Dan: Well, the only thing to report over the last couple of days is that we have both been sick! First I got a bad cold, then Karin got a mild case of Delhi Belly, then I got Delhi Belly, then I got a bad cold again, then Karin got a bad cold! It almost sounds like a comedy act when spelled out like that...

Today is the first day that I've been feeling better.
We've both booked onto a White Water Rafting trip for tomorrow, which will raft 36km of the Ganga - I'm really looking forward to it.

Karin has come down with a bad tummy again today, so I went out for a walk to the next village, trying to find the original Transcendental Meditation centre. I couldn't find it, but found a lovely place to sit by the Ganga and meditate.

On the way back, I found another Westerner's shop, run by a lovely Indian woman and her little boy...


Westerner's Shop

I also thought I'd include a photo of the main square at Laxman Jhula, for no other reason than I accicenlt uploaded it!


Laxman Jhula Circle

(Editor's Note: Karin has yet to type up her diary entries from this day forward, so you'll be getting mine alone until she has time to do them... and then they will auto-magically appear!)

Dan: Both Karin and I were feeling quite a bit better today, so we made an early afternoon expedition to Karin's beach (as I know it!).
Karin has been out running and swimming most mornings (at about 5:00am!!! How cold is the Ganga then???!), and she discovered a lovely swimming spot about 1km up the road from the village.

We spent a lovely afternoon here talking and reading, and cautiously watching the monkeys who would occasionally advance towards us (they could smell our tangerines!).
The beaches on the Ganga are incredibly - beautiful white soft sand.
We were confused about this at first (I don't remember having come across many rivers with whites sandy beaches before!), but when we went up into the Himalayas, it became clear - further up the river, all the cliffs are made of sand-stone - hence all the landslides. When the stone crumbles (into sand!) it gets carried down river and deposited on the shores.

On this beach, there was so much sand that a massive sand dune had formed.
So we sat on the sand dune, ate our lunch, read our books, and generally just enjoyed the sun.


Karin's Beach


Karin trying to "surf" the sand dune...
 

Dan: Well, I now officially have a bad cold - I was bed-ridden all day yesterday, but feeling marginally better today, so I decided to have a go at fixing the power adapter for Karin's laptop (wow, aren't my blog posts really exciting??!).
Once again, I didn't have the right tools, parts, or information for my job, but felt I could cobble something together.
Ever since I was young, I've enjoyed pulling things to pieces to see how they work, and this has left me with a gut feel on how to fix things - especially electrical and electronic things (although it left my parents occasionally frustrated, for if they gave me anything electronic or mechanical for Xmas or my birthday, it was invariably in pieces within 2 hours... one time at Xmas I remember having begged my father to have a play with a very old battery powered car that he had had as a child - it came complete with a petrol station that contained a battery to charge the car. I think my father was very fond of it, and so I was overjoyed when they gave it to me for Xmas, along with a stern admonition that I was to take good care of it as it had sentimental value. The warning must have really hit home, as it was at least 3 hours before it was in pieces, and I was using the motor from the car as the engine for cable car system that could transport my lego people from one side of my room to the other... The guilt still lives with me today!!)

I got a rickshaw into Rishikesh to see if I could find some parts that could be modified for use - and luckily, I found that the earphone plug for a Nokia phone hands-free kit has the same core plug as an Apple power adapter. Off to a good start then...

And so, with the Nokia part, some judicial use of sellotape and wax, and also with some cable that I liberated from the wall-fan in our room (I see it as a service as I re-wired it back up much more safely than it had been!)... I created a new power-adapter. And what's more, it worked! Yay! For about 2 hours, I was in my element, building all the little tools and parts I would need...


Dan hard at work

Karin: It's the evening of the 17th as I write this. The last few days have been spent very lazily, dozing and reading. We're starting to relax out here now. There were a few days of culture shock but this has abated now and we’re just enjoying a lot of relaxing hours doing not very much in particular. Dan picked up a cold a few days ago and so he’s a little below par. Thankfully my stomach is feeling robust again. The incessant chanting of the Diwali celebrations has finally ceased and we are enjoying the peace. The noisy Israelis who were also plaguing our lives when we first arrived have also left (HOORAY!) so things are fine and dandy.
 
Other good news, Dan appears to have fixed my computer – the power supply broke inside the computer about 10 days ago. The little miracle worker has taken the whole thing apart and extracted the broken piece. Can’t wait to watch a DVD!

Dan: OK, well I'm not going to bother writing too much today, a it would be a really boring thing to read!
I feel like I'm coming down with something, so am keeping a low profile roudn the hotel today.
In an effort to keep myself occupied (and also cause I really want to!) I decided to take Karin's laptop completely to pieces to see if I could remove the broken off portion of her power adapter (regular readers may recall that we broke it on Day 8).
Only three things were standing in my way:
1) I've never taken a Mac laptop to pieces before
2) I had none of the correct tools
3) Karin! erm... don't worry dear, I'll put it all back together, and it'll be as good as new, I promise.

Anyway, no boring details - I got it to pieces, removed the offending part, and got it all back together again.

We then spent the evening on the balcony, reading books as the sun set.
This is really a gorgeous place!

(Have yet to upload the photos of a sunset, but they're worth it, so check back on this page).

Karin: The Kamath family had to leave early this morning. I got up early to say goodbye as I didn’t want their last memory of me to be the green-tinged misery that I was last night. We bid each other farewell and as they headed back to Delhi. Dan and I jumped into a shared auto-rickshaw that was heading back to Laxman Jhula. After a freezing cold ride crammed into the back of this rickshaw with far too many people in it we were relieved to get back to the Hotel Divya and all of its relative comforts.

Dan: When we went to leave the hotel in Haridwar, we were pleasantly surprised to find that the Kamath's had paid for our room - yet another example of their generosity! We gave them heartfelt thanks, and also expressed gratitude for the chance to see another side of India, feeling like we were experiencing it a bit more as Indians ourselves.
I hadn't brought a jacket with me, so I was freezing cold on the ride back to Laxman Jhula, the only relief being that we were relatively war, as we were packed into a 6 person rickshaw with 8 Indian women, who were chattering away to us in Hindi!

When we got to Laxman Jhula, we stopped at the local Westerner's shop to get some cleaning supplies - today was the day we were going to tackle our bathroom.
Although our room and view were lovely, there was a continual pungent smell coming from the bathroom, which we thought might have been because it had never been cleaned properly - so we thought we'd have a go.

I'm not going to cover the rest of the day here, as it's not too exciting - suffice to say that my way of cleaning a bathroom that is covered floor to ceiling in tiles is to close the door, splash chlorine on all available surfaces, and lose myself in the scrubbing.

About the only exciting thing to happen today is when some monekys appeared above our room, and then came down onto the terrace - at first we thought they were cute, but they were monkeys with a purpose: they were here to steal Karin's bag of nuts - and so they advanced menancingly at us, hissing.
And rather than get into a scrap, we decided just to leave the nuts for the monkeys...

 
Monkeys above our room, about to steal the nuts

Normally the monkeys are rather cute, and look something like this...

Mother monkey and her baby

After a full days cleaning and washing, we fell to bed exhausted.
Being on holiday can be such hard work, you know??!

Karin: After a reasonably relaxed start this morning I discovered that Amrita and her family had decided to stop off in Laxman Jhula before proceeding down to Haridwar for the Diwali ceremony. We made an arrangement to meet up by the bridge and it was confirmed that Daniel and I should join them for the Haridwar festivities. Haridwar is one of the sacred sites to host the Kumb Mela – a gathering in which 6 million Indians gather on the banks of the holy Ganges for a little communal soul purification. The Kumb cycles through about 8 different locations along the Ganges and happens every 12 years. The event we were to participate in was a much smaller affair. We all bundled into the Kamath family taxi. Mr Kamath had taken his student Vijay with him on his 'plein air' painting tour. Vijay was a delightful man from Bangalore.

Dan: We stopped in Rishikesh so that Amrita's family could buy us some treats - in this case, some sweet candies made from milk products. It turns out that most of the sweet treats in India are made from milk products - something I hadn't known.
Whilst we were there, Amrita's father explained that in traditional Indian culture, there were 3 groups of people that should be treated as "gods": Parents, Teachers... and foreigners! Because of this, Amrita's family insisted on paying for everything, and were determined that we enjoy as much Indian culture as possible.
I must admit, I felt very humbled about this - it's something that would seem so foreign in our culture, but it explains why you hear so much about the Indian culture of kindness and generosity to foreigners travelling in India.
Vijay was also very respectful about his "master", Amrita's father, and said that it was a real privilege to be his student.
I got the feeling that the bond between them was more father-son than anything else, but it was still a bond of mutual respect and love.

Karin: The plan was that we should stay in a special shrine created by a man of the same caste as the Kamath family, but owing to the festivities all the guest rooms were full. We ventured, thus, into town to try and find a room. We finally found a place, dumped our bags and went for some lunch.


Statue of Shiva at Haridwar 

Dan: As we walked through the grounds of the temple, I noticed how many more Sadhus there were here than anywhere else. Vijay exmplained to me that it was a community's responsibility to ensure that Sadhu's were fed and sheltered, and that the temple here was one of many places that would feed the Sadhus three times a day, as long as the Sadhus spent their time in meditation.
Vijay also expained the significance of the orange robes that all Sadhus wear: the colour they wear is saffron, and signifies an offering, in this case the offering of the Sadhu's life to the gods, to ponder life and study the existence of being.

Karin: After lunch we proceeded to a very secluded bathing spot that adjoined the temple where we had originally planned to stay. Here we took a holy dip together, although having no change of clothes Daniel and the girlies just paddled up to our knees. Amrita showed Daniel and I how to do a sacred sun offering.


 

Bathing in the Ganga


Dan and Amrita's familty

Before too long it was time for us to head off to the festival of lights. We arrived just a few moments too late as thousands of leaf baskets containing rose-petals, marigolds and flaming torches were cast off into the dark torrent of the Ganges. We cast off our own offerings and then headed into town for a spot of sari shopping.


Karin and Amrita and their flower baskets

After much deliberation and consultation, I came away with a lovely golden silk sari with black trim. Unfortunately I wasn’t feeling too well by this time and I had to take my leave rather rapidly to avoid an embarrassing scene! Amrita kindly accompanied me back to the hotel where after being sick, I retired into a woozy haze. Thankfully Daniel saved the day and was able to reassure our worried hosts that I would live to see another day. 

Dan: Amrita's family took me to a local restaurant called "Big Ben", complete with a picture of the tower itself (which is called St Stephen's Tower - it's the bell that's called Big Ben, and Daniel that's called "pedantic"...!).
We all had lovely Chinese dishes - I've never had a chowmein with Indian spice in it before!
One thing that Amrita explained to me is that Indian's love things in both Salty and Sweet flavours - so, if you order a lassi (a drink made from yoghurt), you can get it salty or sweet - and, if you order a lime soda, you can also get this salty or sweet! I mention this as Amrita's mother ordered a salty lime soda - which I couldn't bring myself to try!
The funny thing about this restaurant, is that no-one seemed to have any clue what Big Ben actually was, or where it was!
After dinner, I retired back to our hotel room to check on my patient - who was feeling a bit better for having had a bit of sleep.

Karin: The 4.20 alarm call was most unwelcome this morning. Both Dan and I endured an ice-cold morning wash with stoicism but when we finally emerged at 5.00 the heavenly sight of a myriad twinkling stars in a huge, jet-black sky made our pains worth all the while (Dan: well, sort of!). The air is so clear at this altitude that the night sky is really magnificent. We awoke Sundar who had taken to sleeping in the car as a way to pocket his Rs 200 per day allowance and before long we were winding our way back down to the valleys. 

Dan: One thing I've noticed on our road trip so far, is that 90%of the cars are made by a company called TATA. And this one company makes a massive range of cars - imagine if all the different cars you see on a normal day at home (all the models and makes) were made by the same company - and that's what it's like. It turns out that TATA (who also do phone networks) are a division of Hindustan Motors, who make the Ambassador. The only other car manufacturer in India is Mahindra, who make jeeps - TATA make everything else - the cars, the buses, the trucks, the vans - you name it.
It's very rare to see anything other than a TATA car - and if you do, it is likely to be a Suzuki.

Karin: The place that Bhuta Ram had selected for us as our final taste of Himalayan beauty was a walk from the small village of Sari to an area called Deviatal with a famous view of the mountain range mirrored in a lake.  We had set off so early because it is only early in the morning that one can see these views. Thus it was that at around 6.30 am we again set off up another mountain, this time with a local guide called Mr Negi. Mr Negi was a very endearing fellow. As we walked up we were accompanied by a large number of village women from Sari, carrying large baskets on their backs to fill with fallen leaves, to use as winter bedding for the cattle. The sight of all these joyfully colored sari-clad women climbing the hill with their baskets and rustling about in the leaves in the early morning sunshine was like living poetry. Mr Negi stopped on occasion to talk to them. As we walked up, an elderly man passed us who evidently, had a small café at the top and had decided that our potential trade was worth the climb up.


Women collecting leaves
 
The view over the lake as we came over the brow of the hill was well worth our strenuous climb and in spite of filming restrictions by order of the Indian government, Mr Negi was keen to give us a filmed narrative of all the peaks he had climbed.

 
 
Views from the Reflection Lake at Deviatal

After offering our patronage to the café owner we began our descent via Mr Negi's plantation where he explained to us, in depth and with great enthusiasm, that he was working on a project involving a plantation of special medicinal plants. He insisted that on returning to England we should mention the project to our government as he had great hopes to heal the world. He gave us a few samples of his magical plants.


Mr Negi in his plantation

Dan: Mr Negi also showed us round his climbing school, where he teaches children how to rock climb (and gave us a demonstration).
He was very proud of his qualifications and experience (as he should be) and explained how he's climbed most of the peaks we could see from the top - what was fanatastic is that he knew the name and story of each and every one.


Mr Negi demonstrating rock climbing

Karin: By the time we returned to the taxi and our driver, we were thoroughly charmed by Mr Negi and his enthusiastic and altruistic vision so we gave him Rs 1000 (a small fortune in this part of the Himalayas) as a donation to his enterprise. This he received with much gratitude and sent us off with  a bunch of marigolds picked from his garden.
 
The return drive to Laxman Jhula lasted about 7 hours and seemed to go on forever. When we finally arrived back we parted ways with Sundar, his Ambassador and yet another large tip. It was with much gratitude that we walked back to our room and the promise of hot water, clean clothes and a more temperate place to spend the night.

Karin: We emerged at about 10.00 am, packed up some dal and rice and set off for the trail bound for the peak Chandrosila which towered above us at 4090 mtrs. We both struggled to begin with as even at 3,000 meters the air was quite thin and we seemed to be getting exhausted with even the slightest bit of exertion. As we walked up we stopped to chat to a girl called Amrita who is here on pilgrimage from Bombay with her family. She spoke wonderful English and as we made our way up the mountain in fits and starts we struck up a really good conversation.

Dan: Lessons I have learned today: never go hiking in thermal underwear...! It was very cold this morning, but being able to stay in bed till 9:00am made it worth it... The walk up the "hill" at Chopta was rather steep - Chopta is at 3000m, and when we reached the top, we'd climbed another 1000m to a height of 4000m. Karin, being the super-woman she is, decided to go bush and hike cross-country up the last 300m or so - by the time I reached the top, I was too shattered to do anything but collapse for 5 minutes. But when I recovered, and looked around, I was spellbound.
We've been seeing glimpses of the Himalayas for a few days now, and at Badrinath, a few peaks were visible.
But here.. we were surrounded by them. It was magical - the sort of views you see on posters or something, and think, "Wow"...

 
The view from Chadrosila
 
Karin: The view from the top of Chadrosila was breathtaking. We had a glorious panorama of the peaks of Kedarnath (6970m) Chaukumba (7070m) to the North and North West and the more distant peaks of Trishul (7120m) and Nanda Ghuti (6310m) to the east. We sat on the top and talked philosophy and spirituality with Amrita before making our way down in the gently fading light of the late afternoon.  We made it back to our camp down in Chopta some time before Amrita, and struck up a conversation with her father who was a professional painter in Bombay. He showed us his sensitive depictions of the mountains of Kedarnath and the shrine of Tungnath that we had passed on our way to the top. When Amrita returned, we agreed that we would try and meet up with them for the final event of Diwali to be held down in the valleys in a town called Haridwar, not far from Laxman Jula. We exchanged contacts and waved them off as they set off for their long drive down to the valleys. That night we ate again by the light of the tilly lamp and made plans for the next day and our return to Laxman Jhula.


Karin and Dan at top of Chadrosila


A barely visible Dan and Amrita at the top 

Dan: When we arrived back at the bottom, we had some difficulty understanding the plan for tomorrow. It sounded like the driver wanted us to leave at 5:00am the next morning, but we wanted to confirm this, just in case we got ourselves up early and found he was still asleep.
We got Amrita's father to translate, and found that thuis was right - we had another hill to climb tomorrow, and we had to start early and finish early so that we would be well on the 7-hour journey back to Laxman Jhula before it got dark.

Dan: Holy Batman!!! Talk about cold… The alarm went off at 5:00am this morning so we'd have time to get ready, and I swear, you couldn't get me out of my sleeping bag for all the rupees in India!!
Our bucket of hot water arrived at 5:05am, and we had a quick wash, in preparation for our 3 hour drive.
We had bought a pack of cornflakes from the store yesterday, but having no milk, we had to have cold water and cornflakes for breakfast. Oh, the injustice! I'm such a wuss...!


Can you say "happy Daniel"??!

Karin: That morning we realized why we had been given such an early alarm call. As the road to Badrinath is only a single track, traffic coming from each direction is allotted specific times to leave, from a number a checkpoints. In theory, this means that you never meet traffic coming down in the opposite direction. In practice it would seem that road officials will be swayed by offers of baksheesh (bribes) and so it was that on numerous occasions we encountered lorries and buses coming in the opposite direction on the most treacherous bends – a few more heart in mouth moments where we were forced to reverse right up to gravelly sheer edges to allow huge trucks of insouciant Indians past. The road up to Badrinath was astonishingly beautiful. It felt almost as though we were driving along a mountain footpath with the peaks towering above us, and the Ganges cascading down at the bottom of the abyss just a few meters away from where we sat. Our taxi driver, Sundar, soon became accustomed to our numerous requests for photo stops.


View of the Ganga from the road to Badrinath

Dan: I have to make a quick comment about all the "slow down" road signs on these roads - they must hire a poet to write them, because they all rhyme, and they're all hilarious!
Some examples are:

"No whiskey, less risky"
"For safe arriving, less liquor in driving"
and my personal favorite:

"Do not gossip, let him drive"


Typical road sign

Karin: At around 9.00 am we cleared the passes and drove up into the small mountain town of Badrinath or 'Badri' as it is known locally. It is extraordinary to think that these whole communities depend on such an undependable byway. A little food is grown locally but especially in these high and remote places, the vast majority of the food must be brought up from the valleys by truck. One shudders to think about the consequences of an earthquake in such an exposed and vulnerable region. The recent Kashmir earthquake is a timely reminder of just how fragile these communities can be when at the mercy of the phenomenal natural forces that have created these great mountain ranges. The following week, the whole of the town was due to shut down and move down to the lower town of Josimath for the colder winter months, so were there on one of the final days before this annual ritual closure of the shrine.

The Hindus believe that to fulfill the goal of self-realization – the pursuit of 'Moksha' (the eternal peace after death), it is desirable to travel to the 4 shrines of god, which lie at the 4 corners of the country, Puri Jagan Nath, Rameshwaram, Dwarka and finally Badrinath. People have been traveling to this shrine long before the Himalayan mountain passes were built, as Badrinath is mythically known as the place where India was born. It is said in mythology that it is historical Hindu figure of Anshuman who began the task of bringing the Ganges down from heaven to earth. He failed in his task as did his son Dilip, but the grandson, King Bhagirath meditated long and hard at Gangotri, a small village about 80 kms to the left of Badrinath, as the crow flies. After several years of intense meditation, the Ganges (or Ganga as known by the Indian people) descended from heaven and remained in suspense in the coils of Shiva’s hair. The king continued his meditation to Shiva and Shiva, being pleased, released the Ganges as 3 streams.

It is impossible to overstate the reverence the Indian people hold for this sacred river. Its entire length is considered to be a holy site – as important as any temple. And when one takes a ‘holy dip’ in the Ganga, it is believed that all sins are cleansed. This bodes well for me as, with all my mornings swims, I must now be as pure as the driven snow!

The tradition at Badrinath is to receive Darshan (a blessing) at the temple and then bathe in the hot springs just beneath the temple. We had brought a drawing of a mandala made by Rita, the daughter of my good friends - Lee and Melissa and had been dispatched on a  mission to finding a holy man to hold it whilst we took a picture as a memory for Rita. We were finally able to find a willing swami who traded a picture for the purchase of a magnificent garland made from marigolds  to place on the holy shrine.


Swami and mandala

We then proceeded up to the temple where we received Darshan.


Karin in front of the temple at Badrinath

This is a similar ritual to that of the holy communion. You are offered small sweets and lentils and a teaspoon of holy water infused with marigold petals. It really was very special to be there under the deep blue sky of the Himalayas where the air was as clear as a bell and where even the November sun bore down on us with real ferocity. Outside in the galleries around the temple there were a number of holy men offering more in-depth blessings. Several monks approached us, welcoming us warmly and saying that it was very auspicious that we were there. Few westerners seem to make it up to these shrines as they are well off the main tourist track. We were ushered over by another Swami who took us through an elaborate ritual where we had to announce 'Swaha' quite a few times whist throwing lentils into a fire – we were also asked to chase each other around the pillars of his small shrine. After we, our families, our friends and our future children (Dan: what??!) had been thoroughly blessed, we made our way down to the hot springs to bathe. Daniel was fine as he was able to bathe with his shorts, but women in India must bathe fully clothed so I muddled my way as well as I could with a swimming costume and a wide scarf that I used as a sarong. I’m not sure what the Indian women there thought of me!

 
Bathing in the holy spring water at Badrinath

Once our sins were, once again, ritually rinsed away, Dan and I met up again on the stairway leading up to the shrine. It was here that we bumped into the only other westerners in Badrinath – a German tour guide called Ralf and one of his clients. After chatting to them and getting some good advice about trekking, we headed off, back to Josimath, and our next destination – Chopta, a further 7 hours drive away. After being jiggled and shaken for 7 hours more, we arrived by moonlight in Chopta, a tiny little settlement with no mains power. We were ushered into a glacially cold room and our hosts graciously started up their generator so we had a few hours of light. We ate by the light of a tilly lamp (yet another excruciatingly strong curry) before retiring to our ice-cold room and the snug comfort of our sleeping bags.
 

Karin: We met up with our taxi driver this morning. He is to be our guide for the next 5 days as we set off to explore the Uttaranchal section of the Himalayas. We had been given a recommendation by a Sadhu a few days previously to visit a sacred shrine called Shri Badrinath that is at the end of one of the mountain trails that reaches deep into the Himalayas. Our taxi driver spoke hardly a word of English, so after some jumbled negotiations, we decided that it would be easier to drive back to his boss’s office at Triveni Travels to discuss the requested changes to our itinerary. What, in England, would probably be a simple 5 minute conversation, turned in to an hour-long audience with Bhuta Ram, the big boss at Triveni. After tea and much waiting around whilst Bhuta Ram conducted business on the telephone, we finally negotiated our new itinerary which was to involve an extra 2 days of traveling (for the 24-hour drive to Badrinath and back(!!!) and some 3,000 extra rupees. After buying supplies for our trip we set off for our 9 hour drive to Josimath, from where we would make the 3 hour drive along single track roads up to Badrinath at 3,065 meters.

Dan: When we stopped for supplies in Laxman Jhula, I went into a new shop, one that I hadn't been to before - I was pleasantly surprised to find that this was a westerner's shop, in that it sold all manner of things that one would expect to find back home – such as Pringles, Lindt chocolate, Dove soap, shampoo… and cleaning products!
I bought some chocolate as a treat, and mentioned to Karin that we should stop by the shop when we got back to buy cleaning supplies for attacking the bathroom.
 

Karin: Neither Dan nor I could possibly have known what we were letting ourselves in for – 9 hours of the most treacherous, disintegrating roads I have ever had the joy to travel along. About 20 kms along the 263km road to Badrinath we encountered our first of many landslides that had partially blocked the pass. Even with my spirit for adventure, I must confess that my heart was in my mouth for much of the following 3 days as we negotiated mile upon mile of these treacherous trails. The little car that transported us all this long way was an 'Ambassador' – an Indian-made car modeled on one of the early British cars brought to India during the occupation. In spite of the challenging terrain, it proved itself to be incredibly steadfast and reliable. Having said this, some 30 or 40 kms into our first day of driving, the car developed an alarming rattle. After several stops and a lot of poking around in the boot, our driver decided that our rattle was not critical and so we squeaked and clattered our way a further 50 or so kilometers until finally the errant part must have fallen off as, blissfully, although somewhat worryingly, the rattling suddenly ceased. We soon forgot these concerns as we peered up at very large and precarious boulders that perched above us whenever we negotiated a severely eroded section of road. And so on we went, and on and on, until finally at 7.00 or 8.00pm we finally reached Josimath.

 
Examples of the type of road we were following (click to enlarge)

Dan: Our driver made frequent chai stops – a stop for a cup of tea and possibly a pee! I must admit, I'm getting very fond of the sweet spiced tea, so was alwas very happy when we stopped!


Typical road-side chai cafe

As we got further and further away from Laxman Jhula, we noticed evidence that we were leaving tourist frequented places – the signs stopped having a double translation in English, and the people in the roadside cafes quite often didn’t speak English.
We stopped for lunch at a little café where we had some dal (the local curry served up here) and some roti (kown as chapati up here – basically unleavened bread).


Karin and Dan at lunch

We arrived into Josimath at about 6:00pm. Josimath is at an altitude of about 2000m so it was much colder than it was down at Laxman Jhula - fortunately, we were prepared and had packed our thermal underwear - which we quickly dug out and put on.
Having checked into the guest house (and requested a bucket of hot water for the morning - there was no hot running water) we went out for dinner to a local restaurant.
We discovered the food up here is a lot hotter than down south - I almost burnt my mouth out on biting into what I thought was a capsicum, but was instead a green chilli... Doh!
There were some teenage boys in the restaurant, helping with the serving, and they were having great fun practicing their English on us, calling each other "dunce-heads" and generally just calling each other names!
I was quite impressed that there was a large poster showing Mt Cook (in New Zealand) on the wall – go little NZ!!
We got back to the hotel at 8:00pm, and our driver told us that we would need to leave at 6:00am for the 3 hour drive to Badrinath – apparently the road up the mountains is single lane, and they only let traffic go up at certain times. Badrinath is 1200m higher than Josimath, at about 3200 metres.
We were alarmed to see that our driver, Sandar, was going to sleep in the back of the car, but he had a thick blanket and seemed quite happy.
So we piled into our sleeping bags.. I'm not looking forward to the temperature tomorrow morning!