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Published: January 15th 2009
So we left our beach hut in Patnem Goa kicking and screaming. It was hard as we loved it so much there. It was so laid back. We decided to get a train to Hampi which is about 10 hrs inland. Ourselves and a friend from Goa, David, got the train by day accross to Hampi. It was a good decision. The scenery was great all the way accross and just like with owld Iarnród Éireann at home you could open the carriage door of the train, traveling at 100 miles an hour and feel the wind in your face and wave to all the village kids as you passed through. After the 6th fly hit me in the same eye i decided to take my enthusiasm back to the seat i had paid for and as the train rolled into Hampi we saw what the big deal was all about. The Landscape is unreal. Its like landing on the moon. These huge boulders the size of houses and bigger were all perched one on top of each other. They look as if a gust of wind came along they would come crashing down but they have been like that for
millions of years. We later asked many locals how they were formed and each one of them gave us the same fascinating piece of geographical insight that Charles Darwin himself would have been proud of. "God threw them there". So satisfied that we were with this gem of knowledge we set about exploring the second thing that makes Hampi amazing. It's Temples. These, it seems strange, were not put here by God but by some ancient peoples in the 1200s ish. Amazing to see some of them in such good shape even after all those years.
So from Hampi we headed for another beach back on the coast, obviously. We got a night bus from Hampi to Gokarna or at least thats what we thought we were getting. The bus pulled into some shit whole hotel at 1am and dropped 16 of us out saying another bus would be along in half an hour. Dazed and confused, after just being woken from a dream of god flinging stones around the place in Hampi, i sat in the cold with Pam and the rest of us on a step for another 3 hours until we decided to mutiny. We stormed the
hotel and realised the bus which we were waiting for was parked beside the hotel all the time and the jolly fellows emloyed to drive it were sleeping in it. They were then gently awoken by our gentle quiet voices and 3hrs later, at 4am, we were on the way. The bus dropped us to Gokarna as planned origianally but we and a guy from Serbia decided we would stay in a tiny secluded beach called Paradise beach some 10 kms down the coast. A good idea this would have been had it been daytime. We soon realised in the pitch dark, dropped off by a confident rickshaw driver at a the start of a path, that it was going to be some feet to find this Paradise beach. We stumbled through thick jungle paths for 2hrs, fending off dogs and praying we wouldn't step on a snake before we saw something in the dawn light that resembled a hut. We were there. Tired sweaty and mozy bitten, but we made it and it was worth it. The next day we discovered you were supposed to reach the beach by sea on a boat. Another honest fellow that rickshaw driver
was then..... We are just going to chill here again now for 4 days and then head to Mysore. The beach is beautiful and the huts, though really basic are straight out of the beach or something. The views from ours, perched on a cliff, and the sunsets are spectacular. So thats it. Next time its more honest Rickshaw drivers and more brilliant facts on geology and geography. Stu and Pam
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Lavoice
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WOW!!!
Wow Stu ( and hello Sam even if we don't know each other)! The pix r jsut amazing! I am oh soooo jealous of you right now!!! Did u plan it all?! Or u just go with the flow??!! About NZ did u know that Izzy moved down there??!! Yip she lives there with her man now?! Jsut thought i'd let u know in case u didn't know! Keep enjoying life guys, it suits you well...I don't think I'll be visiting this part of the world again until in a couple years...I'll probably finish travelling Europe 1st! So if you're back( if u ever com back) well i'll make sure to do a pit stop by Dublin to come and say hi and hear all of your beautiful stories! Take care and travel safexxxx