So dave and I had a great Christmas and New year in Colva in Boa but decided that lazing around and not doing much will give the reputation that many travellers get in India " I went to India and got stuck in Goa", it happens a lot to many travellers and we wanted to see more!
So we booked a overnight 11 hour bus journey to Hospet, I naively thought we would be provided with a sleeper bus.. how wrong could I be!!!
When we saw the bus we actually laughed! It looked sorry it was the same style of bus we got from the beach to the station. A small and rattlely bus awaited us for the next step in our adventure. So we got on with our big backpacks and quickly realised that there was no place for baggage, dave managed to squezze his bag in the over hear cage but mine had to go under our feet!
Now when we say this bus was basic we mean this bus was basic the seats had limited padding and had straight backs to fit more seat hence more people on the bus, so with my bag at our feet and the straight seat- our chins were touching our knees! But hey this is travelling we tell ourselves its a good experience! We will tell ourselves anything to make a bad situation good! On the opposite seat to us there was a family of seven trying to sit on a seat made for three resulting in two women sitting on the floor with their bags moaning at Dave for having my bag under his seat, as they wanted to put there bags there! Poor Dave spent some of the trip being shoved and pushed by this Indian family.
When the bus stared moving we thought great we are on the way!!! The mixtureof the Indian roads and Indian bus drivers results in a very uncomfortable journey where everythime you fell asleep the driver would break and you would smack your head on the back of the seat in front. So I spent most of my evening watching the driver and how they drives on the roads, Inian roads are very dusty with the roads breaking away at the edge and also full of pot holes and very often had large spped bumps to slow traffic, but all that meant was the driver would slow down for the bump but they speed up as fast has he can before the next bump hence the smacked heads! The driver also had his window open the whole trip to spit - taking his eyes of the road which I felt was too long before he narrowly missed hitting the oncoming traffic.
When we eventually come to the end of our trip- thankfully! I see about 6 men sprinting next to th bus as we park up in the bus station in hospet, they are autorickshaw drivers! "to Hampi to hampi" they shout desperate for our custom so desperate that we got a very good price of nine rupees each for a twenty minute drive into Hampi- result.
The Auto drive down to Hampi was magical! all these random temples and mysterious boulders make the landscape here! We get dropped off in the centre of the backpacker part of Hampi- which is pretty much the whole town and I get the distinct smell that reminded me of Varansi- cow poo! Uh oh but actually Hampi is so much chilled out compare to Varansi and so much smaller! Most of the rooms for Hampi were charging at 600 rupees- way out of our budget and more expensive that at the beach! But after dragging ourselves and our packs around Hampi I managed to barter down a room from 300 rupees to 200 rupees- another result! After dumping our stuff and having breakfast and wandering around Hampi we manage to find another hostel for 150 rupees and we moved in two days later! For that amount of money you dont get much cold water shower- well in this place a bucket. The shower also has a toilet in wth it and so when you shower you dont feel that clean as there is a distinctive smell of shit where you are washing! Yum! But its cheap and the people are friendly.
There is plenty to see and do here in Hampi we spent the first day finding temples inbetween the boulders- amazing. The only frustrating this is that there are only a few signs describing what these grand temples once were but wandering around them is fantastic. Yesterday we hired bicyles and cycled to the further temples and found the elephant stables which were incredible, very majestic.
The weather the last two days have been perfect for sight seeing as it has been slightly cloudy and there has been a strong breeze but it is still too hot to explore all day, so in the afternoons we have found this great restaurant where you eat and then chill out with a view of the river and you can chat to other travellers!
Today it has been too hot for me to do any exploring ut Dave is out and im sure he will see some amazing things, ive chosen to do admin, check out our next destinations and update blogs and keeping in contact.
We leave Hampi on Saturday "HAPPY BIRTHDAY LAURA" and get the train to Bangalore then another train to chennai and then a bus to mahabalipuram which is on the east coast of India there is a large temple on the shore and some other temples to go and see.
Emma and Dave
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment