Mysore, Karnataka

After escaping with a morning bus from Bangalore to Mysore we arrived to slightly more fresh air in a smaller city. We ended up bargaining with hotel inthrowers about their accomadations and decided to stay in "Chandra Palace". Our room is ok if you do not miss a view - there is a brickwall ½m from our windows blocking everything.

Maharaja's Palace

On the first day we went walking around and checked the famous Maharaja's Palace. It was beautiful, but a bit boring as it was just a palace, reconstructed by british a hundred or some years ago. The stars of the visit were a friendly elephant and two camels on the palace yard.

The second day we took a rickshaw drive to Chamuti Hill with an active pilgrimage temple and Nandi (Shiva's Bull vehicle) monolithic statue. We got a blessing for happy future with a long piece of red yellow cotton wrapped around our wrist with under it the kumkum-(red powder) dot that most hindus wear between their eyes. 

 Chamuti Hill

After that we visited some local workshops to see how incense, silken carpets/sari's/pashminas and sandalwood items are manufactured. Mysore is the only place where sandlewood-trees are growing so lots of woodworks, oils and jewelry are made and sold here. Mariska couldn't leave without buying a little overpriced but cute brown bead necklace made of sandlewood that has a nice woodfragrance when you rub it. Unfortunately all the hindu temples look a lot less majestic after seeing Hampi. 

 

 Hungry cow eating a bike

Bangalore, Karnataka

We got woken up around 5:30 by a nice busboy chanting "BangaloreBangaloreBangalore". So we stepped out still half sleeping and picked up a rickshaw to our hotel. After this things started happening, the driver tried to bargain us to drive to "his" hotels, he did not know where our hotel was etc.

After a littlebit of driving around we found our accomodation in Chickpet's market district. But when we got to the door of the hotel it was still dark and locked, no problem, a night janitor came to open the door and said they have no vacancy. This was awesome news for the rickshaw man that told us to go to his place for only 700 inr/night. Luckily I had beforehand written down  some addresses & phonenumbers from nearby and we got a spacious luxury room from Chandra Vihar Hotel only a few hundred meters away for under 500 inr. The Rickshaw driver took us there but then started to demand double payment for his original doubleprice. (Rickshaw drivers are refusing to use mandatory faremeters). Luckily we were in front of our future hotel and not in some dark alley, so he anyway slightly becomming aggressive decided to rather leave then kill us ;)

After a nice morning sleep we walked down to Lalbagh Botanical gardens. This Vondelpark away from home has some nice friendly monkeys, giant silk trees, a lake and lots of young lovers.

 Monkeys in Lalbagh garden

Otherwise Bangalore looked ugly, crowded and is just a busy city. It was also the place where we have seen most smog this far.

 View from our balcony (a quiet moment on market street)

Our Hotel was in middle of a loud neighbourhood, the City market area. We ended up experiencing with local bakeryitems filled with mysterious fruits/vegetables and abusing room service. Also the urban Indian streetfood - curries/dals served in bananaleaves, juicebars etc were present.

Silkworm tree, spot Mariska

 We also visited the Karnataka State Science Museum and spent hours walking searching for lakes/parks.

Hampi, Karnataka

On the bustrip from Gokarna via Ankola to Hampi we met a friendly Indian man called Mani. He talked out loud about his work as a cook in two restaurants, one in Kudlee Beach and one in Hampi where his family lives. He invited us to come to his Dhanlaxmi Restaurant so he could cook for us and show his family. After 5 hours waiting for the bus in a chabby roadhotel in Ankola we finally could get in the already full (with tourists and luggage in the walkingpath) loaded bus. We had some trouble finding an empty bed, which just seemed to not be there anymore. So the chaotic busdriver send a single man to sleep together on a bunk with another man so that we at least got what we payed for. The ride was cold as the window didn't close completely and the whole  road was shakey so we both felt sick afterwards. 

 Virupaksha temple

Main Bazaar road

We stayed the fist nights at the Hampi Bazaar in Vicky's Guesthouse. It had a nice view on the beautiful Virupaksha Temple from their rooftop restaurant. Despite the magnificent surroundings I felt more and more sick for a few days and nights so we couldn't do much more then short walks and then fastly, feeling suddenly very dizzy or sick, back to the guesthouse for bed or toilet. Luckily we could find enough western food in Hampi so the few toasts and mint-teas I could keep inside made me slowly get better. 

  

 Gate to Vittala temple, once covered with marble statues

We took a longer walk through ruins to the Vittala Temple where on the way we got blessed by a local baba giving us the red bindi-dot between the eyes. Many Indian people there asked us to make pictures of them or us with their children, which I found very nice moments of happy smiles. 

This place is really the most beautiful place and has a very relaxed atmosphere. We have been climbing over rocks and ruins with monkeys at Hemakuta Hill, feeding bananas to Lakshmi the holy elephant, and chilling in the many rooftop loungy cafes and restaurants full of matresses and pillows on the floor. So take off your shoes at the door, lay down, order herbal tea (alcohol is prohibited and not easily available in Hampi), eat a veggieburger, smell the insence and stare at the glow-in-the-dark artworks and other spiritual images of gods and godesses being put everywhere where they possibly can be.

 Hemakuta Hill

After looking around through the cosy small streets of the bazaar we found at the deadend of a street a little cheaper and nicer place to stay; Kiran Guesthouse, a familyrun place with a colorfull comfortable room. The next days we visited some more temples (Krishna, Jain and more) and monolitic sculptures (Ganesh and Nandi), we sat down at the Ghats and watched women manually do laundry at the river that runs around the bazaar, we walked through the banana plantage and we enjoyed spotting or being walked over by more monkeys/goats/dogs/cows/sheep/cats/cockroaches. 

Bananas

 The last days in this almost surreal beautiful town surrounded by rocks we ordered bustickets for Bangalore, traintickets for Mysore-Chennai and flighttickets from Chennai to Colombo - Sri Lanka. On the 11th of  december we went to Hospet and waited there for the nightbus to Bangalore.

 Monolith Ganesh

 Worshippers and a toad-god (Shivas reincarnation)

 They were all laughing at this guy for asking us to take a photograph of him

Gokarna - Kudlee Beach, Karnataka

On tuesday 30th of November we said goodbye to Benaulim Beach; the friendly locals and shopkeepers from Kashmir, especially Altaf from Timetravellers Shop where we spend many hours chatting, checking out his books and Jaakko teaching him to play guitar.

We took a rickshaw to Margao, then a train from Margao (Madgaon Trainstation) to Gokarna. With only 3 platforms it was still very confusing where we had to wait and in which train we had to jump. Luckily we were not the only tourists going to Gokarna so we followed eachother everywhere like cows, while wondering and asking around. As expected the train arrived an hour later than planned. The trains are quite dirty in here. We took our seat next to a sleeping man, there was place for 6 so we put out backpacks on the bench, Jaakko sat next to them and I sat next to the man with 1 seat inbetween. During the trip the man slept deeper and I kept hoping he wouldn't fall in my direction as his dirty looks made me feel itchy and I already saw imaginary fleas everywhere. A nice thing was that along the way many salesboys kept walking back and forth offering chai, soda's, chips, candy, samosas etc. Three hours (and many staring looks of man acting like they've never seen womans legs in shorts before) later we arrived on Gokarna Road Station. Trying to ignore the taxirickshawdrivers screaming for tourists, we walked to a local bus that would bring us to town.

We already picked out a guesthouse beforehand so we knew where to walk. We have a nice spacious room on the thirth floor with our own bathroom, a squatting toilet this time and  only cold water. A big plus is our balcony surrounded by palmtrees with a hammock (hangmat) and also it's the first time that  we have a mosquitonet over the bed. 

Balcony

After arrival we walked through the Main street and witnessed how more relaxed this pilgrimageplace is. Guru's, baba's and Ghandi-look-a-likes mixed with Indian tourists and western hippies on every street, alley and open doorway. This holy town is flowing with spiritiual energy, they say the moment you enter you will lose all sin and bad karma.

Ghats to holy watertank

Streetview, Gokarna

"Abbey Road", Gokarna

 On wednesday we walked through the small streets of this town and were happy to notice that the layed back atmosphere of the night before was still there in daylight. When we saw a sign saying 'Kudlee beach' we decided to follow it, as we knew it wasn't more than 2 km away. We witnessed many different natural landscapes on the way climbing upward untill at some point I wasn't sure anymore if we took the right way. After asking a bypasser we heard it wasn't far anymore, "just follow the creek". Around the corner it looked as if we came from inside a split rock mountain with a small waterflow. We carefully stepped on the rocks and jumped our last steps right into the sand; Kudlee Beach! A small paradise for beachlovers, hippies and yoga/meditation practioners. 

The main (and only) road to Kudlee beach

We were a bit overheated so we looked for a nice shady beachshack where we had some fresh lemon-mint juice and an avocado shake while enjoying the view. We took a 'luxury' way back to Gokarna Beach over sea by a small wooden taxiboat.

In the afternoon Jaakko started to feel sick and stayed in bed with fever that luckily disappeared after nightfall, bananas and tender care.

The next day we tried to reserve sleeper bus to Hampi but unfortunately somebody had cut down the towns phonelines - no internet nor phone on any travel agent - they told us to come back later. but we managed to buy tickets eventually via mobile phone and tonight we are taking a nightbus to Hampi.

Gokarna Beach hillview

Benaulim - Margao, Goa

So here we are, still in the same beach. Life is relaxed here, our biggest problem is generally choosing in which restaurant to eat out.

Unfortunately our travel laptop (Acer, Aspire One, thank you Mieke for loaning it;) has had some issues - the power adapter decided to die. So off we went to Margao to visit computer stores. After prolonged 3hour odyssey in search of a local Acer distributor we found their office (from upstairs of a block of flats, no signs outside the building) but they did not have any spare power supplies to sell and told us to visit Acer Support Center anyway (5km out of the city) because the laptop is still under warranty.
By that point we had enough of pointless walking around the town so we decided to return to our home near the beach.

Sun & Moon

Next day I had a nice ½ hour busride to the support center but they told me that the international warranty we have for Acer is not valid in the state of Goa. If we would want to get our power supply fixed for free we should visit either Bangalore, Mumbai or Delhi (all over a day trip away...) So in the end I decided to buy a new "universal" laptop power supply from a hardware store, half of the price of the Acers official power adapter.

Meanwhile I also found a music store from Margao and bought myself a birthday present - a beach/travel guitar.

Grason - Made in India

We have also seen lately few indian music groups - most of the time there is setup of guitar & keyboards and singalong songs (generally pretty awful campfire campiness). The poorest act we witnessed in one restaurant was a fat indian man sitting behind a laptop, selecting karaoke tracks and singing Elvis, Beatles etc. evergreens with an hilariously thick accent. One of the better performances was Indian jazz band, with keyboards, guitar, base, drums and saxophone. They played really well but a rather boring set of elevator classics. With some food and cocktails we tried to enjoy it all. Funny thing to notice was that there was no seperate amplifiers; everything was plugged directly in to PA (without any effects).

Traditional party from Rhadjastan

We spend daily few hours on the beach and ocean and are now slowly planning our next move to Gokarna, a bit holier beach town about 100 km south.

Benaulim Beach continues

Benaulim Beachlife

Since monday the 8th of november we stay at Da Silva Casa, a purple family guesthouse in Benaulim Beach. They have 3 rooms to rent out but at the moment we are the only guests. The house lays offroad in a nice rural area but still not far from the towncentre and close to the beach. The family we stay includes a couple with little children, a grandma and then a few others of which we don't know much. It's communal living here with people walking in and out the garden so it's not clear who lives where and with who and which children belong to which parents. There are no fences inbetween so all is one for everybody. 

 Our pets Neighbours

Around the house is a lot of bush and trees where animals freely wander, sleep, eat, or just be. There is a few motherpigs with lots of mini piglets running everywhere they can, there are chickens, a white cat with kittens, cows and black bulls with massive horns and in the tree in front of out balcony we can spot a squirrel when we are lucky.  It feels really nice to stay here. Layed back villagelife. The same people are almost doing the same thing every day; women washing clothes in the morning, men chopping wood, others building new houses and shacks, trashpickers bended to the ground, poor looking people scraping dirt from fences before others will paint them, women sweeping the fallen leaves in the street or in the gardens to create walking paths, in the afternoon they are burning the collected trash on the sidewalks or in nature (no matter what's the material). All the work is done in primitive ways and their hands still do more than the machines. 

Doing laundry

 

We rented a scooter to explore the coastline. I was very nervous because traffic here is so different then what we are used to. It's not only that they drive on the left side, their mentality seems to be a careless; survival of the fittest. For example local busses don't move aside for any scooter, bicycle or pedestrian, you just have to make way for the speeding bus by ending up in the ditch no matter how steep or dirty it is. Luckily we have seen that the locals are very helpfull when tourists crash or fall. Our trip went well and we visited beach after beach to find out that there are not really any nicer ones then our closest beach in Benaulim. There were even a few beaches than seemed to be especially reserved for Russians including shacknames, flags and menu's in Russian. Continuing our way we both started to feel more at ease with the scooter, it's a refreshing breeze when you go 40 km/h. At slow pase we enjoyed sandy paths in the shade of the trees and ending up on little  roads that appeared to have dead ends to private properties. After having lunch we headed back to the hostel as clouds were getting darker grey and we didn't want to drive in the rain.

 Birthday!

Saturday it was Jaakko's birthday. We decided to have a luxuryday. We started with baked beans on toast (for a change) as breakfast at Tansy. After that we walked across the street for icecream and fruit. For lunch we chose some nice chocolate- and pearcakes at our local German Bakery to take home. We bought a little bottle of Indian whiskey and cola to have a nice cocktail at our balcony. Around 18 o'clock we went to the beach to have a beer and watch the sunset. In stead of the standard Indian Kingfisher beer we had some real nice Goan beers called Kings, a sweeter taste and made of corn. I ate tomatosoup and veg stuffed papadum (like veggie springroll) and Jaakko had masala fries and Tikka Paneer (barbecued stick with capsicum, tomato and cottage cheese). To finish the night we walked over the beach to Little Tiger, a backpackerbar with 70's music and hookah's on the tables, where we had rum cola's. In loungy seats on the sand we talked and watched the pitchblack sea making white waves in the light of the moon.

Benaulim, Goa

After spending 4 long days in bustling city of Panaji we decided to return to the beaches. This time around we chose Benaulim beach, nearby Margao. We took a "bouncy" local bus from Panjim to Margao, missed our stop and ended up taking a rickshaw to the beach. 

Currently we are staying in Rosarios Inn, a budgetresort with a 15min walk to the beach. We also managed to haggle the price of our stay down from 350 inr to 300 inr (5€ per night for 2 persons).

After two days Benaulim feels by far the most relaxed place we've stayed until now: less tourist shacks, hustlers and tourists themselves. Pigs, dogs, cats, cows and waterbuffaloes run around freely and a rooster from the neighbours wakes us up in the mornings. 

Benaulim Beach

For a change the sellers / hustlers actually respect the word "No", awesome.

This beach attracts a totally different crowd then Anjuna / Vagator - there's a mix of older westerners, Indians and few backpackers.

Unfortunately the weather has taken a slight step worse, there's been daily rain showers but that's just refreshing with continious heat. (It's only bad for the laundry)

After the rain

Later on we are planning to rent a scooter and do a small trip up the beaches - there's a dozen beaches in the next 20 km up north.