quite good when measured against what we had seen for roads earlier, we were at our destination Sravana Belagoia, a smallish town built between two volcanic domes which were topped by temples and it was only about noon. We checked in the Jain guesthouse, at 135 Rupees for a nice double with attached bathroom the best housing deal of the trip. After getting settled in we walked down the road to a restaurant to have lunch, after lunch I headed back for the room for an afternoon of bed and reading, my gout was acting up and there was to be no hill climbing for me that day, and Adam went off for a walk to see the temples on the smaller of the two hill. About 5 PM Adam returned having enjoyed the walk and what he saw, we hung out a bit and then walked down the street for dinner at the same place we had lunch, not a lot of choice in town and it was close and that was definitely an advantage for me. Afterward back to the room for a little more reading and sleep.

Adam wanted to get up before dawn the next day to be able to see the sun rise from the larger of the two domes and I woke up at the same time but didn't get out of the room till about 15 minutes after he was already on his way. My gout was much improved and I was determined to get up to the top of at least one of the domes but I didn't want Adam to wait for me, he is a hugely stronger hiker than I am even when I dont have gout. As I walked up to the gated entrance to the steps, 620 of them to be exact, that went up to the top of the larger dome I realized that the gates still weren't open and then I looked around and there sat Adam waiting. It was about a half hour later when they finally let us in, we checked our shoes, no shoes on the mountain, and started up, Adam going ahead to try to capture in pictures the sunrise. My foot was much better so the walk up wasn't to bad, but it certainly got my blood circulating. The views from the way up and from the top of the stairs were magnificent and peaceful, a huge fertile valley with hills scattered around and a few mountains, large hills, in the distance. There were a number of Jain temples on the top of the dome but the main attraction was a 10th century nearly 60 foot sculpture of a naked man carved out of a single piece of stone. This sculpture was standing in the open air but was located in the courtyard of a large temple, a setting that made it seem even larger and more dominating than it was. One of the ideas behind the naked sculpture was to remind Jains of the relative unimportance of the material world, but I believe it was also to remind them that salvation, or nirvanna, was each persons responsibility. Adam and I met up on top and walked down together and had breakfast, he went back to the room and I decided to walk up the smaller dome before we left, scheduled for late morning. I set off up far fewer steps to the top of the smaller dome, when I arrived I was one of only two people on top, not including guards etc. The tall naked man pulled in a much bigger crowd. The smaller dome had a series of Jain temples, mostly from the 10th to the 12th century which were architecturally beautiful and the setting, esp. with so few people around was magic. I greatly enjoyed my time wandering through and around this beautiful spot. I walked down, claimed my shoes and went back to the room where I met Adam packed and was ready to leave in a few minutes. We checked out and walked the 100 yards to the bus station to catch a bus to Hassan our first transfer point on todays trip to the mountain town, or as they say here, hill station, of Madikeri. We arrived in Hassan and after some confusion found our bus to Madikeri, some of the problem stemmed from me continually misprouncing it Madiriki. This bus ride went through some of the most beautiful countryside we have seen on the trip, not as spectacular as the bus trip into Nepal, but just as beautiful. As we slowly climbed through bigger to smaller valleys the agriculture changed and more and more of the land became forested, before we knew it we were in coffee plantation country, the coffee being planted under the forest trees for protection. Four hours later we stopped in Madikeri, got off the bus and went looking for the hotels recomended in our guide books, most of them turned out to be full and the only one that had room was quite a bit above our budget, but not having much of a choice, and me being tired, we took it, ate dinner in it's restaurant and went to sleep.