Soja, Saraj Valley, Himachal Pradesh, India November 2nd 2014 “Comes a time when you're drifting Comes a time when you settle down” Neil Young “Fields of forest green Where the mountains touch the sky A dream come true....” Don McLean “Excess should be avoided. Excess of anything is bad. Balance” from the Bahagavad Gita: Ati sarvatra varjayet No, I am not hanging up the sandals. Certainly not. But sometimes you just find a place where you keep coming back to and then an opportunity comes along, and vanishes, and another comes along ….and you grab it. I first time I came to the Saraj Valley in 2009 after meeting a young Israeli couple in Om Kareshwar (Madhya Pradesh, India, on the Narmada River). They swore me to secrecy about a ... read more

Bala, Inner Saraj Valley, Himachal Pradesh 9th October, 2014 “Smile, breathe and go slowly” Thic Nhat Hanh “Be happy in the moment, that's enough. Each moment is all we need, not more” Mother Teresa “What is your name?......What is your quest?.......What is your favourite colour?” The Bridgekeeper, Monty Python and the Holy Grail Waking early to a totally clear sky, I decide to do my stuff and take a bike ride the long way to Banjar so as to score a glimpse of distant snow caps, as is my passion. Rather than the relatively good 8 km road this is a 15 km unsurfaced road with some sections reduced to a mud bath. But at one point the views north and east reveal distant high mountains. My plan is to visit Wolfgang, a German married to ... read more

Dhunda and Rishikesh, Uttarakhand, India 20th Sept 2014 “Wind in my hair, I'm a part of everywhere Underneath my being is a road that disappeared” Eddie Vidder I was not quite ready to ride to Himachal and I felt like getting out of Haridwar for a few days in the mountains. Gangotri seemed as good a place as any. Gangotri is one of the 'chardham' sites in Uttarakhand (the others being Yamnotri, Bodrinath, and Kedanath) which are pilgrimage sites revered by Hindus who aspire to visit them all in their lifetime (together with the more prominent sites across India of Dwarka in Gujarat, Puri in Odissa and Ramaswaram in Tamil Nadu). The Uttarakhand sites are all source areas of what eventually becomes the greater Ganges River below Allahabad. I had been given variable local advice ranging ... read more

Istanbul September 11th 2014 “The more things change, the more they remain the same” Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr I have just spent 3 months in Turkey and I am on my way back to India, a country that seems to have me returning to again and again. It was my first time in Turkey however, and being so full of India, I could not seem to avoid the tendency to see things that reminded me of India. This so-called 'blog' is really a short pictorial essay and is intended for those who have travelled in India and who therefore will appreciate the similarities found between certain sights and practices I found in Turkey. There is no serious thesis involved here, just an attempt to share the smile on my face as I came across these things whilst ... read more

Ayvalik, Turkey August 28th 2014 “Zen teaches vigilant carelessness and detached involvement. In a more high-sounding phrase, it teaches transcendental ordinariness. In a simpler, more sympathetic phrase, it teaches nothing but ordinariness” Yoel Hoffman, The sound of the one hand I was back in Ayvalik again, the port of departure for Lesvos a week earlier, when I had reconnoitred this quaint old town as a place I would not mind spending some down time in. 'Down time' means just lolling around a place, getting a feel for it, getting to know where the best places to hang are (not too many and not too far from where one is staying), and becoming familiar with at least a few locals. That week before I had just spent one night on my way through to Lesvos, and couchsurfed ... read more