From Varanasi to Lumbini - Happy Holi!

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After yet a very long and delayed night train all the way from Agra and some slight grief trying to find a random man at the train station whose friend had shared our booth and forgotten his phone, we arrived in the holy city of Varanasi. A short (9km one way, as usual) rickshaw drive followed by a long walk down some narrow windy alleys took us to our hostel which turned out to be nicer than we thought, especially the view of the Ganges from the rooftop terrace. After a quick drink, we decided to take advantage of the free (or at least partly so) boat tour offered by the hostel. It was extremely peaceful and beautiful to be taken down the river watching the sunset - despite the floating cow corpse and the burning ghats where people were being cremated. Once the sun was set, we lit some floating flower candles and watched them bob along the river before stopping to watch a ceremonial pooja which took place on the Main Ghat. All very nice until the mosquitoes came out - never ever seen so many in our entire lives! We were completely surrounded and getting itchy just thinking about it now!

With the Holi festival fast approaching and Varanasi being a little too big/scary/rowdy/smelly, we decided to make our way to Nepal a little earlier. Unfortunately, this was somewhat easier said than done! After 4 hours at the hot and sticky Varanasi bus station, getting on and off the wrong buses with our big bags and desperately trying to make sense out of what everyone was telling us without losing our calm ("what time? no problem!"), we finally managed to find a direct bus to Sunauli - the border crossing for Nepal. And it seems that direct also means super express. A journey which was supposed to take between 12 and 15 hours actually took 9 and a half... You can only imagine the state of our sorry selves after such a ride! An absolute roller coaster involving us taking off from our seats every 5 minutes or so and being totally jam-packed into the bus along with about a million other people! Having just about arrived in one piece (though a little bruised and completely exhausted) we then had to wake up the guy at the Indian border who told us we had to wait for his boss to arrive to stamp our passports. 10 (Indian) minutes later, and still no boss. But hey, who doesn't love to sit in a candle-lit shack at 5am having not slept and being eaten alive by mosquitoes?! Boss eventually turned up, we got our stamps, crossed the border, got our Nepali visas and hopped into a taxi to Lumbini (we just could not face another bus!).

A hot shower, short nap and breakfast later, we felt a tiny bit more human - enough to rent bikes and ride around the temple complex anyway. Despite being the birthplace of Buddha and therefore a very important place of pilgrimage, it is a very cute and peaceful little town with not much more than its one and only main street. A perfect place to celebrate Holi! Having watched the fun from the rooftop for a little while, we decided to join in. It took approximately 2 minutes for us to be absolutely covered in multicoloured powders - we hadn't even had a chance to buy our own! A lot of fun was had, just walking up and down the street with all the children rubbing bright coloured powders into people's faces and shouting Happy Holi! But for next time, remember to keep your mouth shut as the powder doesn't taste very nice and green teeth is not exactly the best of looks!

{No photos right now I'm afraid as the internet is very sporadic but we will try to upload some asap so keep your eyes peeled!}

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Comments

[Helen, your personal Travel Counsellor]

Great blogs girls!
Hello from your Travel Counsellor! Great to see you're having such an amazing time - you'll be my first point of contact from now on if I need inside info on India etc. Keep up the good work and enjoy! All the best, Helen