We left Varanasi on the morning of May-16 and reached Lucknow by evening. Lucknow is my father's hometown. I was also born there. We were initially planning to leave on May-20 but decided to extend our stay by one more day.
Visiting lucknow as always was a great pleasure. Apart from my grandmother and my fathers elder brother who stays there, there were quite a few other relatives also that were visiting which made the stay even more fun.
The brilliant Kulphi and Dalmoth are great on taste. We missed Tunda Kebab this time. I and my brother Bharat were busy designing a r.c. aircraft. We learnt that making a helicopter is very difficult with the hub, thrust, Jesus nut turning mechanism and what not. So, we turned from the Chinook to a simple airplane. Even that isn't simple. We buyed a r.c car and dismanteled it to make a remote control motor, rudder and elevator. Learnt how the Differntial works and spent a lot of time moving trains in train simulator.
Thursday, May 20, 2010
Day 34 (May-15) : Benaras
My third cousins (Pragati and Unnati)
Sarnath
Crowded road in Benaras.
Ganga Pooja
Day 33 (May-14) : Bodhigaya
We decided to enjoy Bihar and not rush through it. So, after Nalanda we halted at Bodhgaya, the place where lord Buddha is said to be enlightened. The B.S.T.D.C. hotel was beautiful. It took some effort to find it. We initially gave up and went to a decent looking hotel called Siddarth. The rate was 5000/- a night with no guarantee of AC as electricity was unreliable. We resumed our search and finally found the BSTDC hotel. The rates were just 735/-, the location was much better and uninterrupted AC was assured!! I think people underrate government hotels.
Reached Varanasi in night and checked in a UPTDC hotel near railway station.
We learnt that standard food like mixed veg too gets the local flavour.
Bodh gaya, is a very peaceful place. The Bodhi vriksha there is of the fourth generation. It is presently 150 years old. There is no problem of Pundas there, so the place gives a better peaceful effect. Some things are unexplained, for example, the question of what exactly am I? A constellation of thoughts perhaps, but you are something else of course to be able to observe it!. The answer of this question is what Buddha probably experienced.
We left Bodhgaya by 12:00 PM and reached Ramnagar before 5:00 PM. Ramnagar is one side of Ganga while Varanasi on other side. My father had spent 4 years in Ramnagar and we went to see his old college and house. We also had the famous lassi there. You had to fight through the crowd to get it. Other than that, I found it to be a peaceful place. Two or three peacocks had settled on a tree behind my dad’s old house. Ramleela takes place on avery big scale in this place. The entire city becomes the stage, and people who are rich enough see the thing from elephant backs.
Small stupa
Bodhi vriksha
The middle column in railing is from Ashoka's time ie 2300 years ago!
Penancing monk
Buddha's statue
Dharam chakras
Thai temple
Ramnagar fort. It belongs to King of Kashi (Varanasi).
Sunset on Ganga in Ramnagar
Diving in to Ganga for a bath
Day 31,32 (May-12 and 13) : Nalanda
We were initially planning to drive through Bihar quickly. That we learnt would have been a great mistake. For we would have missed all the major Buddhist pilgrims, the Nalanda university and the great food.
Our first plan was to go via Darbhanga and Muzaffarpur. However after reaching pretty close to Darbhanga and Nepal border, we realized that the bridge there had been washed away in last year floods and had not been built as yet. So we had to backtrack 75 Km in night to halt at Purnia for night. Decided to take the Maoists infested area tomorrow to Gaya and then to Varanasi.
Leaving aside the lawlessness(we didn't witness any), Bihar is just wonderful. We had to go through Maoist problem area as the highway bridge was broken. We halted at Nalanda. The college is of dimensions 5km x 10km. However only 500mt x 500mt of it is excavated. An amazing fact about the university, is that when a certain portion of the complex became old, the kings simply filled it up with soil and built a new one over it ! The university had all facilities, including baths and a proper drainage system. The door gaurds would ask the students questions. Correct answerers alone would be allowed inside the complex.
As we walked over the stairs of the place, I could imagine the great scholars running up and down the same stairs, great minds at work.
A simple house in a Bihar village
Corns drying on the road
A de-railed train
Restored drainage system from centuries ago!
The university
Big temple complex
Storytelling stairs.
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
Day 30 (May-11) : Gurudongmor
Yesterday’s walk helped a lot. I didn’t feel a thing while mom got a bit of headache because of altitude. We went through an army post. The soldiers there gave us tea and soup. The lake was magnificent and the road was as wild as it can be. After the place where the army checked our permits, for 5-6 Km we went through an area where there were no fixed roads. It was like a high altitude plateau at around 16000 ft. One could make their own path!
There was only one other Jeep going to the lake that early in the morning. The tourists in that car were probably feeling so cold that they had outsourced even the job of clicking the pictures to the taxi driver! The driver used to stop the car every once in a while, take the camera from the tourists and click pictures. It was very weird. Those guys threw empty wafers bag also from their car. We picked it up and gave it back to their driver when we caught up with them.
We also spotted a couple of Himalayan marmots. The lake has circumference of around 3 Km with a Buddhist temple on the farther side. Jawans from Sikh regiment have also built a Gurudwara on the closer side where the road ends. They gave us free hot tea. We spent around 90 minutes there before starting back. Even while driving back, we kept stopping often and clicking pictures.
Peeping snow peaks
Me again
Long way to go
Approaching the lake
Dad
Himalayan Marmot
Make your own road
Gurudongmar Lake
Clarity
One last look at the beautiful lake
A loitering cloud and its shadow
Splash
We dropped the idea of going to Pelling. Instead, we decided to go straight to Singtam that day and then drive on to Lucknow via Bihar on following days. The road to Singtam was very bad. Waterfalls actually went over the road! Rivers were flowing on the road, and the worst of all, the narrow road was bustling with many huge trucks. Our widecar had to be backed and taken through narrow places, with a deep cliff on one side. It was night so not many pics could be taken. I had to be out of the car to keep guiding dad to carefully manuver the car. It is a tough job for a cleaner. The road clearance of the car really helps!
We finally reached Singtam at around 8:00pm. it becomes very dark in the east at this time. We stayed at a place called Shimma lodge. Again, I was to sleep alone. However this time mom took my place. The place was dirt cheep. Compared to the other places there, and the one where we stayed in Omerga, the place was great value for money.
What a road
That is a stream flowing on the road
Effect of pressure difference between 17,300 ft and 4000 ft! We drank water from this bottle at the lake and this is what happened to it at Singtam
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