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David & his bike go to India
Sunday, February 27, 2005Udaipur
Day 20 cycling:
Gogunda to Udaipur It was nice getting up with the realisation that I only had a little over 40km to cycle. It can feel quite a pressure when you know you have a 100km day ahead of you, especially when you have no idea how the road will be. I had a relaxed breakfast before heading off (mind you, if the sounds of hawking & gobbing in the morning are 'off-putting', the sounds of them emanating from the kitchen are especially so). The road was undulating with some steep parts. Despite this, it was a very pleasant ride. Very rocky, with some amazingly long stone fences snaking across the hillsides. The people seemed extremely friendly, waving & smiling & saying "hello" or "bye", and children would coming running up to me from all directions, invariably, and annoyingly, with hands outstretched, demanding, very specifically, "one pen" or "ten rupees". Luckily they didn't know what a kindly spoken "fuck off" meant. But generally, the friendliness was extraordinary. I felt like how the Queen must feel with all the waving she encounters & in turn is expected to return - sweet, but a bit of drag after a few hours, and there's always the risk of falling off my bike as I do so. One kind gentleman even offered to push me & my bike up one of the steeper hills with his outstretched leg from his motorbike. I thanked him but declined this unsafe-sounding offer. The nice part about struggling up these undulations is that you get to hurtle down the other side at great speed, singing "what goes up must come down, spinning wheel ...". I was also struck by how many westerners - either singly or in pairs - were driving past as passengers in Ambassadors & other cars, probably on the way to Mt Abu. Always a hoot to watch them gawp when they see me cycling along. I've checked into the Hotel Caravanserai. A clean & simple room, good value for Rp 400, with a fantastic view of Udaipur from the rooftop.
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 02, 2005Udaipur II Udaipur, known by some as "City of Lakes" or "Venice of the East", is struggling at present with the fact that its lakes have been dry for at least the past year. Apparently it's been many years since things have been as dry. Still, it's a pretty interesting place to spend some time in. At first I felt quite dispirited at how 'touristy' it is, in that there are more western tourists & tourist infrastructure here than anywhere else I've been in India this trip (without forgetting that I'm also one, of course). So, leaping wholeheartedly in, I had an "Ayurvedic" massage out the back of a local barbershop (Millenium) for an hour (cost: Rp 400, which seems fairly standard around here. It was reasonable, but I'm not keen on the coconut oil residue that sticks around for the next day or so. Then, the next day I had a massage from Raju, who runs the Bharti Guest House, Restaurant & Massage Centre in Hotel Lake Pichola Road. It was a very strong massage, which I like, and he employed some unusual techniques. I was briefly alarmed when he removed his own trousers, but thankfully he put on some shorts, and was again startled when he sat astride me to commence the massage, especially as the hairs on his legs were rather prickly. His approach was thorough & professional, and I may well have another before I leave here. At Rp 1050 however, it was extraordinarily expensive by Indian standards. Yesterday was the time for a big treat, and so I went and had lunch at the Lake Palace Hotel, a 5-star luxury hotel in the the Lake Pichola, built in 1754. It's in the middle of the lake, usually surrounded by water. You're taken to the hotel by boat. Lunch is a buffet comprising soup, salads, a dozen or so veg and non-veg dishes and perhaps half-a-dozen different deserts (cost: Rp 1200). Sometimes buffets can be a bit pedestrian, but this food was delicious, and we were there for several hours. Later we managed to have a look at some of the rooms by the man in charge of housekeeping there. The rooms, at over $300 a night, were wonderful. posted by david w at 5:08 AM 0 COMMENTS FRIDAY, MARCH 04, 2005Udaipur III I'm still here in Udaipur after nearly a week, soaking up some relaxation & time not on the bicycle. I can become a bit driven & so it's been good to just stop for a while - not that a week is all that long. My plan is to cycle to Ranakpur tomorrow, about 90km to the north of here, and then a little further north to Kumbhalgarh to do some sightseeing (Jain temple, fort, etc.) I'll most likely return to Udaipur for a day & then get a bus from here to Mumbai where I'll hang out & explore the place by bicycle for a few days before departing. I have enjoyed Udaipur though, enhanced by having met Marianne, a Swiss woman, and John, an Australian, who curiously lives fairly close to me in Melbourne. It's been good to eat out, walk about & generally hang out with someone who enjoys these things.
Ranakpur Day 21 cycling: Udaipur to Ranakpur Distance: 102.88 km Ride time: 6:27 hrs Average Speed: 16.31 km/hr Maximum speed: 49.1 km/hr Total cycled: 1969 km Between towns distance: 1769 It was good to get back on the bicycle after a week's R&R in Udaipur. It actually rained last night in Udaipur, and occasional drops fell on me as I cycled, taking the edge off the heat. I really enjoyed the ride & the scenery on the way, despite some hilly bits. The first part of the journey to Gogunda was along the same stretch of road that I cycled into Udaipur. The last 15km was largely downhill, as Ranakpur is tucked away in a wooded valley. The Jain temples were good to see, but I'm not sure that they were worth a 100km cycle, especially as I'd already seen and been impressed by those at Dilwara (Mt Abu) and elsewhere. I stayed at the relatively lavish Ranakpur Hill Resort for 2 nights, after having managed to beat them down to Rp 700 for a quite nice room. They even had a swimming pool, which I sat alongside for an hour or so trying to even up my odd cyclists' suntan. But SOMEONE GET THESE PEOPLE A PEN!! People were very friendly, waving, smiling and calling out, but the kids became exceptionally tiresome after a while, with their "one pen, one pen!" cries (and the occasional "one rupee!" and even a "shampoo!"?). The children will see you coming from the top of a hill, and start screaming like banshees as they hurtle down shrieking "one pen, one pen". At first I thought I was mishearing; that perhaps it was Hindi for "welcome, stranger on a bike, to our village", but the outstretched hand, the occasional tugging at the bicycle, and even running behind me for several minutes with hand outstretched dispelled that thought. Several times I cycled past obviously better bred children who would calmly, with one hand behind their back & the other imperiously outstretched, request "one pen". And this occurred almost the entire way from Gogunda to Ranakpur (and to Khumbalgarh). People who know me will know I'm not a cynical man, but I did begin to wonder if the delightful "bye, bye" that many people said as I cycled past was not perhaps "buy, buy".
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 09, 2005Kumbhalgarh Day 22 cycling: Ranakpur to Kumbhalgarh Distance: 53.34 km Ride time: 4:38 hrs Average Speed: 12.14 km/hr Maximum speed: 50.4 km/hr Total cycled: 2022 km Total between towns: 1822 km It took little less than 2 hours to get to the top of the hill out of Ranakpur, where a Hindu temple stands (about 19km from where I stayed). As I left my accommodation and began the day's cycling, a dog suddenly made towards me. Thankfully he didn't bite into me, as I at first feared, but merely began trotting alongside me - and did so for the next 13 km (which shows how fast I was travelling). My next reaction at him following me was an echo of the irritation that I'd developed from the "one pen" kids who followed alongside, but then I figured the dog couldn't have been expecting much of me. I then began to think (cycling does strange things to your psyche) as the hill became steeper & I began to huff & puff a bit harder that "perhaps he knows I'm gonna die up here & he's tagging along for the meal" (I'd seen some dogs ripping into a bull carcase the previous day). He finally disappeared after it started to rain. Fair-weather friend. Unbelievably, it began to rain really heavily on the way, and I sheltered for a time under a tractor trailer at the invitation of the driver & his colleague. There were even a few hailstones falling for a time. Thankfully it was fairly short lived & I finally made it to Kumbhalgarh [also check this site], while singing at times "it's raining in Rajasthan ..." . It was an excellent ride, although hard in parts, and I made 2 milestones - the fastest downhill ride of the trip (50.4 km/hr) and breaking the 2000 km mark. It was predominantly a rural area, and I found it to be one of the more interesting rides this trip. There was so little traffic & so few signs of any sort that for some time I thought that I'd taken a wrong turn. I stayed at Hotel Khumbal Castle, quite close to the fort, which was expensive at Rp 1000 (cheaper accommodation was in the town of Kelwara, down the hill a few kilometres, but I didn't fancy making my way back up the road to see the fort, which I hoped to do straight away). It was comfortable enough, and had a great view out the window. The fort itself was impressive & probably worth the cycle there. Unfortunately during the night I awoke with "gastrointestinal problems" that I felt precluded me from cycling the final leg back to Udaipur (about 80km) and so I did the unforgivable, for a cyclist, and hired a jeep to take me & my bicycle back here. It was interesting to muse on the difference between travelling by bicycle & by jeep (and I did enjoy seeing that even it was forced onto the shoulder several times by oncoming buses). Obviously the jeep is much faster, and so serves a purpose if you want to get from A to B quickly. On the other hand, it felt much more insulated from what was happening outside, and no-one waved or said hello (or, it must be said, cried out "one pen"). It was like being in a bubble. You still are on a bicycle, I reckon, but it's a much more slow moving bubble & it's a little easier to stop & look at things that grab your attention. So, I've bought a bus ticket back to Mumbai, leaving tomorrow at 3pm. Less than a week & I'll be leaving India.
INDEX: 1. Melbourne, Mumbai, Shahapur, Igatpuri, Nasik 2. Nasik, Kaparda, Daman, Surat, Bharuch, Baroda 3. Ahmedabad, Lothal/Utelia, Bhavnagar, Palitana, Rajula, Diu 4. Veraval (via Somnath), Sasan Gir, Junagadh, Rajkot - this page -
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