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Published: December 12th 2006
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John
All the trains to Bharatpur were booked as it is on the main line to Mumbai, and coming up to the holiday period, so we treated ourselves and our host Ian to a car trip (wth driver) to visit the Keoladeo park wich is world renowned for its birdlife. Bharatpur is also described by the rough guide as 'fun to explore...!'
The journey down was uneventful apart from Talitha being sick, which came from reading in the back...Getting out of Delhi was the usual traffic mayhem, but once we were on the main road out it was fine.
Leaving the main Delhi - Agra road to connect to Bharatpur, was more off any beaten track, and much more rural, plenty of mud huts made with what we think is cow dung, and used for storage, although I think the occassional one might have people staying in them, farmers tending fields, a lot of which seemed to involve irrigation, and creating small mud walls around the fields to hold in water.
Our hotel 'sunbird' is very typical, clean enough, fan in each room and white walled roomed, made very stark by the neon bulbs in the lights.
The food wasn't anything special, but they served kingfisher beer, and we didn't get any bugs, but did get bitten by mosquitos. It is poor Talithas turn to feel a bit war weary as the mosquitos seem to go for her, and as soon as you have scratched them the itch is unbearable, and if you break the scab off it can go septic and really horrid, so I covered her bites with cream and then put plasters on to stop her scratching them and we seemed to have success, although Talitha did have one or two unhappy moments..
The first evening we decided to have an evening trip in the park, where cycles and rickshaws are the transport used. We hired probably the slowest rickshaw driver, and a couple of 'atlas' bikes with bar brakes and sprung saddles (which cost 1600 ruppees about 20 pounds (to buy as I discovered in the market) - and 25 ruppees to hire)
Our rickshaw driver was very knowledgeable, as they are trained to work in the park, and he new the names of all the birds, although the best treat was an Indian Roller, spotted by Anne, which was an
incredible luminescent blue, and a black shouldered kite, which we spotted ourselves, a beautiful white with (of course) black shoulder bits to its wings.
Talitha and Ian did an early morning trip to the park the day we left and saw jackels and wolves...!
Bharatpur itself was fun to explore and we had a couple of trips infrom the hotel, the main bit of the town was not open to cars, but the motorbikes, scooters, pedestrians, rickshaws and bicycles were mad enough.
We of course caused a bit of side show, spending most of the time saying 'hello' back to everyone who spoke...which included a whole platoon of female soldier cadets, who screamed at us from their truck (well Ronan really, but its nice to dream...) and then smiled and commented as they marched by in single file amidst the mayhem. When I mentioned to Ian that it would be fun if we bumped into them again he pointed out that having the attention of such a group of women in uniform was 'a once in a lifetime experience...!'
The town was all shop fronts, small units which sold everything you could ever need (Ronan even
Camel powered cart
Often seen on busy highways and even in outskirts of Delhi managed to find plastic 'power ranger' figures in a tiny toy store full of plastic rubish. The scarf and material shops had material carpeted platforms above the pavement level, and the stall keepers sat cross legged bare foot so as not to dirty the space to show their wares. Cobblers, bycicle repairs, motorbike repairs cheek by jowel to food and sweet shops and stationers. Dusty but available...
One wedding party went by, as we photographed it, they photographed us. The groom on a horse with a small boy, prersumably heading to one pat of the ceremony ( I believe they last days)We also saw a bit of one ceremony which had mad drumming bands and rave like dancing by the ladies, all beautifully dressed in colourful sarees.
On the journey back t Delhi (see Annes bit) we passed numerous wedding cars which were beutifully decked out with flowers (marigolds.?) strung together as garlands and attached as streamers all over the vehicle.
In delhi itself it sounded like a war zone due to the number of wedding fireworks going off..
Anne
Having a huge park next door I decided to be bold
In Keoladeo Park
An oasis of quiet in India and take my first venture out jogging, which, like every venture out, was a major adventure! Overtaking rickshaws and bicycles being a first and then being chased by monkeys....... that got a bit scary and I fairly sped up with all thoughts of rabid bites.... I eventually had to turn around and be on the attack as they were close to outrunning me.. a good Trotternish snarl got rid of them!
Our trip back to Delhi was more adventurous than anticipated as we were diverted about 60kms from the city because of an accident..... this led to loads of chaos as the transport police just pointed vaguely down a dirt track and gave no directions! About 2 hours later we eventually found our way back onto a main road.... not the one we had left but at least it led to Delhi! It was all a bit mad! Driving along dirt tracks with all the heavy traffic which had been diverted from both directions! Every driver for themselves! At one point our driver was a bit concerned that the street (well, gap between houses) was too narrow to continue on, the only problem being that reversing was impossible with
Talitha and Ian buying a garland
20 rp and looks good for a few hours. Marriage cars are covered in them. loads of vehicles backed up behind us! To add to the maddness we kept coming upon marraige ceremonies - at one point we saw a bus load of wedding guests who were more lost than us and i reckon they could still be out there on the dusty tracks trying to find their party..! This is the time of year for weddings as there is a "season", a bit like grouse shooting or something...... then; within the season there are certain prestigious dates for tying the knot and it is said that tomorrow (13th of Dec) there will be 26000 weddings conducted in Delhi. We look forward to a sleepless night of bands/fireworks and general high living!! The papers since we arrived have been full of matromonial propositions as people try to match off their offspring...
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Iona
non-member comment
Bet there are never any fall-outs in that playground!