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Published: January 7th 2007
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Ajanta Caves
This amazing interior blows your mind. Ok so the hoilday is over. No more siting on the beach, no more swimming in the sea and well a definate reduction in alcohol consumption. After a day to recover from New Years Eve, the 2nd of Jan was a new start to the India exploration, no morew pussy footing around, full steam ahead. Basically it's all about heading north and passing as many sights while experiencing as much of India as possible. This signalled the first of many long, painfully uncomfortable bus trips. It takes so long to get anywhere, the traffic is slow, the roads bumpy, it takes twice as long as it would at home, but hey i'm not complaining its all part of the Indian experience. The next major stop was to experience a 'must not miss' exploration of the Ajanta and Ellora Caves, based near the city of Aurangabad. To get there though we had a 12 hour bus ride from Panjim to Pune, arriving at the brand spanking time of 7.30am, refreshed and revived after a brilliant bus ride. But not one to whinge we sorted accommodation out, had breakfast and were well on our way to exploring the city. We walked and walked,
ate, and walked and walked a little more, covering 14-15 km in the day just exploring the place, but in all honesty there wasn't to much to see. We were told the fort here was a great sight, but i think they were kidding themselves as it hardly impressed. So continuing on our travels the next morning after breakfast at yet another German Bakery (i didn't even know they were bakers, but there everywhere) we were off for another 6 hour bus ride to Aurangabad.
Now this town is kind of central to the two caves that we wanted to visit, but other than its central location, it was just another run down dirty Indian city which not to much to offer. Realistically the town is a shit hole and is as bad as it smells, piss on a wall (and you can take that literally because thats what they do piss on anything, anywhere). Keeping with the full steam ahead, no nonsense attitude, our afternoon arrival allowed us to organise a tour to the Ajanta Caves (for the next morning), located some 105km away, and our bus ticket out of here 2 days later, as for the Ellora
Caves we thought we'd just organise our own transport as it was seriously closer than Ajanta, and were intending to do this before the next bus out to the next location.
Lets start with Ajanta, to start with the mini bus, was so bloody mini that we could hardly all fit in and 2 of the tour had to go by private taxi because they couldn't fit in (nicely organised). Second to travel 100km and into the actual cave location took us almost 3 and a half hours, due to A)a slow bus driver (thats head and foot) B) pit stops to food stall that no ones interested in and C) waiting for another bus that had nothing to do with us, why i still don't know but we were all fuming by the end of it. Indian's lack a sense of urgency, which is fine, because I'm on hoilday and going no where fast, infact time means nothing, but today....this pissed me off and i let him know about it to. Fat lot of good that did, his response was the typical Indian head wobble......yes, no maybe.....(oh I've almost got it mastered too now and its brilliant because
when they ask you if you want some thing ie a tuk tuk, just wobble your head and they just stare at you could it could mean anything, haha). But with all the angst of the tour, the actual spectacle of the Ajanta Caves was overwhelming, truly amazing. Basically in the middle of no where there is a gorge where 30 caves are cut into the steep face of a cliff, which follows a horse shoe shape around a river. Not only is the location out of the world the design, detailing and general construction of these caves are so incredible it's hard to comprehend the time and effort that would have gone into creating these masterpieces. Many of the caves are spread across different era's the earlist cave is believed to date back to 200BC with the areas golden period believed to be around some time around AD 460. But enough of the history lesson, lets just say, this is why i came to India, sights that books can only describe and pictures only imitate, the only way to experience these sights is to be here, walk though them, touch them, be surround by the environment. Brilliant.
The
following day, with a 16 and a half bus ride out of Aurangabad awaiting us that evening, John and I decided to by pass the painfully slow tour trip and hire our own private taxi (pretty much as the same price as the tour too) and head to the Ellora caves, early hassle free and to avoid the rush. But no, not quite that smooth, 8.30am starts must be when school kids get there, right......bugger. After winding through the sea of kids throwing questions left right and center, "Mr what country" and "whats your good name", shaking a million or two hands and posing for photograph with the adults as much as the kids we finally made it to the cave sights to view a range of Buddhist, Hindu and Jain Caves, all located in extremely close proximity to each other. These caves are slightly newer than the Ajanta caves and date back some where around AD 720. Because of there age difference, the Ellora caves are in far better condition, although they lack the scenic grandeur of Ajanta, but both are atonishing. The highlight of the Ellora caves is the Kailasa Temple (main temple). (Plagiarizing from lonely planet) "Three
Ajanta Caves
The large cave arc is cave 10 the oldest in the center. huge trenches were cut into the cliff face, and then the shape was released with tools-an unbelievable undertaking that entailed removing 200,000 tonnes of rock. Kailasa covers twice the area of the Partenon and is 1 and a half time higher. The entire temple is a single monolithic structure or sculpture, hacked through the stone by 7000 labours over 150 years (and I complain about being on a single project for a year or two, whoops). It's pretty hard to get your head around the size and complexity of the works, but again take my word for it, there is nothing like it on the earth.
A real highlight of my trip so far and well worth the visit if anyone is out this way. The photo's dont really describe how intense the experience is, but some of the photos do look amazing with the coloured sari's highlighted against the dark harshness of the exposed rock.
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