India

Here are the 11 joys, the eleven pleasures that will entice you to mountains every time. 1. Drinking straight from the waterfall – You carried two bottles of water but they are both empty now. You can’t buy Bisleri along the way. But you are thirsty? Look for the next stream of water that falls on your way(…Make sure it doesn’t fall on the walking path for you don’t want to be drinking another man’s elixir). Ah! the sweet taste of mountain water, from snow melting at the top somewhere. Why has the water never tasted this great before? Because you hardly came to the mountains before. 2. The patchy mobile signals – You are on first leg of your trekking trip and already the mobile signals are weak. Nobody can reach you, not the boss, not the family, not the job, not your relationships, failed or successful, nothing can contact you. It worries you, bothers you and irritates you. But when the moment here and now absorbs you, you feel grateful that there is one place where facebook notifications don’t chase you. 3. The God sent noodles – Just when you are getting hungry, there appears a tent on the horizon and from within it appears a man with a pan in his hand and you ask him, “can I get something to eat” and he asks in return “will maggi do?” and you say with a desperate relief, “Yes!” And then you enjoy the noodles with oodles of greenery and a view to behold for a lifetime.     4. The wonderful smiles of the villagers – You pass by the villagers walking on the trekking path and wonder how come they are so much more energetic. They are not even wearing your fancy branded shoes. They are running …

If you haven’t been to Ladakh yet, then here are nine reasons why you must head to Ladakh this summer. And if you have already been to Ladakh, they still hold valid. For warm Thukkpas and momos – I will not say I am a huge fan of Ladakhi food but who doesn’t love a bowl of hearty soup with noodles. The no fuss reliable taste of thukpa with a lashing of red chilly at your heart’s desire when the winds are chilly and dry is a great solace. And the steaming momos are a wonderful snack for every stop you make along the unending roads of Ladakh. For the ever fluttering prayer flags – The sound OM Mani Padme Hum can be heard under the breath of the winds sweeping the vast deserts of Ladakh. Even when you are travelling away from the world, on a lonely pass will stand a stupa meditating in solitude of towering altitudes, dressed in the many colorful flags making your journey from challenging to serene shifting your travels inward rather than outward into the remote corners of your own soul. For The friendly locals – A smile on every face and a ‘Julay’ on every lip, Ladakh is one of the friendliest parts of India. People serve not for money but with an honesty and hospitality that is heart warming. To stretch your money with Cheap accommodations – One of the best and cheapest accommodations we found anywhere in the country was in Ladakh. In Leh we paid Rs 600 for a two bed room and bathroom that overlooked a field and the mountains beyond it. One of the most breathtaking views we have had from a room. To be a great photographer – Anywhere you look in Ladakh, just click and it …

1:00 am in the night, at Patnitop 120 kms from Srinagar Don’t remember what the date was. We had spent a month zig-zagging, criss-crossing, bumping over the roads (or roads that could be paved) in Ladakh. We were returning home via the beautiful Kashmir valley. The clouds were bleeding over us. But we stopped not breaking our ‘no riding at night’ rule. We kept going like there is a tomorrow, and we must get to this place, any place outside of Kashmir before tomorrow gets here. We stop. We stop only when reach that and knock on the door of the first hotel in sight at Patni Top at 1:00 in the night.   5 hours ago at 7:45 PM, 55 kms from Srinagar on the way to Jammu The local traffic police official asked us to leave. “What are you waiting for? If you want to get out of here, then now is the time. People are all in their homes breaking their fast. Leave before they return. Tomorrow morning the stones will return to be pelted at you. God knows what will happen. Leave! Leave! God will take care of you. Khuda Hafiz.”   5 hours ago 2:45 PM, 55 kms from Srinagar on the way to Jammu Ishwinder refuses to eat anything before she gets home and sees “mumma” again. She can’t stop crying. A kind uncle who is the owner of the hotel where we were staying waiting for the curfew to be lifted tries to pacify her. We feel like we are in a movie when he offers us to bring something from the house of Hindu shop owner in case we feel eating at Muslim’s house violates our religion. Ishwinder in a gust of emotions touches his feet and tells him he is like …

Delhi – Pushkar – Ajmer – Chittorgarh – Kumbalgarh – Ranakpur – Udaipur – Bundi – Jaipur – Delhi Bundi – Jaipur Distance Covered (210 kms) Time Taken 6pm – 11pm Room At Rawla Mrignayani Palace – 1000, One of the nicest rooms we found in Rajasthan. A great deal for 1000 but came with a big draw back. The rooms were super cold and in the chill of the January Winter, this drove us out of Jaipur after two nights. This place would be ideal if you are visiting Jaipur in Summers. Everything else about this place was perfect right from location, ambience, staff, cleanliness. Food items – Rawat ki pyaaz kachori, kesar doodh.  Found the kachori to be over hyped, the Kesar Doodh was the clear winner. Like all other places in Rajasthan, Jaipur set the bar for food really high. All the places we ate at served good food at reasonable prices. The only food experiment that we did not enjoy in Rajasthan was the Dahi Ka Saag at a local restaurant. It was like any other mixed veg raita. Sight Seeing – Amber Fort. A 30min drive from the city takes you to one of the best preserved Palaces in Rajasthan. If you are driving down, make a note that you can take your vehicle right up to the entrance of the Fort. The fort is huge and the audio guides make a nice companion in the 3-4 hrs that you will easily spend here. The guides at the entrance will try to persuade you against the audio guides claiming that is cheaper to hire a guide and that your audio guides won’t answer any questions. We went with the audio guides and were happy by the end of our visit. However if you are short …

The beach is empty and quiet. Really quiet. Not the quiet when you can still hear murmurs and see people in the distance. It is the quiet when you are the only one outside while others are all inside their huts, shacks, rooms and homes. The beach is empty. The beach belongs to me this morning. Those foreigners drinking beer. Those workers from Himachal and Nepal. Those smug locals. No one is here. The beach belong to me. Just me. The sunbeds are tucked elsewhere. The umbrellas stashed out of sight. The music boxes silenced and the candles blown out. The fancy is gone. I am the only one here this morning and The beach belongs to me. Just me. Besides me the dogs are here too. They are walking behind me wagging their tales. I pick up an empty beer bottle to scare them away. I am no good to make friends right now because I am alone here and I am scared. Oh, its totally dark except the moonlight. Oh, I could bumped into bull sleeping on the sand. I must turn on the flashlight. I think that the beach most certainly doesn’t just belong to me. I see some people walking in the dark just randomly moving around. Where could they be headed at this time of the day? Are they here to scare me because the beach clearly just belongs to me. Its scary if a dog approaches me or a man walks by. To be mugged would not be cool. I am scared. I realized I must be scary too to someone else. My own shadow on the sand scares me. I feel like a ghost walking in black pyjamas and hair flying in the wind. Let me just go back to the room. But …

Delhi – Pushkar – Ajmer – Chittorgarh – Kumbalgarh – Ranakpur – Udaipur – Bundi – Jaipur – Delhi Total Distance (233 kms) Time Taken – 6pm – 12:30pm Room at Shivam Tourist Lodge: 700 and 550. The phone booking procedure for hotels and guest houses in Bundi is time consuming. Be prepared to answer a long set of questions right from Number of people, where you are arriving from etc. The moment you mention you are Indian, the voice on the other side takes a new role and the questions become more direct and specific. We said we were two couples, so one of them how we are travelling together. There is a certain dislike for Indian tourists in Bundi. Food Items Tried – Pyaaz Kachori, Daal Kachori with special Heeng ki Chutni. A must try when you are in Bundi.  Krishna ji ki Chai – You get the creamiest of Chai’s here along with lots of gyaan from the owner. The walls of his shop are covered with some innovative and funny paintings / graffiti Bundi is picture perfect. It lives up to the image of Rajasthan that has been painted for years. The locals are not used to seeing many Indian tourists, so when you are there, everyone knows you. Most cafes have a stunning view of the palace and food is pretty much the same. Our top pick was the Tom and Jerry Café. We went there on both evenings in Bundi. It is run by two brothers who call themselves Tom and Jerry and roll out fairly good pizzas using a non-stick pan. Sight Seeing : 1. Local Pottery Village. You need to drive out 15 odd kms from Bundi to get to this village, and most guide books have a mention of this. This can be …

“Yes, Calangute and Baga are crowded, choking you with vehicle pollution and cacophony of city life you intend to escape from. Anjuna? Come on, everybody who comes to Goa goes to Anjuna. It’s for wannabes. Let’s be a little different. The truth is its expensive. How about Arambol? Well isn’t that for penny picking travelers, drug addicts and hippies. Anyways, lets give Arambol a chance. Let’s go to Goa.” And that’s how we arrived in Goa and in Aramabol in Goa. The start wasn’t good. But by ten in the night, we had a room we sort of liked. Next morning we were ready to check out and head to Hampi, Kerala, anywhere but here. That is when things began to get better. We started the day with beautiful walk along the beach that quietened the soul. Where else in the world will you find people hitting the beach to do yoga independently in such large numbers? Well, some of them were looking away from the sun therefore aiming the surya namaskar wrongly, but what the hell, its okay, they had a pursuit of the higher in mind. A bunch of people seated in the sand singing bhajans, some practicing Tai-chi, some walking their dogs and about a hundred others simply running along the beach. None of them was Goan but they all looked like they belonged to Goa. A lot of them looked they may be walking here but are present somewhere else. Most were in deep introspection. What is it about Goa that makes you question life? Is it the new age pilgrimage of the industrialized world? And hey I realized that those people with dreadlocks, no they are not here to smoke up and drink till wee hours. People with no dreadlocks and corporate jobs are more …

Goa has always been tedious for me because we are: Not willing to take flights to save money and why the hell are the train stations in Goa so far from everywhere Not willing to be duped by taxi drivers and the Goa heat is ideal only for beach bumming and not for bus rides Not willing to live in cheap beach huts for howsoever much beaches are fun but after sunsets we need four walls around us Not able to go with recommended guest houses because you see our definition of budget doesn’t include dirty shit hole of a room Therefore, getting to Goa, getting to someplace when you are in Goa, and then finding a room was a challenge I didn’t feel I was upto. I remembered Goa for: the beaches full of young couples parading the tiniest clothes in their wardrobes the babies of IT boom buying beer after beer men displaying their recently waxed chest and new sunglasses the tiny lanes around Calangute and choked with SUVs of wealthy families from surrounding cities breathing smoke and stress and the shack owners not happy to serve brown skinned Indians and giving extra of what we call footage to the fair skinned cientele For those operating businesses in Goa, you are just another wave in the many million waves that hit Goa beaches. There will never be smiles to welcome you. They look at you, size you up and blurt a number quoting a price, take it or leave it. The room, the service, the food quality doesn’t matter. Forget it. You can’t reason with them. This is Goa. If you leave someone else will come and take your place. But Vikram was convinced that if we have been traveling for over a year, then we have to …

Delhi – Pushkar – Ajmer – Chittorgarh – Kumbalgarh – Ranakpur – Udaipur – Bundi – Jaipur – Delhi Time taken – Left Kumbalgarh at 12pm, reached Ranakpur by 2:15, Left Ranakpur at 5pm and reached Udaipur by 7:15pm. Room at Udaipur – 1200 INR dirtiest room we stayed during the trip after 3hrs of searching. They should have paid us to stay in that room. Ranakpur Jain Temples – Undoubtedly the most well preserved Temples in India, and the finest Temples we have visited so far. The architecture, carvings are stunning. What also needs appreciation is the management of the temple. Audio guides at the Temples are very informative and they are the only option as there are no guides around. They have a strict policy regarding cameras. So you need to buy tickets for everything and be prepared for a proper security check. We tried to fool the staff by hiding our cell phones and he caught us like he knew where we had hidden them. Verdict – A must see on your trip to Rajasthan, easily accessible from Udaipur. You must get the audio guides and a ticket for the camera as what you see inside the main temple is breath taking. The audio guide is very informative and a tad bit interesting. Give yourself at least 2-3hrs to see this masterpiece. Sight Seeing – Udaipur Palace, Jagdish Temple and Hanuman Ghat It is a very huge palace. It took us about 4hrs at a brisk pace. Palace is beautiful and takes you on a journey in time. They have put a trip advisor rating in one of the showcases, wonder why a Raja who has 365 cooks to cook him meals so that no meal is repeated in a year would care about the Rating on TripAdvisor. Breakfast recommended at …