Om Beach

Yes its really called Om beach. Thats because its shaped like the Om symbol from the Hindu religion and Gokarna town is one of the most sacred Hindu towns in India.
Of course Om neach is also full of hippies, how can it now be with a name like that??
Half of the beach is sealed off but you can walk along the sand but the rear is taken up by an exclusive hotel that is hidden in palm trees. It seems odd to have a place like that here but its for the mega rich seeking seclusion, apparently Paul Macartny is staying there. Its a bit of a contrast to the other half of the beach which has about 10 shacks on the beach front and the price of the average room is about 2 Euro a night.
We had decided that it was time to leave Half Moon beach as we were starting to go a bit funny in the head, Robinson Crusoe style, so we moved back over to Om which has a few places to eat, electricity and a few fires on the beach at night. Its also a very beautifull beach but not as nice as Half Moon.
On Sundays (today) it fills up with Indian blokes who's main mission is to gawk, perve, grope and take photos of western women in thier bikinies. I have seen a few girls in tears because of this and the lads can be quite intimidating. You basically have to shout FUCK OFF and they clear off , it seems to be that any thing less is not taken seriously. It gets on yor tits after a while as these guys would be arrested in 2 minutes in Ireland if they behaved like this there!

Anyway the plan was to chill on Om for a few days and the get the trian to Kerala and then fly from Kerela to Bombay where we catch our flight home on the 25th of Jan. In the end we could not get train tickets on time and had to think seriously about how to spend our last 10 days- running on a mad dash through the bottom half of India or stay on the beach for a few days and make the most of the relaxation before we head home. In the end we have opted to stay on Om and head to Bombay on Monday (tomorrow) and we fly home.
We have been filling the time here on Om pretty much the same way as half moon. There are some nice people here, a mad londener called Nicky who has us in tears all the time. Sol and Sunshine who Lilly knows from Cork and we have got on with and Lilly is staying in the same place so its quite sociable here which is nice.
Its my birthday today so we are going to have some fireworks and shenanigans tonight on the beach. Its great you can buy massive firework bombs over the counter here, Rock n Roll.
OK, I gotta confirm our flights home. Probably do one more post here and thats it, we are back on Thurday morning. Looking forward to it : )

Gokarna

Sorry about the lack of posting, been away from the web for a week and there not so many PC's where we are now!
After new years we hung around Pallolem for a few days but then decided that we had had enough of the same place. We looked at the map and the next set of beaches to the south was in Karanataka provence, a place called Gokarna. We had never heard of it but it was only a 3 hour train ride from the train station in Pallolem. The night before we left we met Lilly and two of her friends that she had met on the train, two girls traveling with thier families from Cork. They had headed out on thier own for a bit and had met Lilly. We all hooked up and had some food on the beach and a few drinks. I had a giant Hookah bong (filled with apple tobbaco) at the same place a few nights before and it was lovly.
We chatted and and wandered down the beach looking for some action but found bugger all. Dee was feeling a bit ill anyway so we split for an early night.

The next mornig we packed had breckfast on the beach and left for the train station in a Rickshaw as the station is a few Km outside town. It was boiling hot at the station and the train was an hour late. It was also packed to the gills and we squeezed on with our packs and I ended up hanging out of the door for the journey which was great fun if a little scary sometimes. Also after the fairly liberal attitude in Goa it was a bit of a shock for us, Dee really, for all the men just to be staring and perving at any western women on the train.
So after a few fun filled housr in teh pressure cooker train we pulled into Gokarna Road station.
We shared a taxi to the beach with an Irish girl and her spanish boyfriend who were sound. It took 30 mins to get to the beach and the sun was setting. We had to make it down a dirt cliff path and then we made ot to Om beach.
This area is known as Gokarna and south and north of the town there are a series of perfect beaches that are either completly undevoloped or have a few beach huts but no electricity. Om beach is the most popular but is also the most busy. Not busy like Goa but we could not find a bed once we got there. We decided to jump on a boat and head for a place called half moon beach a few Km south and only accessable by boat. The sun was setting when we pulled into the beach but we all could see that we had found paradise. If anywhere Ive been is like the movie 'The Beach' then this is it. Its absoultly picture perfect beach surrounded by jungle and NO buildings,roads, people, cars, cows. Also no electricity and the accomidation consisted of some bamboo huts pearched on the edge of the jungle that had to be reached by crossing giant bolders.
Thank god we have mozzie net and anti bug sheets to sleep on because you are pretty much sleeping outside in the jungle and there are a lot of bugs. That night we had a few beers with the couple we met and we all absorbed the place and its beauty. The starts at night were in thier millions and the moon seemed to hang above the tree line, giant and yellow.
The next morning the couple decided to leave as the could not handle the 'basic' conditions. Me and Dee ended up staying there for 7 or 8 days. Its was like our own private world, at night we were the only ones sat one the beach. It was a kind of solitude that is very hard to find in the world these days and we lapped up every moment of it. Our days just consisted of eating, swimming, sunbathing and the odd jungle walk up to the sunset spot. As you sit on the beach here dozens of dolphins splash about in the water in front of you. The whole place is like a Walt Disney version of a tropical Island, its all perfect.
Lilly turned up after 2 days so we had some company and one or two nights we had fire on the beach with the one or two other odd people that we staying there.
No electricity at night so we tended to be in bed buy 8.30 and up around dawn. Its wierd how your body locks into this natrual rythem when away from eletricity and disrtractions at night.
The most exciting thing that happended that week was a giant black scorpian walked through the middle of the place where we were staying and one of the local lads killed it with a big stick. giant hard looking thing it was like a evil toy. Nasty.

New Year - Palolem

Well, we have been here a week or so now, I am having trouble writing my blog as the Indian government keeps blocking blogging sites. This makes it bloody hard to log on and it normaly fails : (
We have been doing the groundhog day thing every day now, breckfast, beach, bar, bed so its quite hard to consider moving on although we still have a bit of ground to cover in the next 3 weeks or so.
Palolem is cool, New years eve was packed with millions of fireworks being set off all over the place and every one partying on the beach. Due to terrorist threats in Goa there has been Police with guns on the beach all the time but they have not botherd anyone and no one has botherd them.
Me and Dee got very drunk new years , obviously, but the partying that we have heard about in Goa seems to be no more . The authorities are sick of stoned hippies dancing for 3 days straight on the beaches so its all very relaxed and we have not even been getting a sniff of a joint which is a first in India.
We is a bit disapointed as we were looking forward to a bit of a boogie after the travel across conservative India but it looks like we will have to wait a few weeks till we get home before we can go boogie!
Still its very nice here and we have spent 7 days now working on the tan and eating to much. I am stuffing myself on seafood every day and its great, giant prawns : )
Every day is a big sunset over the arabian ocean and its beautifull to be sure.
Its all starting to quiten down now , a lot of people were here just for New Years and the Indian holiday makers are back at work so the place is returning to the sleepy village atmosphere.
We took a boat trip in an outrigger dugout and went Dolphin spotting,saw loads ,then went to a
really pretty beach that can only be accesed by boat, we may go back and spend the night there.
So I think we will be here for a bit, making the most of the lazy beach bum life as we go home 3 weeks today and reality will bite for sure; although both of us are looking forward to coming back and enjoying some normality!
It will be odd to be going home but also great to see everyone. We have gotten the travel bug out of our systems ,for now anyway! We are thinking of South America next year maybe....

Not much else to report. We will be here doing the same thing for the next few days and then we have to make our way south to Kerela, our last adventure, we will be cruising the Kerelan Backwaters which are supposed to be fantastic. After that we will spend the 21st, my birthday, on a really nice beach on the very southern most point of India and then flying from there to Bombay for 2 days and then home. Time is flying.
Also, I got a tattoo ; )

Colva and onwards

We went straight to the beach in the morning and it was great. Palm trees, blue sea, no hassle, coconuts, and cocktails. The beach was far from the rave party you think of when you think Goa, as it was more family orientated. We did bugger the entire whole day apart from sunbathe and acclimatize to the heat, lovely. Some nice food and drinks that night and we repeated the whole day again the next day.
We decided that maybe we could do with being around a more 'alternative' crowed than the people around us so the next morning we got a taxi 1 hour south Palolem, Goa's nicest beach apparently and a real hippie and backpacker hang out.
We would have gone to the famous rave beaches in the north but they have been ruined by development apparently and there was a serious bomb threat to Israelis from Al Quedia and the beaches are full of them up there so we thought we would avoid the whole area.
Palolem, while developed a bit (bamboo huts, bars and Internet cafes) is beautiful and is the beach that we have been looking at in the Lonely Planet for a year, ya! I walked the beach looking for a place to stay and the prices I was quoted for accommodation in shitty beach huts was insane, 2000 Rupees, nuts. This is because of the xmas/new year’s peak. We settled for a sensibly priced place at the top of the beach and spent the day vegging out on sun beds sipping drinks on the beach. Heaven again.

To Goa

We rose early, before dawn and had breakfast and jumped in a rickshaw across Udaipur to the bus station. We zipped down to Udaipur and, apart from the roaringly load Bollywood movie that was played on the way it was an easy trip.
We got to Ahamedabad airport around lunchtime, which turned out to be the nicest airport we have seen in India and killed a few hours there before checking in for our Goa flight.
We jetted off and 1 hour and a bit later landed in Goa airport. It was great getting off the plane back into the tropical heat; we have been feeling mildly warm to freezing cold the last few weeks so the heat was welcome.
It was dark by the time we landed but we could tell the place was completely different that Rajasthan or any other part of India. The infrastructure was great, lots of new cars, and lots of bars, tourists, and women in casual clothes. Goa is mostly Roman Catholic and is the wealthiest state in India and probably the most liberal. After verging on getting Dee a Burkha for the last few months it was great for her to feel almost as comfortable as at home. It felt more like a holiday in Spain that India.
We got a taxi the 30mins or so to Colva, a quite beach and found a hotel, well a shitty little place but it did the job and we were in a bar getting some food a few minutes later, kind of shell shocked to be around gangs of pissed westerners and Indian tourists having a ball and drinking in public!! After living like monks sometimes in the rest of India this was a great buzz.

Udaipur agian

After breakfast and saying goodbye to Gemma and Ben again (they were staying for another day) we left to head back to town. We managed to get the same room in our previous hotel and that was cool as the staff were really nice and efficient and Piers could learn a thing or two about actually running a place from them.
That evening we decided to treat ourselves proper by going to the most romantic hotel on the lake for dinner and that was lovely after the last two days. All in all a quite day and it was nice just to have our independence back. We had our flight booked to Goa for new years the next day from Gujarat, which meant getting up early for a 5 hour bus trip first, easy these days!

Christmas Day

Slightly groggy we woke up and had breakfast, which again was not really enough. I don’t think this guy has thought through what running a guesthouse entails, very untogether. Dee had been getting a jacket made by some tailors and they dropped up to do a fitting. I decided to get a suit run up, as I will probably need it in the real world in a few weeks. It was odd as I have never been fitted for anything and was a man intimately measuring odd.
We spent most of the day chilling in the garden and had a few beers that afternoon. The house was quite apart from a few visiting Indian friends that found us fascinating and wanted to talk a lot. The thing is we came here for peace and not to have the same conversation again and again; what country? what name? what Job? Married? So we kind of hid by the pool.
Piers it seemed had not thought of sorting dinner out until one of the other guests mentioned it so he sent one of the cooks into town on a food and beer run. That night we had a decent but agian to small dinner and chatted with some American people whom let us use their work phone to call home. We would have had to go on a trek back into town if not so that was very nice of him. His name was Sean Brennan which was funny as me and Dee work with a Sean Brennan.
To be honest this expensive hotel thing turned out to be a complete let down and I'd have half a mind to write a bit of a complaint on his website. Simple things like access to bottled water was awkward as you felt like you were asking a stranger to get it out of their fridge. Bummer. We should have stayed in town in a nice place but what can you do??
We had a bit of a giggle that evening and Dee got to wear her lovely new jacket so she was happy.
Also we bought a bottle of Champagne for ourselves and Piers opened it and shared it around. Not impressed with that. We crashed out; personally I was gagging to get out of here at this stage.

Christmass Eve

We left our little hotel in town and set out in a Rickshaw to find 'Mountain View' Lodge where we were to stay and also meet Gemma and Ben. None of the rickshaw drivers knew where it was so it took some time to find and ended up being miles out of town down a dirt track. In the distance though you could see this house that would be more at home in an eco friendly experiment in Switzerland rather than on the side of a hill in Rajasthan! It was totally modern house in design, solar powered and all that, fantastic looking and such a contrast to its surroundings (maybe not a good one) We unloaded the rickshaw and went up to the house to be greeted by Piers a tall, bald, eccentric English chap who had built the house over the last few years. He was very nice but very very posh and had a curious way of pronouncing hid R's that made me feel very common. He showed us to our room and informed us that a traveling band of Shakespearean actors were performing a carol reciting to a bunch of local in the village. We declined as they were just leaving and we needed to settle in. They needed up being very posh English public school types who were to put it bluntly pig ignorant and they did not bother to hide there bemusement that we were actually staying there. Who let the bloody ruffians in, eh?? We retreated to our room which was very nice but still did not have hot water. We were paying top dollar for this place and he did not have any hot water which I don’t think is on. I was writing a review of this place that would have been a bad start. The wankers, sorry, actors went off to the village to confuse the Hindu locals with some christen Christmas carols. As we were having a smoke on the balcony Gemma and Ben pulled up, thank god, as we were feeling very out of place. They had had a very bad journey down also so we started hitting the beers and Vodka.
That night a lot of people turned up at the house, various ex pats who live in Udaipur and some long stayers at the house. We had dinner, which was really nice if not enough of it and a bit of a boogie, which in the circumstances was quite odd! We kind of formed our own little group and chilled out by the pool (empty) until later in the evening when everyone left. We had a nightcap in G+B's room and crashed, drunk.

Udaipur

Udaipur is a famous city because of its lake hotels and palaces which sit in the middle of giant man made lakes nestled in the hills of south Rajasthan. It was a bigger town than we expected but the pretty center of it was easy to get around, apart from getting lost in the usual labyrinth of streets. In the middle of the lake is the Lake Palace hotel built by a King a few hundred years ago. It is world famous and one of the top 5 hotels in the world apparently. The cheapest room costs $600 per night. That put an end to our plans for going for a night!
We were pretty wrecked today after our little trip the night before so did not do too much.
After dinner in our roof top restraunt and the sunset we watched James Bond 'Octopussy' which everyone here tells you was filmed here. It was funny watching a 25-year-old film that everything looks exactly the same in India now as it did then. Everything seems to look Identical as it did 25 years ago. It was funny seeing 007 run around Udaipur chasing villains. Daft. We crashed out after this excitement.
We did very little the next day either apart from book flights to Goa as you cannot get trains anywhere due to the xmas rush. The flights were dirt cheap at $40 each and we did not fancy back-to-back 16-hour buses, as this is what the only other option was to get to Goa for New Years.
That night we decided to treat ourselves and went to one of the flashest hotels on the lake in front of the lake palace and had a really nice dinner and lots of expensive cocktails. It was really nice to posh it up after roughing it around the dust bowl that is Rajasthan!
We got a Rickshaw back to our cheap hotel and the driver did not want to bring us. We insisted he did and he drove about 20 foot up the road and our hotel was right there. That’s how badly disorientated you can get in a twisty city like this!! We laughed as we though the Rickshaw driver was scamming us but he was being honest for once and we paid him anyway.

Bus Hell

Today we checked out of the guesthouse we were in and killed time until we could get our bus at 3 that afternoon. We said our goodbyes to Gemma and Ben as they were staying on another day or two here. We arranged to meet in Udaipur. Me and Dee's Xmas plans had for a while to book a really nice hotel for Christmas Eve and day. Gemma and Ben had one set up already so we booked the same place with them on the Internet. It was a home stay in a really big house in the hills a few miles outside Udaipur. It looked good.
So at 3 that afternoon we squeezed onto our luxury VIP bus, which was a dirty big old coach with beds above the seats. This was going to be a long night as its 16 hours to Udaipur. The first few hours were OK apart from the smell of feet that chocked you every time the bus stopped.
As the night went one though everything got more and more painful. In India the private coaches act as buses also and stop to pick up anyone along the road to bring where ever they want to go en route. This is a pain as the bus is stopping every 20 mins and people are barging off and on. As there are no seats left anyway in the first place the extra people stand and squeeze in next to you. It was a nightmare as these people are also really really poor. I spent hours with a family in rags sleeping at my feet. There was a little girl, about 4, I offered her my seat but she thought I was telling her to go away and legged it. This is because of the caste system here which is the most fucked thing in the world I think. You have these rich young Indian lads sprawled across 3 seats and children sleeping on healthy floor under them as they are of a lower caste.
As you can imagine it was with great relief that we pulled into Udaipur after 16 miserable and sometimes harrowing hours. It was Dawn when we got to the city and we got a rickshaw direct to a guesthouse, which had rooms thank god. I finished off some Vodka and we crashed.

Sore Arse

The next morning we got up at dawn and watched the sun come up over the dunes. The Camel men cooked some eggs and bread and after packing up for half an hour we were on our way agian.
Our arses were a bit sore after the prevoius day so we got off after and hour or 2 and walke through teh desert with teh camels. We got to the jeeps around 11 said our good byes to desert king and the lads, gave them a bit of a tip and drove back to Jaisalmer.
We were going to go straight that night to Udaipur , a 16 hour bus ride away, but decided to have dinner and drinks with Gemma and Ben on the roof of our hotel. Me and Dee rang home and got our tickets for teh bus the next day sorted .
It was a cool evening with teh lads. I bought some crazy beer called Punjab 6000 which was like 13% and vile, I poured it down the sink. Offically teh worst beer I ever had.
One of the lads from the hotel was off his face on Opium and talking shite for a few hours at us and would not go away so we called it and early one.

Night Terrors

After the sunset we settled down to dinner that the lads were cooking on a campfire. The sunset was obscured by clouds but it was very pink and looked really desert. I was dark when we ate dinner and had a beer that we had bought with us. Really nice when Desert King started singing desert songs and the stars were out by the million.
We chatted for an n hour or two and then started seeing a jeep/car drive towards us and away into the distance about a mile away. We thought noting of it as there was an old track we had crossed earlier in the day. The guides looked a bit frisky though and surprised by the compact. The cars lights went off and after a while we started seeing torches. At this the guides started to look worried and kicked the fire out and told us to turn our torches off. Shit. This gave us all a bit of a spook and the way the guides were acting was worrying. Over the next 2 hours we watched the light come near and further away from us. The young lads were spotting from the top of a dune so we felt like, shit, what the fuck is happening? Desert King said it was nothing but he was a bad bluffer.
In the end car drove off after a few hours and we crashed out. It was a bit of a downer after a good evening as the guides behaviors freaked us out. They said it was lots of different things from Shepard’s to border patrol as we were right next to the Pakistan Border and there is a lot of Military out here. The changed the story every minute and we never got to the heart of it but all in all I think it was innocent and the lads were just surprised that there were other people out where we were. If anyone would have come over we probably would have to feed them or if the were officials then bribe them as a matter of course out here. Bribes are all prevalent in India in every level and corner of society. I don’t think we were in any harms way but still....

We slept under the starts that night and I woke up with that goat that had been following us asleep on the bottom of our blanket.

Middle of nowhere

Booked out of our hotel, owner grumpy as we did not book safari through him. Tough shit. We booked directly with the camel men so they actually get the money instead of the hotel. Ethics man!!
We had some breckfast and ended up with a group or 6 others, 2 Singaporeans and 2 English.
Funnily enough the 2 English people , Gemma and Ben, we had met a few months before in Calcutta in the train booking Office!! very weird too meet them here and be on the same camel safari. Small world.
We climbed into a Land Rover and drove into the desert for aborts an hour as we needed to get away from the usual day tripping camel safaris. We meet our camel man, Desert King who was a Pakistani Muslim with a glint in his eye. Nice guy and a real desert man. He had spent his youth smuggling Opium and gold and various other things across the border into Pakistan. He asked my age and I said 32 and he said he was 34. He looked 54 at least. The desert must really be a hard life. I ended up getting the smallest girl camel which was more like the size of a big donkey while Dee and Gemma had huge beasts. I soon found out I got the little camel because her saddle was made out of sharp bits of metal with a nail to hold onto, make a man out of me!!
That’s OK though, least I did not get the small camel because they though I was a woos. The photos look daft with me on this mini camel and the rest one these giant desert monsters!!
We walked for a few hours until midday and stopped for lunch that Desert King made for us with his 2 lads. He suggested we buy a goat from a village for 15 Euro odd and we could and have barbecue that night. I was into it and another lad but the everyone else was not into it.
I mean, where do people think meat comes from???? One lucky goat.
After we left to go onto the next place a goat started following us all the way. Desert King said it was god deciding and that if the goat was still following us at dinner time he would turn him into some nice Kebabs.
We trudged through the desert for a few more hours and stopped at these dunes to camp for the night. It was quite and beautiful and in the middle of bloody nowhere. We wandered off on the dunes and took photos of each other,enjoying the fact we were far from anyone or anything which is hard in the year 2006.

Jaisalmer 2

Today we just hung around the town and checked the fort out. we changed rooms to one with a TV as we have not had TV in a long time and I am starting to watch dung beetles for fun.
We just watched TV until the evening when there was a power cut which put an end to that!!
We went to book a Camel Safari also for the next day which is a really nice thing to do apparently, you can spend 1-14 nights out in the desert with local guides and spend the night in the dunes looking at the stars, cool. We booked to leave the next morning at 7.30 for 1 or 2 days depending on our arses. I would have liked to do more but we are under time pressure because we need to be in our next town for xmas.
That evening we went to a resrunt on the ramparts pf the fort with an amazing view called 'Little Italy' and had some pretty good Italian of all things. Makes a nice change from Veg curry and rice.
There is virtually no meat anywhere so we have for all intense purposes become vegetarians.
Its not bad as there is more veggie food in India than anything else and nobody really eats meat in this part of the country. Bed.

Jiasalmer

After breakfast we checked out of our room and killed an hour or two before rickshawing it over to the bus station to get the 6 hour bus to Jiasamer.
Really stuffed bus with the locals bringing anything they could carry on no matter the size or substance. As we went west the desert became more apparent and you really started to see how remote this place is, especially back in the old days when this town was one of the most famous town on the spice routes/trading routes.
If you picture the bit in Gladiator when Russell Crowe first becomes a Gladiator after being bought by Ollie Reid in that shit hole town in the middle of the desert then that pretty much is exactly what this place looks like at street level. from a distance its a fairy tale fort on a hill that you can see for miles away in the flat desert. Certainly fulfils all your desert exoticness needs!
One the way there the bus crew hit us for baggage charge which is bullshit as the locals don’t pay this, its just another feckkin way of ripping of the tourists. I kicked up a fuss and they kicked up a bigger fuss. Eventually Dee paid and I was raging as I am a bit fed up of this kind of shenanigans!!
An hour later another guy gets on the bus demanding 'Tourist Tax' This is a new one and complete bullshit as far as we knew. We stood our ground and then it got a bit ugly with this guy demanding the money or he would kick us if the bus ion the middle of the desert. Dee paid again just to finish the row. She was right as it turns out as this is a real tax that the government has just started putting on tourists in Rajasthan but they, helpfully, have not told any one.
You have to go around India and treat anyone who asks you for money for a 'tax' or 'charge' as a bullshitter and 99% of the time they piss off. Lucky Dee paid this time or we would have been walking the rest of the way to town!
We pulled in and zipped to our hotel inside the actual fort itself. Its the only place in the world where you can stay in a real world heritage designated f ort. Its magical sitting on the roof or the battlements looking over the town and desert as the sun goes down. Really living history. It all looks like Hollywood decided they needed a big set for a swords and sandals movie, very, very special place. Unfortunately the locals are building spalp dash everywhere on top of the old fort buildings and the whole thing is going to roll down the hill its on in the next few decades unless they stop feckkin laying bricks everywhere. The tourists come here for this place and the locals and building to much infrastructure for them wily nilly and destroying the place. Very sad.

We ate dinner that evening at the hotel, wandered around the fort in the dark. Very nice as there are no vehicles allowed her (very rare in India) and crashed out.

Jodhpur 2

Today we managed to get out of the hotel and wandered , after getting lost in the maze of the old town, up to the fort, Meherangher. If you think about a huge medieval fort from the movies, popped on top of a huge hill and in perfect condition then that is what this place is. The scale is massive, like far bigger that anything I have seen in Europe or anywhere else.
We were giving audio headsets from the ticket office and they were great. We spent hours wandering around the fort and the museums inside and the headsets told us everything that we needed to know about the place. I could try describe this for hours but I cant be arsed so I'll show 'yis all the piccys when we get back ; )

After a few hours we went back to our lovely room and relaxed for the evening. It was to nice to go out to the mental ness of downtown to look for a retreat so we just ate in the hotel and retreated to out room. The next morning was another early start, this time to Jaisalmer a fairy tale castle the last bastion of civilisation on the edge of the great thar desert which stretches west to Pakistan for hundreds of miles.

Jodhpur 1

Woke early, like 4.30 or something stupid. We left the hotel in the pitch black and the freezing cold to look for the bus station. We were following the Lonely Planet map which is for the most part complete fantasy. We were looking for roads that were not there etc bloody book, its a life saver sometimes and a pain in the arse at other times. Every bugger has one also so its like yer all doing exactly what the Lonely Planet tells you. Its a blessing and a curse.
Anyway after staggering past a few cows and an angry dog we found the bus station. Still dark and looking like a rubbish tip/scrap yard filled with guys in the shadows with blankets around there heads it can seem like a fairly dodgy place. We had no hassle besides being charged the usual double for a cup of Chai. Our rickety 1947 vintage bus pulled up and we left Pushkar along a road that Cambodia would be proud of. Bone shaking is not the word and any thought s of sleep soon evapoirated. The guy sat next to us had a 40 gallon drum of petrol with some cloth stuffed in it as a cap. Of course people were smoking on the bus, this is India after all.
Every time the bus stopped the 2 of us were swarmed by kids and young lads who were completely fascinated with us and also wanted to see if Rupee/sweets/pens could be extracted from us somehow. It was mental, you are sat in the bus with 30 people all pointing and poking at you. Now I know why aliens don’t bother with us.
Its a pain in the arse being the most exciting thing in the town in 20 years!!
We passed through a load of literally 2 horse (camel?) towns in the middle of now where and finally after 5 hours pulled into the chaos of Jodhpur, central Rajasthan.
For once we did not get any shite from the rickshaw driver about him taking us to his friends hotel/shop/tour etc. We wanted to go to the old town which is beautiful and ancient. All the buildings are painted blue and towering over the top on a huge hill is the biggest fort/castle I have ever seen, the walls are like 32km long!!!
We got to our hotel of choice rite under the castle in the old town and got a room, not just any room but the only one the had left which happended top be the best room we have stayed in so far, the Maharani suite. In and ancient house, our room looks like something from Arabian nights. We had 10 windows, stained glass, pillows, amazing decor and a direct view of the fort above us, magical and really felt out of place there being scruffy backpackers off a 5 hour rattle trap.
It was stunning place to stay and we did not leave the room for 24 hours!! only about 18 euro per night and I reckon it would have cost 300 Euro a night at home, if you could get it.
We chilled out that evening in the room as it was all so romantic and special : )

We gotta take that Hill Girls!!

Last day in Pushkar today. We got the tickets to Jodhpur for the next day leaving at the painful time of 6.00 in the morning. I convinced Dee and Lilly to take another trot up the hill, hopefully avoiding any old men with boxes. I had left my little binoculars up there also like the spanner I am. We hooked up about 3 and made the climb up, taking it easy on the way and stopping to look at the panorama below us. Photo heaven this place. We made it to the top and found my little spot and watched another sun go down , this time though there was a good mob of people up there but it was still very nice. We came back down in the dark and arranged to meet for dinner in an hour or so.
After dinner and the usual Chai stop we bid our farewells to Lilly and arranged to meet her in Udaipur for Christmas time. Me and Dee got back and Will the Irish guy came into our room and had us in stitches talking about India and the craziness out here. He played some beautiful baroqe, classical, Irish finger style and some ballads. Made me decide to seriously start learning some Irish guitar at home. We got Wills number and promised to call down to him in Kerry in the summer and then said goodbyes.

Hills and old men

A bit tender after the camels we had a bit of a late start. We spent the morning talking to an Irish bloke from Down who has lived in Kerry for 20 years. He was bang on and very funny, reminded me a lot of Billy Connelly in looks and manner. Also he was a great Irish guitar player and nearly had us all crying when he started plucking my guitar!
That afternoon Dee decided to veg out on the rooftop and I decided it was high time I climbed the local hill/mountain thing looking down over the town. After walking through the town I found the bottom of hill and started my climb. I was bloody hot and dusty and maybe not the best time to stagger up this thing. I was doing grand, no one there and admiring the views and the solitude until about a 3rd of the way up when I caught up with this old man carrying giant boxes up to temple on top of the hill. I felt a bit sorry for him. No retirement out here and he looked far to old to be struggling up this thing. He was probably only 35-40 though as I have been shocked when I have found out peoples age here sometimes. Poverty really does add decades on to you I am realising. Anyway he asked me if I would help him with a box and what can you do? say no? I took a box and carried on up the hill. he gave me the big box of course and I have a feeling he waits there everyday till a tourist wanders past and pulls the same thing.
I kept up the hill and then realised how bloody steep and giant the steps/rocks were becoming.
It took me an hour to get to the top and I was shagged after it. The old boy came up after me and said he was thirsty and would like a Pepsi and he had it before I knew what was happening. So I carried his stuff and ended up buying him Pepsi, biscuits and Chai for his 2 mates. Only about 3 Euro but still, cheeky bugger. I could not help laughing though.
I got away finally down the ridge of the mountain and watched the sun setting over the desert, dunes and mountains. I had a smoke and completely sank into my surroundings, special moment for me.
After dark I walked back down the hill to town and hooked up with Dee and Lilly and we went for dinner on the lake. I ate Chilly Pakora which is basically giant deep fried chillies and blew the bloody arse of me the next day. Fun.
We went and had a few cups of Chia at our local chai place and chatted with various hippy types who seem to have been in Pushkar for a 1000 years. The usual shite, 'It was so much better when I was here 20 years ago, to many tourists now' I hate it when people say this about anywhere, arrogant tossers who think they are some kind of travel Guru's.
We drifted back to the gaff after as there are no such things as late nights in Pushkar!

Camels

We went for a camel ride today for 3 hours in the desert around a mountian at the end of town. It was really odd at first and one of the Camels , Johnny, was a in a bit of a mood.
Camel is deffinatly the way to travel the desert. We had a big red sunset in the desert also so all in all really far out day. Your arse and hips do hurt a bit after. It was cool with just the 3 of us, me Dee and Lilly and the Camel drivers, you guys and really nice lads.
In the evening I was asleep by 9.30, Im knackard out here always :)

Pushkar day 2,3,4

Pushkar is a timewarp. We have been here for 4 days now and have not achieved anything, its great. It’s the first time we have stopped and rested. Dee had a bad cold all of a sudden even though it’s roasting hot in the day. Freezing at night though!
All day and night there is chanting and instruments being played. Very atmospheric. We are just killing time, eating, drinking tea and walking about. It is so pleasant to be able to walk down the street without being assaulted by touts. Its nice to sit in the tea shops and watch the world go by.
Yesterday I tried a Bangh Lassie and it was great, wandering around town bombed out of it, in a nice way, its virtually mandatory here, its the religion thing, honest.
Today we are going to have some more Lassies and have hired a few camels for a trek into the desert to watch the sunset. It’s a hard life!
I think we shall be in this place for a few more days.

Pushkar

Time to leave Jaipur, although there are a few more things to see here the noise, hassle and commotion wears you down.
We wanted to head south to a little place called Pushkar, which is one of the holiest places for Hindu's in India. It’s a very nice place to relax and as we have been traveling constantly for a few weeks we really need to recharge the batteries!
We got our rickshaw driver to drop us at the station and the git was still trying to get us to come to textile shops so he could get his commission! We said no and chilled in the bus station for a few hours while we waited for our bus. We had news papers and tea and no hassles there so it was OK. We met a Canadian guy there who had just been in Kashmir and said it was mad. He also reminded us that Pushkar is a dry town, no alcohol there. I zipped up the road and got a bottle of Smirnoff.
We caught the bus the 4 hours they’re the land becoming more and more scrub and desert as we went west and south. Its really changing now from the India we have seen until now.
We pulled in to Pushkar and hired a porter to wheel our bags the 20 mins to our hotel.
Pushkar is an Oasis of tranquility. It’s a small town with virtually no traffic surrounded by desert hill and set around a sacred lake. Its magical here, clean, peaceful and quite and no one gives you any hassle. Exactly what we need after a month of crossing mad India.
There is no meat, alcohol or eggs or displays of affection in public here although Bangh, marijuana, is freely available and everyone drinks it in milkshakes, Bangh Lassies, and meditates, contemplating navels etc.
It’s the first place I have been where you can have a smoke but you will be arrested if you are drunk!
We got a nice hotel over looking the lake and the ghats. No one is burned here but it’s similar to Varanasi. People and general life buzzing around the holy lake. We look down on it from our balcony but I have not walked around as its very sacred and I don’t want to break the vibe there! We watched the sunset and bumped into Lilly and Craig. We had some dinner and an early night, as there is no TV and usually no electricity :)