Benares... the holy city

Benares or Varanasi was incredible. I left Kathmandu by plane so I got to see the Everest, it is magical to see such a high range from the plane, the peaks higher than the clouds!

I was so happy to be back in India, Indian people are lovely, and yes it can be easy to lose your patience with them sometimes, but I have tons of patience!

I stayed from the 23rd till the 28th at Mishra Guest House, just behind Manikarnika Ghat (the Burning Ghat), I had a huge double room with views to the Ganga, and best of all it was just by the very best CHAI maker of Varanasi, seriously I must have spent a few hours there every single day, drinking chai and talking to Telu (not sure of the spelling...) my gosh he had stories to tell, about the Ganga and Shiva and Parvati and all the gods...

I spent most of my time there walking up and down the river, watching the people, the old maharaja palaces, the ghats... The Ganga is full of life (but not inside the waters, apparently there are so polluted there is not even oxygen in them). People bath, swim, brush their teeth, do the laundry, fish and most important that's where they go to die, before they are burnt at the Ghat they get touched by the Ganga waters and then they go up in smoke! Nice! Every day, every night they burn corpses...up to 200 a day!

I also visited the old part of the city which is a maze of very narrow streets with lots of cow shits to dodge, but you become used to that and it is even kind of fun.. In the new city I visited a couple of temples and I went by ricksaw, which I just love it love it love it, it is so much fun, the way they drive and the things you see along the road... like the Indians say: Kuchi Milega (or something like that) which means... EVERYTHING IS POSSIBLE, and it's so true...

Kathmandu, bloody Kathmandu...

The trip to Kathmandu was amazing. Early in the morning you could see the whole Annapurna range from Pokhara, with the Fish Tail looking over us, what a wonderful peak, so elegant, although it seems it is the highest it's "only" 6.997 m, but it looks higher than the Annapurna because it is closer to Pokhara. You can only see these peaks early in the morning or late in the afternoon because after that they are covered by the clouds.
Kathmandu has been my first real disapointment in this trip. Such a big chaotic, noisy, polluted city, I didn't expect it at all. My guest house was in Freak St., just behind the souvenirs market in Durbar Square.
Kathmandu no m'ha impressionat gaire, es una ciutat molt bruta i plena de bruticia i pol.lucio i els monuments molt deixats, a mes a mes fan pagar per veure les estupes, pero nomes als turistes. El primer dia d'arribar-hi vaig fer com la gent d'alla i em vaig comprar una mascareta pero fins i tot aixi em vaig passar tota la setmana tossint i amb mocs.
Per sort, encara que la ciutat no em va agradar gaire justament se celebrava DASHAIN, que es una festa hindu i per aixo cada cop que sortia al carrer hi passava alguna cosa nova. Per exemple, un dia el cel es va omplir de cometes, un altre dia vaig veure el rei i la reina (de moment, em sembla que tenen els dies comptats) entrant al temple de Hanuman Dhoka, pero va ser el primer any que van entrar com a gent del carrer i no pas com a reis.
Bueno, otro dia, el mas bestia, je je, fue el dia que sacrificaron animales en honor a los dioses y alli estaba yo, tachan, intentando capturar el momento, pero no fui capaz y me gire justo cuando le cortaron la cabeza al bufalo, al darme la vuelta ya estaba la cabeza rodando por el suelo y sin apenas tiempo para respirar, chaca! la cabeza de la cabrita y luego, chaca! la del gallo, bueno, la de unos cuantos gallos...
Cada dia, los nepaleses hacian cola en los templos y un dia la cola mas larga era para ver a la Kumari, que es una diosa viviente (bueno...) . Cada vez que los hindues rezaban sus oraciones y ofrecian flores a los dioses se ponian una mancha naranja en la frente, la tika. Pues un dia, la tika era un empastro tan grande que casi cubria toda la frente, ese dia era de color rojo y al acercarme me di cuenta que era una mezcla de arroz, o sea que daba la impresion de que llevaban una racion de paella enganchada en la frente...
Los templos y todas las esculturas que ahi alrededor datan del 1600, algunos mas antiguos pero como estan restaurados no se sabe muy bien que es lo antiguo y que es lo moderno. En dos de los templos "descubri" las esculturas Porno!!! asi, entre dios y dios y animalitos, cuando menos te lo esperabas pues una orgia! que interesante...
Ok, so Kathmandu wasn't what I thought so it was time to move on and booked a flight to Varanasi (Benares, in India)... ah, old India, I was missing you!
Por cierto, que los nepalies no me cayeron demasiado bien y ya me estaba muriendo de ganas de volver a la India...
Mi aventura en Nepal duro 2 semanas y el dia 23 cogi un vuelo a Benares...

Bored in Pokhara

Hello! The scenery is too pretty to be true, but the town, oh well, it is just boring...

El pueblo es feisimo y suerte que tienen de tener unas montanas y unos lagos tan espectaculares. The place where I stayed in Lakeside is one long commercial street that caters to the tourists needs. This town is like a base for trekking, and if you are not here to trek then 5 days is more than enough to enjoy the sites. Power cuts occur very often and a hot shower is a luxury and on my last night I discovered someone else sleeping inside my bed... a cockarage! brrr, I was so sleepy I didn't want a big argument so I just kicked it to the other side of the room.

On the 17th I caught the 7.30 am bus to Kathmandu...

Pokhara, Nepal

Leaving Rishikesh was hard because all the good times I spent there, but I was ready for new adventures!
I bought my train ticket to Gorakpur from Haridwar. A sleeper train that would take 15 hours to leave me near the border with Nepal. In Rishikesh I met 2 girls and 2 guys that were doing the same route so I joined them, and we were actually together in the train. The train was very crowded and the ride was smooth, but it is difficult to describe the state of the train, when you have been in India a few days you get used to everything, but if you've never experienced something similar the train ride would have seemed totally surrealistic: piles of rubbish everywhere, people sleeping on the floor, 20 men staring at me like they've never seen a woman in their lives, dirty fans hanging periously from the ceiling, the doors of the train opened, sellers of tea going in and out of the train and funnily enough I though it all was fantastic and I even managed to sleep all night long...
The trippy part of the adventure started once we got to Gorakpur. We only had to take a bus to the Nepalese border but they told us the roads were blocked, so we decided to take a jeep instead. The jeep was carrying 15 passengers and our bags, half way it broke down and we were lucky that there was a few little "cottages" where we could drink some chai (no cold drinks or water or food available), it took more than an hour to fix it and when it finally did we started the ride. The scenery was so beatiful, plenty of rice fields and water ponds with water lilies and lotus flowers, lots of peasants carrying big piles of leaves on their heads and sheperds with their buffalos, monkeys along the roads, lots of bikes and motorbikes and funny trucks blasting Indian music... and then... our driver lost control of the car, we went to one side, to the other side, we fell of the road and we crashed against some buffalos killing one of them. I felt a bit shaky but fine, but terribly sad for the buffalo and specially for the owner who started crying. Our jeep was totally damaged by now so we had to stand by the road waiting for someone to help us out and suddently half village was there, pulling the buffalo from under the car and helping carrying our luggage to the road, police came as well and was very friendly and stopped a bus who took us to Sunauli (India-Nepal border). The bus was carrying people from Sri Lanka who offered us some bananas. Since I have come to this country I have only found out the kindest of people who have nothing and give you everything.
Finally at Sonauli we got our visas for Nepal and took an overnight bus to Pokhara.
So Rishikesh- Pokhara--- 2 days trip! but it didn't seem that long. My partners in adventure are very nice people and we are all staying at the same hotel by the lake side.
I am in the Himalayas!!!!! It's stunning, it's so beautiful I can't describe it with words.
Internet connection is very slow and not good so again I can't post any pictures, hopefully I will do so one day.
Lots of love!!!

Please help, there is a monkey in my room...

I still can't believe that I ever had to use that sentence... It happened a few days ago in Rishikesh, I was reading in the balcony of my room at the Divya Hotel, just went inside the room to pick up something and when I turned my head around there he was, the cheeky monkey staring at me. I tried to convince him to leave the room but I could see he was not leaving so I went to know on my neighbours' door and then I said the weirdest sentence I have ever used... Please help, there is a monkey in my room... The neighbours were lovely and brave! The monkey run away only taking one of my medecines, the cheek he had! looking through my bags see what he could grab, unbelievable... We then saw him trying to drink the bleach to make water drinkable I was carrying in my medicines bag, good think we was unable to break the bottle and drink it, otherwise I would have to have use the sentence "please help, there is a dead monkey in my balcony..."
Bueno, la historia de amor entre la practica del yoga y yo se acabo en el momento que descubri las playas al borde del Ganges, me he pasado los ultimos dias en Rishikesh banandome en el rio y comiendo los platos tipicos del pueblo, que bueno!
Cada dia era una nueva aventura en Rishikesh y la ultima fue el momento en que un mono se colo en mi habitacion y tuve que llamar a mis vecinos para que lo echaran, ya que a mi no me hacia ni caso, pero el maldito no se fue con las manos vacias, me robo el liquido de potabilizar agua, el pobre, menos mal que no pudo abrir la botella sino se habria llevado una sorpresa...
Otra noche, con unos cuantos amigos subimos a la terraza del hotel en el atico con los sacos de dormir y mantas y nos quedamos todos alli a dormir y vimos un monton de estrellas fugaces.
Despues de estos dias "tan duros" en Rishikesh decidi que era el momento de emprender otra vez la marcha...

Still in Rishikesh...

I think it's going to be really hard to leave this place, I am falling in love with this town! After one day we had already met many people and we decided to go further up north, to the holy site of Gangotri, where the Ganges springs.
We took the bus early Monday (or Tuesday...) morning. We were Carles (my friend from Barcelona), Luis (a guy from Bilbao) and Gabriel (from Romania). The bus we caught it in Rishikesh town would take 4 to 5 hours to Uttarkashi. From there we would take a jeep to Gangotri. Well, that was the plan... In the end, it all became the scariest day of my life!! The ride to Uttarkashi took 8 hours, the bus was, of course, more than 30 years old, the road was bumpy, the problem was driving through the highest mountains, 10 cm from the edge to nowhere and on the other side massive rocks about to fall on the road, I think I felt like praying for the very first time of my life. The scenery was breathtaking but I was so frightened I didn't even dare to look out of the window. The bus was quite full and in one of the stops we got on board a couple of policemen with a prisoner, very surrealistic really.
We finally arrived to Uttarkashi, luckily the town is surrounded by stunning hills because it is quite an ugly town and quite expensive too, it took us two hours to find a decent hotel and double the price than in Rishikesh. Anyway, over there I made my mind to return to Rishikesh first thing in the morning, I didn't want even to think what would it be like the ride to Gangotri, apparently the roads there are worse, and yes, you can call me a chicken.
So, my friends stayed there and 7 am I took the first bus back to shanti Rishikesh. I didn't suffer at all on the way back and I don't know why, but I was more relaxed and took lots of pictures, the bus was even fuller with peasants, school kids, sellers, pilgrims, so many people that they even had to stand up carrying their bags on their heads, ah, and the bus had no door, so you could see the edge...
Got to Laxman Jhula (second bridge) and find a nice clean cheap room, ahhhhhhhh.
So on Wednesday morning, very early and FINALLY I went to check out the ashrams and the yoga courses. Most ashrams fully booked and not as cheap as I thought, so my hotel was good for the moment.
The same day I met Guy, an Israeli guy and he was interested in practicing yoga too and the good thing is that he is got a motorbike. The best yoga course is in Ram Jhula (first bridge, about 40 minutes walk from Laxman Jhula, where I stay) so in the afternoon we went to our first yoga lesson by bike. It was good, it was at Parmath Niketan and the class was for free.
I came back to my hotel where they offered me a free lesson too, so that evening I was totally wasted, I did 3 hours of yoga in a row, after almost a month without practicing.
So, here I am still, chilling out, doing yoga in the afternoon, taking trips to nice places in the evening (I went to see other waterfalls, lovely!) and drinking chai (Indian tea) at night with my friends at the Freedom Cafe, a beautiful bar by the river.
I just don't want to move from here!!!!

Going up North to Rishikesh

3 days in Delhi is enough, everybody says so and I totally agree. So by the third day we booked a night bus to Rishikesh. The bus ride was very funny, stopping at strange places and picking up people until it was full, of course we got to Rishikesh later than previewed, but this is India! On the bus we met Amid, an Israeli guy who speaks very good Spanish and we all have a good laugh about the bus and the way the driver drove it.
Rishikesh is in the mountains by the Ganges river. The setting and the nature is spectacular but I am a bit let down by the dirtyness everywhere, in the streets, in the mountain trekks, it's amazing. Sometimes you get to a waterfall in the middle of a pretty mountain and by your side there will be plastic bottles, old clothes, all kind of rubbish, it is a bit sad. Also, there are many tourists, specially Israeli, and so this is also called the Houmus Route...
There are many yoga schools and ashrams, but we are staying in a hotel by the LaxmanJhula (second bridge). We have a room with two beds and bathroom and a massive terrace overlooking the valley and we pay 150 Rupies per night (less than 3 euros, so 1.50 euros each, pretty good eh!). Food around here is very nice and very cheap aswell, I think I am going to put on weight in India, I like everything!!
I don't know how long I will be here, but hopefully I will be able to log in again and download some pictures.
Estoy muy bien, y de momento no he tenido ningun problema, al contrario. He estado tres dias en Delhi y ahora estoy en el Norte en Rishikesh, cerca del nacimiento del Ganges, es tan bonito! Esta tarde he ido a pasear con unos amigos y nos hemos encontrado en un parque nacional y caminando caminando hemos llegado a un pequeno salto de agua, unas mini-cataratas y nos hemos banado alli, como en una pelicula. Por el camino habia arboles altisimos y flores y muchas telaranas y... monos! En Delhi me encontre con bastantes catalanes pero aqui en Rishikesh solo hay israelitas, incluso en este ordenador estan las letras escritas en hebreo y en muchos restaurantes preparan cocina hebrea, es curioso...
Bueno, espero que esteis bien. Si me conecto otro dia a ver si bajo alguna foto de aqui, ya vereis que bonito es.
Hasta pronto, besos!