Blogs from Haridwar, Uttarakhand, India, Asia

Return to India 2 The Gateway to God - Haridwar 14th January 2018 Continuing the travels of two somewhat elderly brothers, David (of ‘the grey haired nomads’) and the much younger, Mike, (aka, ‘keep smiling’) getting to know each other rather better as they travel through the north of this fascinating country. Haridwar The 0645 train from an extremely tidy but rather chilly New Delhi Station finally arrived in Haridwar, the 'Gateway to God', in Uttarakhand State, an acceptable one hour late. That’s Indian trains: incredibly cheap and extremely unreliable. But either way it’s not an unpleasant experience, particularly if you should travel Executive Chair. The one-mile long train trundles its merry clittery-clattery way for five hours through 200km of grey morning fog, past quiet towns and villages, tarp-tented shanty encampmen... read more

When we read about this pilgrimage of our spiritual master Paramahamsa Vishwananda, we were having a grin on our faces. A silent retreat in one of the noisiest countries of the world - this sounded like a special experience. Well, just joking...... we know very well that there are regions in India you can find perfect silence, especially when you do not aim for an external silence but an internal silence. I am talking about a silence in your own mind. And this was what we were looking forward to. Well, coming back to the trip. From Delhi our group took a short flight up north to Dehradun. Here we were welcomed by 3 buses which finally took us to our amazing hotel near Haridwar which took about 1,5 hours. To name it a hotel is ... read more

Day-10: Badrinath to Devprayag. It was one more day of long hours in the bus. It is especially tiring when your main objective is over. Char Dham Yatra was completed successfully and without a major mishap. Badrinath to Delhi is more than 500 km. At least one break is required. We were given two which accommodated Haridwar. Our starting from Badrinath was delayed by 30-40 min as one couple wanted some last words with Lord Badrinath. They had gone at six in the morning, but were denied the opportunity at the last moment – the doors closed for some ceremony, and they had to return disappointed. Badrinath to Devprayag, via Pipalkoti took almost 11 hours. At Devprayag, Ramkund Resort is RadheShyam’s own property, a good one, and is located at a perfect place – just ... read more

So i was on holidays from my office but due to some prior commitments i was not able to leave Delhi. In the back of my mind i was praying to god that please do something and get me out of Delhi .So it was Saturday evening 11th Oct,2014 i was having tea with a cousin of mine and in between our talks Haridwar came out of my mouth. I told him that i really want to visit Haridwar as its been 5 years since i have visited the place. So within an hour he was all set. I packed my bag and he packed his .We searched alot on net about the timings of buses from Delhi and then came to know that from Delhi Kasmere Gate- ISBT terminal a bus leaves for haridwar every ... read more

Delhi As the planned Trip to Tibet is cancelled due to the Chinese closing the border to Brits, we decide to go to India a week earlier than planned and spend a few days in Haridwar & Rishikesh – we considered a day or so in Mussoorie but felt this was too ambitious. We arrive in Delhi – Terminal 3 which is new and impressive and get a pre-paid taxi (Rs350) to our hotel Namaskar India in Karol Bagh (who’d offered free taxi to the city but didn’t show - not totally unexpected as hostel booker previous guests had similar problems). The Airport Express is not working – closed due to maintenance since July’12 – to open – anyone’s guess. Basically the contractors screwed up & now have to redo much of it. The drive in ... read more