Advertisement
Published: March 2nd 2009
Edit Blog Post
After spending longer than anticipated in Goa, I realised that I only had about 6 days until my flight out of Chennai to Bangkok. My plan had been to go to Hampi and then down to Kerala (right down south) and then back over to Chennai, but there was no way I could do Kerala with that amount of time, so I decided to save that one for next time.
I took an overnight bus to Hampi, a standard 12 hourer, and arrived in Hampi Bazaar the next morning. I had made friends with a French-Swiss guy called Samir. We had a look around the small and unremarkable Hampi Bazaar, and decided to take a boat across the river since we had heard that north of the river was the place to stay, and it certainly was. We found a well priced guesthouse which looked out over the river, absolutely perfect. We spent much time sitting in the chilled out restaurant overlooking the river, which, like many around here, had low tables and long comfortable cushions to lie and sit on rather than chairs. We spent much of the time there eating, drinking, chatting and there was even one day a
highly masculine competetiveness-charged 'hit the waterbottle' catapult contest in which many rupees were waged and lost.
The thing that was so striking about Hampi was not the temples, which I didnt actually go and see, but the landscape, it was unlike anywhere I'd ever been before. The lonely planet describes it as 'A boulder strewn landscape', which is what it is, huge hills of boulders, all precariously perched on top of each other, really beautiful to look at. We hired a small motorbike one day and went out to the reservoir not far away and sat amongst the rocks and watched the sun go down behind the boulder hills which was amazing. A geordie guy we met even swam the width of the lake, very brave considering the tourist repelling signs of 'No swimming - crocodiles!' and also the overwhelming size of the lake.
I hired a bicycle on one of the days and rode out in the blazing sunshine to the monkey temple, which was a small hike up a hill. The views were great, but I didnt find a single monkey until I came back down to the bottom!Also, hiring the cheapest of bikes meant no suspension, which
I payed for on the uneven and rocky roads.
The highlight of this part of the trip may however be my introduction to......yoga!! Didn't think I'd try that, but Samir was going so I decided to join him. After a relatively heavy night on the kingfisher, the 7.30am wake up was unpleasant, but I soon got into the swing of things. It lasted an hour and a half and luckily the class comprised of many beginners like myself, which meant it was relatively basic and easy to follow, which wasvery good for me since I had no previous inkling as tp what yoga is or how to do it, other than the fact that you need to be bendy. I concluded that I dont have enough patience for yoga, but very much enjoyed the new experience, it was something different to do and I'm glad I did!
I took an overnight bus and arrived in Bangalore at 6am, and was not tolerant of the lying tout who tried to tell me there was no train and that the only way to get to chennai was to book though his friend... you get used to people like this in India and
since I had my ticket, I ignored him and made my way to the train station. Fortunatley there was the train I was after and I found it no problem. Booking it through a travel agent rather than on the internet myself meant that I ended up in the lowest class on the train, which I have done before, but would not want to do again in a hurry. It was crowded and not too comfortable, which was not a problem since I've got used to that in India, the people around were very friendly, but the journey dragged and I couldnt wait to get off by the end. The journey was made more uncomfortable by the constant streams of beggars, mostly pretty badly disabled, up and down the carriage asking for money. Poor blind guys selling really cheap plastic stuff like rulers and kids toys, really sad to see them all. It was for this reason that I was much outraged to be asked for money by two cocky and boisterous transvestites, who 'can't get a job anywhere else' etc. That really annoyed me.
Killed time in Chennai, which was again a different place to most I've been to
in India. I took a taxi to the airport full of excitment for the new-to-me country that lay ahead - Thailand!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.096s; Tpl: 0.015s; cc: 12; qc: 47; dbt: 0.0467s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb
Ann Marie McMahon
non-member comment
How Marvellous
Hello, Will! Just to let you know how enormously I'm enjoying following your progress. Many thanks for letting me have the details! Carry on having a wonderful time! Very best wishes, Ann Marie McMahon (aka The Big Mac)