Week 4

This is Laksmi the elephant at the temple. She baths each morning in the river next to the men and women bathing!!

This is the queens own cool house where in the olden days she could retire when she was too hot!Water would be passed through the pillars to keep the building cool.

Above -This is where the kings favourite 11 elephants were housed.

                                                             Who is this veiled beauty

Duckie quenching her thirst with a fresh coconut

One half of an old temple door that needed elephants to close it-it is made of solid concrete and the two halves are extremely heavy.

The photo does not do it justice but this is a beautiful green stone water tank. Each piece is numbered so when they wanted to clean the tank it could be taken apart.

We went to watch sunset at the Hanuman temple which is reached by climbing 575 steps! Birgit and I are on number 486??

It was worth it for this view.

Duckie finishing her falafel wrap - the best falafels ever made by an Israeli guy in Hampi

Guess what this is?

On our lovely morning stroll. Ravi was the leader and us girls thought we were going on a gentle stroll... many boulders, river crossings later we arrived back to sanity!Thanks Rav!!

Having spent a night on the 'luxury' bus we arrived in Mumbai and chose a room with a view!

We stayed on the road behind the Taj hotel near the Gateway of India.

An amazing sugar cane hut which Ravi went to in 2006-its still going strong.

In front of the famous Taj Mahal hotel by the sea. It was over run by terrorists in 2008

The gateway built in 1911 to comemorate George V vist to India.

We took a ferry to Elephanta Island where there are 5 caves dug out of the rock. The main one has lots of sculptures.

 

They look so young....

Coming back from Elephanta island.

In the evening we headed to Chowpatty Beach where there is a good mix of food stalls, some regulated and some not.

                         Then off to Udaipur.We left Mumbai by executive bus but bailed out after an hour and flew from Mumbai airport to Udaipiur.

 This was a group of women loading the backs of these donkeys with sand

                                Ravi waiting for the bulls to let him pass...........could be some time

                                     We found this backstreet and watched a family doing pottery

 

City palace in Udaipur. Octopussy was filmed outside lake palace

 My new friends

We went to watch sunset up at the top of the mountain. The cable car was awesome

 Sunset looking over lake pichola,Udaipur

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City Palace by night

We arrived in Mt Abu and while having some lunch the cattle came to say hello

Crazy faces in front of the lake at Mt Abu

 Ok so a more normal photo, taken at 7am on the way to our 'luxury' bus!

 Ravi's mum and dad honeymooned here over 50 years ago.

 

This is Ravi's luxury seat - so spacious that he has to turn on his side to sit comfortably!

This appeared to be the queue for the local bus

 

This is the view from our hotel room in Jodhpur. A view of Mehrangarh Fort walls buit in 1459 and added to over the years

A selection of Howdahs, which are the names of the carriages that the Maharaja travelled in. Mostly carried by elephants or men

Week 3

Outside Mysore Palace we were really thirsty so Ravi suggested a freshly squeezed sugar cane juice

I had my first sugar cane and ginger drink - the man above is passing the cane through this machine while the juice is collected underneath and then poured into a glass. It was really tasty

                                      More views of Mysore Palace and the different entrances

 The highlight at Mysore was a visit to the palace - wow the whole building was amazing especially the wedding room, beautiful floors and doors and stained glass. No photos were allowed inside though. We loved the silver doors!We spotted an elephant and fed him one of our bananas, skin and all!

 

We went to the railway museum and saw the maharaja's coach all kitted out with a bed and a western toilet!!

We visited Shri Mahabeleshawa swarmi temple which is high up a mountain and can be reached by walking up 1000 steps.We chickened out and walked down instead.

 The bull is Nandi, Shiva's chariot. This one is about 5 metres high and is half way down the mountain steps.

We decided to walk down the 1000 steps and watched the sunset!

Next day we visited a 12th century Hoysala temple at Somnathpur-simpy stunning.

The detail in these temples is amazing. Hand carved stunning detail - the real thing is outstanding.

 The above photo is the hand carved ceiling at the Channakeshava temple built in the 11th century

Nearby in Belur another fascinating 12 c temple - we went 'native' for this!!

 Nandi the bull is inside the complex at the temple in Belur

Ravi drinking a fresh coconut 10 Rupees / 7p and the inside flesh is for free and really yummy. 

Note Ravi is modelling a Khadi homespun (like Ghandi) top!

Just for you Debbie, Upekshe and Tanya - The travelling duck on the bus to hampi!

The bus journey was 8 hours long and the driver did an average speed of 50mph over craters and bumps on the unfinished roads. I blame the driver for making me ill!

We arrived in Hampi - lovely, a good place to chill out and get over my bug! We have a sweet little cottage and a hammock in the front - see me modelling it! Across the road there are paddy fields with a backdrop of boulders!

Paddy fields,coconut plantations and boulders-what more do you need?Ah yes a 15th century lost kingdom!!

We went up a boulder mountain to see sunset and found these children running around selling tea. Rebecca, an american lady wrote their names on paper and they had such big grins on their faces.Ravi tried to teach a 10 year old kid the economics of using clean cups to sell tea and a new business of taking pictures of tourists during sunset using their own cameras

Sunset from a mountain in Hampi

On Monday we started walking to see the ruins and came across this pretty pattern outside a house-a Rangoli design.It is traditionally used to decorate the doorstep or courtyard of a house at Diwali.Here it is used to let people know they are welcome inside.

This is a lost kingdom, dug out of the ground by the archaelogists of India.So important is the site that the govt of India is closing all the shops and buying land from the farmers to ensure that the site is not damaged.

We walked this path to the lost kingdom and it only represents a small part of the overall Vijaynagar 15th century kingdom.You must visit Hampi if you come to India!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                Look how thick the walls are to this temple used by the Royals of the day.

                                                     Examples of some of the ornate columns.

                    This temple was also dug out and was hidden under  a coconut plantation for 30 years !

Ravi the leo (lion) meets a carved lion which is often found at the entrances to temples in this region.

This is a carved ceiling but does not look so good in the photo. It is also covered in bats.

This would make a great backdrop to an Indiana Jones movie, The Vittalya temple circa 15AD.The main dance area has musical columns which 63 musicians used to play!