After our awesome experience in Amritsar we took a night train back to Delhi. One of the trail guides we met while hiking to Beas Kund near Manali offered to take us out for an evening in Delhi for some really delicious street food. They said we weren't getting the true Delhi experience if we never ate street food so we hesitantly agreed to meet him! We say hesitantly because we heard horror stories or foreigners getting Delhi belly from eating the street food. We ended up being completely surprised at the quality and deliciousness of the street food! Raghav’s friend Vandana had previously been on a walking food tour of the area and knew all the best places for us to eat. Our first booth was a chicken vendor who served the BEST BBQ chicken with Ghee (similar to butter) we've ever eaten! We ate nearly two full chickens worth. We were all so stuffed but Vandana said we had to top off our bellies with dessert! They arranged two cycle rickshaws to take us through the back alleys to our next gut filler. Driving through the alleys with locals was a great experience! They taught us a lot about the people, culture, and also informed us of the differences between areas. The next stall was a specialty ice cream shop called Kuremal Mahavir Prasad. Vandana was very upset as the shop was closed; she went around and spoke to a couple of young men standing around. The next thing we saw was one of the men opening up the shop just for us! We couldn't believe they were opening up just for us but Vandana explained it was her third time coming that week and she was beginning to get quite the reputation as an important customer. We tried two different desserts; the first dessert was made from fruit concentrate and ice, kind of like a really delicious slushy. The second dessert was something we had never seen before called Kulfi wale; it was a frozen spiced ice cream stuffed mango, peeled then thinly sliced. So each bite had fresh mango, spice, and ice cream it was Delicious! We thoroughly enjoyed our night out and rolled ourselves home. FYI we never got Delhi belly! The food was all prepared to the highest standards even though it was prepared on the street. We highly recommend other tourists to try some of Delhi’s awesome street food. You should be fine if you ask locals or go to stands that are preparing the food fresh! The next day we flew from Delhi to Bagdogbra (the city closest to Darjeeling). After our flight we jumped into a jeep and began a 4 hour ride up the steep mountain side to Darjeeling. We met two other English travellers and decided we would share the experience of the jeep ride. The driver stuck us four in the back where the two bench seats faced one another. It was very cramped but we had a great time getting to know Shane and Gemma! The drive was scenic; we drove through tea plantations and got great views of the valleys. Darjeeling isn’t the small quaint town you picture. It’s actually quite large, loud but set on a beautiful landscape in the Himalyan foothills. We took a day to rest then arranged for a 4 night trek up into the Indian Himalayas. The Singalila trek is not only popular with foreigners but also with Indian trekkers. The trek climbs up into the mountains above the clouds (and sometimes through them) and criss-crosses in and out of India and Nepal. We chose to do this trek in particular for the views of the Himalaya and the chance of seeing 4 of the 5 highest peaks including Mount Everest! From Darjeeling we took a 1.5 hour Jeep ride to a smaller town called Maneybhanjang to meet our guide Pemba and start the trek. The first day we hiked in thick fog through forest and alongside a Jeep road which services the small villages in the area. We hiked for 5 hour and ended in a tiny village where we spent the night at a tea house with homemade Nepalese food. Our second day we woke up really early bundled in some blankets and hiked to a small lookout to watch the sunrise hit Kanchenjunga, the third highest peak in the world. After we enjoyed the view we went back to the tea house relaxed, ate then headed out for the days hike. We continued hiking, the trail traversed through small villages, a conservation area with the Red Panda (we looked hard but never saw one). The total day's hike was 20 kms with 12 being very steep. Unfortunately the clouds rolled in early, which significantly decreased the views. It was interesting and slightly eerie hiking above the clouds. Later in the afternoon on one of the very long and very steep climbs the clouds opened and we got a view of our hotel which sat at the top of Sandakphu overlooking the huge mountain valleys. We finally reached our hotel at 3636m we could feel the elevation in our breathing and were so looking forward to sleep. Even though the hotel is so high and set in the mountains there was no heat so it was very cold. We were lucky that our guide gave us hot water bottles to sleep with! We had a very difficult night as it was very cold and we had eaten something that made our bellies turn upside down (not the street food from Delhi, this was 5 days after). Needless to say we spent the majority of the night running back and forth from the bathroom (squat toilet with a tap). After the horrible night we were glad to see the first signs of sunrise. We once again bundled up and stepped outside to see the sunrise hitting the mountain range. It was stunningly beautiful! Pemba pointed out which mountains we were looking at. The neatest part was Everest was further away and it looked smaller than some of the other giant mountains around except for when the sun rose it hit Everest first! It was an amazing view. We were feeling very ill so we decided to hike to another village at a lower elevation. Pemba was convinced we had a touch of altitude sickness but he quickly realized it was only in our guts as every 5 minutes we were running into the woods to use the bathroom! Although the 14kms was downhill it took way longer than planned and was way more difficult for us that we had thought. Once we arrived at our village we ate then climbed into bed and slept the night through…all thanks to Imodium! After we woke from a decent sleep we ate then hiked the last 7 km to where a Jeep picked us up. We asked if it could pick us up any closer but due to a massive landslide that happened during the Monsoons the driver had to wait at the other side. Once we rounded the last bend we had never been happier to see a Jeep! We had a 3.5 hour ride back to Darjeeling where we checked into our hotel then went to a Doctor. Due to a Hindu festival the doctor’s office was closed so we had to endure a visit to the hospital. We walked into the building which looked like it was built in the 1940’s and never updated. There was no triage area so we walked up a really decrepit staircase and started to pop our heads into rooms to find someone. Signs above the doorways read; women’s ward, men’s ward, economy ward and our favourite, which we didn’t dare enter was the surgical auditorium. The dormitories (wards) had people laying on gurneys which looked like they came from World War II. The whole building was old and very dirty. We eventually found a nurse and explained that we would like to see a doctor, she told us to wait downstairs and they’d let us know when he arrived. Waiting for the doctor we heard a lot of commotion then saw a group of (at least 8) Indians all carrying and surrounding a stretcher up the flight of stairs. There was tons of yelling and chaos but the man on the stretcher seemed to be conscious. Once the doctor arrived he made us feel much better about being there as he was very knowledgeable and professional. He explained we probably had eaten some type of parasite and prescribed us antibiotics and instructed us to drink electrolytes. We were glad we were healthy other than the stomach bug as we’d have been very reluctant to get treated for anything serious there. After a few days of rest we felt much better and much lighter! We enjoyed a few more days in Darjeeling sipping tea and people watching in the main plaza.
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ShimlaFrom Delhi we had planned to head north to the Himalayan Mountains to do some trekking and site seeing. We spent half a day arranging a night train to take us to Kalka where we would catch a toy train that would take us the rest of the way up the steep slopes of the Himalayan foothills to Shimla. We were told that Shimla was a big Honeymoon destination for Indians and when we arrived we felt like the only foreign tourists around. Shimla was absolutely swamped with Indian tourists but it had quite a nice charm to it. The views from the main town were really nice and people weren’t constantly approaching us trying to sell us stuff unlike what we experienced in Delhi. Instead we had a lot of the Indian tourists approaching us to have their photos taken with us! It was a concept that seemed really odd at first but we quickly got used to it and started to have some good fun with it! We didn’t do much in Shimla, but what we did do turned out to be a lot of fun! We had planned to send a few parcels home and to Australia so we went to a local tailor (yes that’s correct, a tailor) to have our items to send sewn into cloth packages, which were then sealed at the seams using hot wax! It was a lot of fun to watch the tailor and his assistant whip up the packages! While looking for lunch one day we were stopped by and older gentleman in the main square, he wanted to know if we needed help finding something. At first we were really apprehensive and assumed he was up to something but as we continued to chat with him we learned that he was only a retired college professor looking for a good conversation. He introduced himself as Madan and he recommended a few different restaurants for us to eat at and then politely mentioned that we were more than welcome to join him for tea at a restaurant in the main square. So we took him up on his offer and accompanied him for tea in the main square. Our conversations went from understanding the meaning of love to scientific explanations of existence to poetry! Let’s be honest the only poetry we know is the stuff we learned on Sesame Street years ago! It was a lot of fun and it turned out that Madan was written a book entitled ‘Endearing Approach’ and it’s kind of hard to describe but we understand it as a collection of poems that attempt to shed some light on our purpose of existence…we think. Anyway he used poetry throughout his entire career to aid in teaching mathematics to high school and college students. In the end we felt privileged to have met him and we are trying to find his book to buy online. He says that the publisher produces very few copies so they are quickly sold through Amazon, but he also said that the Royal British Library has a copy of it. Maybe one day we’ll get a chance to read it. ManaliFrom Shimla we took a bone-rattling 10 hour bus ride to Manali where we had planned to do a little hiking. Unfortunately Manali was even higher in elevation than Shimla and so it got quite cold at night! We stayed up in Old Manali where most of the foreigners stay. We’ve been lugging all of our camping gear around with us and we wanted to use it one last time before we sent it Australia to lighten our traveling loads. We had heard of and read a few stories of hikers who went missing near Manali. We guessed that the majority of disappearances were drug related, with Manali being the weed capital so we got some info from the Mountaineering Institute and planned to hike up to the source of the Beas Kund, the huge river that flows right through Manali. All of the people we talked to said that the hike was safe, well-marked and easily doable without taking a local guide. We are really comfortable planning and going on our own overnight trips so we went for it. To get out of Manali we took a local bus headed north and hopped off in a small village. Everything was uphill from there! We walked up to a small local ski resort where you could go paragliding for less than $10. We passed on that because believe it or not we still value our lives and continued up towards Beas Kund. We had read that the beginning of the trail was a 4x4 only jeep track; well that was written back in 2009 and now there is basically a 2 lane highway where the jeep track used to be. Luckily the highway is closed to general traffic and open only to authorized construction vehicles so as we walked up the hill dump trucks would pass us on either on their way to pick up gravel or drop some off. We walked up for about two and a half hours and finally we reached a huge construction site. We felt defeated. Even though everyone kept telling us to continue up the road to find the Beas Kund trail we stood there at this huge construction site feeling like we should turn back. They were building a tunnel, someone told us, and when we asked them to point out the trail to Beas Kund or to the Dhundi campground everyone pointed in a different direction and no one spoke more than a few words of English. We stood there, right in the middle of a massive construction zone, debating our next move when a young Indian (he looked to be in his 20’s) appeared from the forest on a hillside about 300 meters up from the construction zone. At first we didn’t think much of it; he was probably just a local farmer coming down into town or something like that. As he approached us he said, “Oh, I thought you were part of my group.” He went on to explain that he was guiding a group of Indians up to Beas Kund and that he could help us find Dhundi camp, where his group was set up. He spoke fluent English and made certain we knew that he was a real guide; probably because he knew that there might be some apprehension on our side. He introduced himself as Mowgli and took us up to the camp. Later on we were invited over for dinner by Mowgli, Raghav and Prem; three of the guides who run an adventure company called January the 14th and who were organizing this trip up to Beas Kund. We were warmly welcomed by all the Indians in the group and we enjoyed an amazing dinner and some really groovy campfire song and dance! That night as we tried to sleep the temperatures dropped… and dropped some more! We were freezing and we tried everything to stay warm in the tent. We zipped our sleeping bags together to share body heat, we put on all of our clothes and we even used our sleeping bag liners for more insulation but nothing really worked. Feeling sick and groggy we decided that it probably wouldn’t be a good idea to continue up towards Beas Kund where the elevation only got higher and the temperatures cooler. When we woke up and were having breakfast in the morning (all stuffed up and soar-throated) Mowgli and Rhagav came up to check on us and bring us a packed lunch for the day! Unfortunately we decided to turn back despite them offering us an extra sleeping bag and liner! We thought we would walk up a little ways to get some more views in another valley and then turn around for the day. When we were tried enough to call it a day we headed back towards the road we climbed up and hitch-hiked with a construction vehicle heading back down the mountain towards Manali. The next couple of days in Manali we tried to relax and enjoy a few of the sites around town before another perilous 10 hour bus journey to Mcleod Ganj, home of the Dalai Lama and Tibetan Government in exile!
I think we are going way too fast to be landing. The plane hit the runway with a bone-rattling touchdown and the pilot hit the brakes so hard that we both flung forward in our seats. Wow, that was rough. We must be in India. We had already adjusted to stifling heat in Abu Dhabi and Delhi would be no different. We called our hostel and arranged a transfer from the airport and within about 30 minutes a young man arrived with a sign reading something like, “Courtney and Andrew.” Our names were completely misspelled but you get the jist. Our first taste of India was quite exciting! Driving from the Delhi airport into Pahar Ganj in the heart of the city was like something out of a movie. Even after traveling for the last 9 months we felt like it was our first day out of Canada! Cars travel both directions on the road even on one way roads, roads are not only used by motorized vehicles but also by horse drawn carriages, cycle rickshaws and yes even elephants. We were a little tired from our night flight so we planned to just take it easy on our first day. This proved to be quite difficult. When we arrived at our hostel, which was located through a maze of alleys, it took about an hour to get checked in. First we had to walk to another building where we sat and waited for 20 minutes or so, then we were brought back to our hostel and sat and waited for another 20 minutes but at least they gave us tea. Then a guy showed up and took down our info and we were on our way. We spoke to one of the employees of the hostel and he started to recommend a few things for us to see in India, he recommended us visiting the government run tourism office for help on booking trains among other things. He then offered us a free ride to the place. Great! We thought. While we were on our way out our driver asked us if we were hungry for breakfast, which we were, so he dropped us off at a little place with pretty bad food and pretty high prices. We ate while he waited and then we continued to the tourism office. The office looked very official; it had air conditioning, government signs, desks and even computers. We sat down with a friendly man and we told him what we wanted to do and see: hike in Manali; visit the Taj Mahal, Varanasi, and the Golden Temple; trek in Sikkim and finally head to Rajasthan and then head south to Goa. We were absolutely shocked to hear that the weather in Manali was very bad right now (despite what the weather websites on the internet were showing us and what we read in our guide books). He recommended that we head up north to Srinagar and stay in a house boat for a few days, then return to Delhi and tour in a car through Rajasthan since there were no trains there. We asked for what that type of trip would cost and the price he gave us was astronomical in terms of what we had heard things would cost in India. Courtney and I excused ourselves from the desk to chat about his offer. We both agreed that this was one of those scams that we had read about, so we bailed. Unfortunately this wasn't the last. During our time in Delhi we were approached by people who were interested in getting to know us, students, dance instructors, people from Mumbai and they all had one thing in common: they wanted us to visit a local tourism office so that we could get some really good and valuable information on India. Turns out they were all touts looking to get us on outrageously expensive houseboat tours in Srinagar. Once we were used to them we had no problems telling them to leave us alone and that's when Delhi became quite fun! We loved visiting all the shopping stalls around our area! We wandered through the bustling Main Bazzar; Chandi Chowk, one of the older areas of the city; and Connaught Place, which has a combination of upscale shops and local markets. We even stopped by an interesting shoe shop where the shoes fall from a hole in the ceiling. One of the helpers asks your size and the shoe you like and calls it up to a stockroom in the ceiling and within seconds the pair of shoes you are looking for falls from the ceiling in a very comedic yet slightly dangerous fashion! We aren't very good at visiting historic sites so we've decided to try improving that here in India. We started with the evening light and sound show at the Red Fort, one of Delhi's oldest buildings that has stood through many different eras of rulers. We had heard the food was great in India but it took us by surprise even with our high expectations! It is absolutely fantastic! After we finish one meal we are already looking forward to the next one! We tried a lot of different things in Delhi and there isn't one thing I can think of that we didn't like. Fortunately we avoided Delhi belly, which is the common term used to identify one who spends three days in the bathroom after first arriving in Delhi. We had a lot of fun in Delhi but like any other city, it eventually wore on us and we grew tired of the hustle and bustle. Fortunately we've met a few people that live in the city that we hope to visit the next couple of times through! Here are a few more exciting pics to get you ready for the last leg of our year trip, enjoy! |
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