Profile
Blog
Photos
Videos
October 12th Our last morning with the gang we all had one last breakfast
of cornflakes together and then everyone went their separate ways. Our
first mission was to get a train out of Delhi as fast as we possibly could.
We all hopped on the metro and made it to the train station, but as we were
looking for the tourist office, a gentleman came up to us to say it was
undergoing construction and had temporarily moved... we ended up taking a
rickshaw to a travel place that had "Government" in the title, but after
realized that they were just using the same darn website that got us in
this mess.
We went back to the train station on the metro after the rickshaw totally
ripped off TJ who was kind enough to pay for the ride even though his hand
got slammed somehow and was bleeding all over the place! After we, again,
arrived at the Delhi train station, we followed the 22 signs pointing us in
the direction of the tourist bureau. Once we actually got there, it was a
great relief even with the 30 minute wait to buy it from a teller.
Tickets down, luggage to go so we went back to the hotel and picked up our
stuff and rick-shawed to a pretty sketchy looking FedEx. Too bad
sketchiness doesn't automatically mean "cheap" because the total for
mailing everything was $400 usd so we decided to take the burden and carry
all of it for the remainder of the journey.
The rest of the day, I walked around with a little more than 10 kilos on my
head like a local while we shopped around trying to find Nate shoes that
would fit his enormous non-Indian feet. No luck and my neck was getting
pretty tired so we ended the market and went straight to the train station
3 hours earlier than we had to.
As our rendezvous time of 9 o'clock approached, I started looking out for
TJ and Hana, our traveling companions from the course. I caught TJ around
9, but Hana was still MIA and our train was scheduled to leave in 45
minutes. Nate was also searching and then finally Hana and 3 of the boys
that had chosen to hang out in Delhi ran up enthusiastically relieved since
they had all been utterly lost without any clue as to what platform our
train was at.
Finally altogether, Nate and I had the idiotic plan of catching dinner
before the train and nearly sabotaged everyones trip because Nate was
carrying the one ticket with all of our names on it. We boarded the train
with literally 30 seconds to spare and I'm sure Hana and TJ wanted to smack
us.
The rest of the night, we were out cold as the train rocked us to sleep.
October 13th We arrived in Haridwar at 5:30 AM and began bargaining for a
ride to Rishikesh. It was at least 20 minutes before we got on wheels for a
relatively decent price and another 30 till we reached the city.
After we got out, TJ was kind enough to wait with our luggage till we found
a room. The prices stared with 600 rupees and after 5 hotels, I bargained a
room to 250 (only $5) per night. The place even has a small balcony, but
it's a dirty dump.
We spent some time on the internet and ate some street food and met back up
with TJ who has been trying to arrange getting back to the mountains for a
solo trek for Joshimath. Alas, he can't get out on a bus till tomorrow so
he's crashing in our room till then. After he dropped his stuff in our
room, he showed us the route he was on all day which took him to the clean
part of the city where he found more, nicer hotels and ashrams and yoga
posters (basically why I was interested in going there) Unfortunately, this
is where all of the other tourists are seen milling about so I feel a bit
removed from the Indian culture.
October 14th We woke and TJ had already left and we set out with our plan
to return to the nice side of town for the day. We discovered a few
appealing yoga places, the post office, more good food, and an amazing
retreat house on the banks of the Ganga. We ate lunch there and I started
re-reading The Hobbit from my childhood. I still remember when my mom used
to read it to me. Though I don't think we eve finished it, it still brings
me back.
- comments