(Lesley) Well, I haven't blogged in a while. John and Sam have surely keep you up to date with where we have been and what we have been doing: Ooty was cold! It was like Winnipeg in the fall with everyone wearing tuques and scarves. We did a 10 km hike in the hills which was a real highlight for all of us. En route to Mysore, we drove through The Mudulamai Nature Park and Tiger Reserve. We didn't see any tigers, but we did see about a dozen elephants. It was nice to see forest and parklands with no litter. Mysore was regal and I enjoyed seeing the palace especially in the evening when it was all lit up. I also toured a silk factory there. The tour was funny; I signed in and got a visitor pass and was let in to the factory. There were a few English words explaining each section of the factory (soaking, threading, weaving,) Other than that I was just allowed to wander through and watch. The workers were used to people venturing in and some of them indicated that I should lean in and try, or touch something. I helped the man do the quality control at the end, by looking through the silk in front of a window and two florescent lights. I can attest to the quality of the silk from Mysore! I enjoyed Hampi; loved discovering all the ruins, but found the food in town overpriced and boring. The food in Gokarna is much better and more reasonable too. The highlight here is the fresh dairy; milk, curd, lassis etc.
I have been busy this week. We decided to send a few things home; gifts and such, so instead of sending a small package now and another later, we decided to buy some things and send them away at once. Sam and I took care of most of the shopping. We like to barter and we work well together as a team. We went into town leaving John and Mhari at the beach and came back with a day-sack full of stuff. Mhari had helped me a bit the other day as well, so we managed to get some things and we plan to post them home soon. It will save us carrying them on to Delhi.
I have also been busy washing clothes, swimming in the sea and reading my book. I am reading The Glass Palace by Amitav Ghosh. Finding books hasn't been difficult. They aren't cheap to buy, but well worth it for entertainments sake.
We have also been adjusting our plans due to conflicts in Egypt. Fortunately, we didn't already have a flight booked for Cairo. We will give Egypt a miss this year. The pyramids will have to wait. We may extend things here in India instead. There is lots of interest to see.
(John) I have to confess, I love to explore new places but I love being on the road the most. From Gokarna, or Gokarn as it seems to be written everywhere, we ignored the guide book's advice to get a taxi to the railway station that was 10 kms out of town and found the local bus that took us there for a fraction of the cost. It meant a 400 metre hike to complete the journey but hey! We saved 150 IR or $3.75 CAD. We met our friend from Ibiza, Enrique, at the station as expected and bought our tickets, 20 IR each for our journey to Margau. We had a long wait for the train as it was delayed and we were early. We had bumped into Enrique in Gokarna the evening before in a restaurant near the beach. It was quite fortuitous as he knew all about how to get to Panjim, the capital city of Goa. I was also able to finally pay him back the 40 rupees we owed for the train journey to Ooty. We had a lovely dinner that evening on the rooftop near the sea. We not only chatted and caught up with Enrique but met his friend from Spain who had about as much English as we do Spanish. Sam had a particularly animated conversation. Enrique's English is excellent so he could help out. We also met a couple from Finland, Wilma and Artho. They encouraged us to go to Helsinki from Estonia and gave us many tips. So perhaps we will. In addition, we met another Canadian, Stephanie from Quebec. She had been to Amma's Ashram and had even travelled with Amma on her on tour. Her insights were fascinating and more proof that I still need more time at the Ashram.
While we waited for our train to Margao, we talked about Ibiza and the hotel where Enrique works for 6 months of the year. It is called El Grecko and he told us that it is 'all inclusive' for just 30 Euros a night.per person in low season, a lot more in July and August. The food is fantastic, the rooms are great, the standard is high and the three nearby beaches are beautiful. You can book on line and some kids are free while older ones pay half. We think we might try and do it at the end of trip in late July if we can get there cheaply enough.
The train eventually pulled in and we found seats in a chair class carriage. This is the basic general class for passenger trains and was open with lots of space for baggage and ample seating space. But for people like me who haven't done nearly enough Yoga and for whom a seat at 90 degrees hurts like hell after 15 minutes, It was no picnic. No matter, we pulled into Margau after 2 hours and jostled our way to a taxi where we joined with Enrique to get to the bus station. Once there we quickly found an ice cream, half a dozen samosas and a bus direct to Panjim. We said farewell to Enrique who was going in another direction and boarded the bus.
The bus took about an hour and it was pretty hot by the time we arrived. Finding a hotel was a little frustrating as we enrolled the services of a taxi driver who clearly had few interests in the area we were interested in. He took us a little out of the centre where, tired and hot, we settled on a room that was huge with a balcony but questionable security and really dirty. The shower was OK but not a saving grace and mosquitos and poor security around the balcony, meant we could not open the windows. Then the ceiling fan broke and some of us had the worst night's sleep of the trip, including the sleeperbus/beach night. So Natasha's in Panjim got 0 out of 4 fountains. Panjim however was my favourite city/town in India so far. Situated along the massive Mandobi River, the city is manageable, the buses easy to use and the streets have no cows or goats, few dogs and relatively little garbage. Architecturally, the Portuguese influence is charming, and while we saw tourists/foreigners, we were rare. We found a new hotel in the centre for our second night called Somia's Guesthouse, small and cramped but clean and with a working fan and a window we could leave open at night. I had to use a curtain to prevent mosquitos but it worked well enough and we all slept well. 3 out of 4 fountains for Somia's. I forgot to mention it had a neat little system that heated up the shower water by way of a heater coil right in the shower head. It is only because we are not all dead that I know that is does not electrocute people.
We spent the majority of the day exploring Old Goa, which is essentially a park full of large churches, a museum a convent and a ruined monastery. We saw the remains of St Francis Xavier – interesting!
The night before we left Panjim, Sam and I, who must have slept the best the previous night, had the energy to take a 1 hour evening cruise on the Mandobi River. It was a big boat that had at least 200 passengers. It was essentially a party boat. The MC worked hard to get the crowd excited about the dancing that was displayed. The dancing was OK, not amazing, but we enjoyed watching the sunset as we cruised. The most fun past though was when the MC invited the men in the crowd to come on stage and dance to some Punjabi dance music. Without any further encouragement the stage filled instantly with eager men, obviously longing for a moment in the spotlight. They were fantastic! The joy was abundant and it's to my shame that I did not join them. Maybe next time.
We ate that evening at a great little restaurant close to our guesthouse. It appeared much fancier than we have been used to but was only a fraction more expensive. I bravely ordered the Goan speciality – Vindaloo - and told the waiter that I wanted it spicy. It had a kick but I lapped it up. Southern India did not defeat my appetite for hot spicy food.
In the morning, we had to get out early as check out at Sonia's was 8.00 am. I might downgrade the fountains to 2 for that reason. We again ignored Lonely Planet's advice to get a taxi to the airport (for 800 IR) and made our way to the bus station. For 100 IR we got on a bus to Vasco di Garma, had a comfortable journey to a junction, got off the bus, quickly found the connecting bus, paid another 20 IR and went to the airport. Damn we're good.
At Goa airport we found the arrivals hall but turned around by security because it was on fire. Well, it was full of smoke anyway. We were 2 hours early so we went to a little restaurant near the entry to Arrivals where I am sitting now eating Samosa and being deafened by military jets taking off.
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