(old stuff) elephants riding, chilling in chilla and hectic haridwar..........

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right - this should have been written up waaaaay before but this is me and anyone who knows me......

Nats and I had escaped Rishikesh and awoke early the next morning got a ricketybus and arrived in Haridwar. Haridwar is famous for it's temples and evening aarti's. It is not as touristy as Rishikesh but is very devout and is a center of the Kumbh Mela (the largest religous gathering on earth) which occurs every 12 years where people come to ritually cleanse themselves by bathing in the Ganges.

Nathalie and I were completely unprepared for Haridwar. It is a mini - delhi by our standards. The main road is crammed with booths and shops either side and there is a constant roar of noise. Vikram drivers jostle for your attention and because it is less touristy the Rishikesh there was a lot of attention... There are beautiful temples apparently but unfortunately the cable car was broken so we could not see them. We stayed in Haridwar for a few nights and soaked up the atmosphere and bought sweet "jalebis" off the street - debatably the cause of our belly problems later! 😊

We found Haridwar very very intense and hetic and so thought we would go to the village of Chilla and Rajaji National Park. We haggled with a vikram driver and eventually got ourselves driven out to Chilla. We were full of optimism that Chilla would be more chilled out and a place to relax...after 20 minutes in the vikram going into the forest with one man and nothing in sight we began to get slightly worried.....but no need to worry there was the village coming round the bend and then we dismounted paid the driver (who quickly sped off) and turned around. The village was nothing and seemed to be lacking any form of women...at all just men...lots of men. after mentally calming myself down and squeezing each others hands we confidently walked down the track to the Ranger's office and sorted out details of excursions and prices. then we proceeded to locate the guesthouse which...was in the lonely planet but no one had ever heard of....we wandered further and further into the undergrowth and eventually stumbled upon a dilapidated dodgy hotel filled with (you guessed it) more men...nats and i had a suprisingly pleasant lunch there in the not-so-nice ambience and then trekked back to the rangers office.

After 2 hrs waiting it was all worth it. We went on an elephant called Raja, with a driver and a man with a huuuge gun...on the back. We ambled through the bush seeing deer and colourful birds and a bird of prey and eating fruit from the trees and getting scratched to death by the bush and then eventually seeing a hyena! briefly 😊 It was all worth it. anyway unscathed and content we made our way ack to Dehra dun.

p.s - sorry to all about the punctuation.
p.s.s - photo's to follow shortly

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