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Golden Temple, Amritsar

The other big highlight of our trip to Amritsar was visiting the closing of the border, 30km away at Wagah. This was perhaps one of my favourite experiences in India, on either trip. As you get there a group of soldiers are selling Coke and Pepsi from the fountain machines, small children are selling DVD's and CD's of the experience. It really is like a show in DisneyWorld. All of a sudden everybody surges forward and snakes around a pathway (the addition of signs stating '30 mins from this point' would not have seemed out of place) before coming out in front of grandstands. Of course, due to our being white skinned, we were ushered into the VIP area. For the next hour or so we were entertained by various enthusiastic groups
chanting, singing, dancing, and running up to the gates waving flags, whilst just across on the Pakistani side, the same behaviour is occurring with equal gusto. Eventually the soldiers break out in fits of marching and shouting and the lowering of the flags begins, starting with the briefest handshake between one soldier from each side. Another hour of pomp and ceremony passed before the flags were sententiously marched back to the office, until tomorrow. This is a daily event, just imagine you are at a football match in the UK, the same level of fanaticism and fervour.

Escaping the heat of the Punjab we journeyed up to Dharamsala in the lower reaches of the Himalaya, the home of the Tibetan government in exile. Ali and I were extremely excited to see snow on the peaks as we approached in the bus, a novel sight after baking in 35 degree heat for two months! We stayed in McLeod Ganj, just above Dharamsala and the actual home of the Tibetan government. Also home to many guest houses, shops and restaurants to cater for all the pseudo-enlightened neo-Buddhists that the town attracts. I actually liked McLeod a lot however, we managed to get out and walk in the forests and along the valley's edge. Highlights including the Church of St John in the Wilderness en route and seeing the graves from the colonial times as well as reaching Dal Lake, another few hundred metres higher than McLeod, and full of Indian tourists having fun on the pedalos. The town did live up to its rather Scottish sounding moniker however and it was rainy, freezing cold, dull damp and dreary for most of our week-long stay. But no matter, there were plenty of cafes to while away the time in and also small "cinemas" of the Khao Sanh road variety to keep one entertained come the chilly evenings. Finally we did manage to visit the home of the Tibetan government, a complex of monasteries and dormitories. In the courtyard the budding Buddhists are loudly debating and making their point with handclaps, inside devotees are praying using the prayer wheels (giant wheels full of mantras so you don't have to say them, just spin the wheel). Interesting idea, but perhaps a tad lazy don't you think?

Monk at Prayer Wheels

Leaving at a ridiculous hour in the morning, ("O-6-hundred-hours. What does the O stand for? O my god its early!") we headed up to Manali. Well I say up, we had to come back down the Kangra valley and go up the Parvati valley to get there, a journey of 12 hours on a local bus, complete with monks and women taking turns to vomit out of the window. Manali is infamous on the backpacker trail but we seemed to be there too early in the season as it was very quiet. Also, we stayed in Manali town, not wanting to go out to Old Manali which is backpacker land because we wanted to be in the town. As well as being a backpacker retreat it is also an incredibly popular domestic tourism destination especially with honeymoon couples. Again it was a perfect area for walking, lots of forest and protected parks and great views of waterfalls, snowy peaks and towering pines. We joined the hordes up from Delhi for weekend and visited the Hadimba temple up on the hill. Touts were offering photos outside and I fulfilled a dream held since I was in Sri Lanka two years ago and had my photo taken with a giant snake. Which was cool.

Turning about-face and returning towards Delhi the next stop we made was in Shimla. Shimla used to be the capital of the British Raj during the summer months and its easy to see why. The town is set on a hill, actually higher in altitude than either Dharamsala or Manali at 2200 metres and is full of mock Tudor buildings, old churches, town halls and other edifices echoing the colonial age. Shimla is also almost completely pedestrianised, making it really seem like the Olde English area at Epcot. Cleansed of rickshaws, beggars and other undesirables Shimla really is a pleasant place to wander around, indeed the highlight of Shimla seems to be a stroll along the Mall, taking in the air and keeping up appearances. Another side of Shimla is witnessed at the Hanuman temple, a 45-min climb out of town. The temple is nice enough but the real attraction is the legion of monkeys hanging around, living off of food from visitors. We received a puja in the temple, took
pictures of Indian families outside and watched old Indian women having fun on the giant swing. All in all Shimla is a fine place.

Our last stop before returning to Delhi was Rishikesh, commonly known as the Yoga capital of the world. because of this we imagined a really relaxed small town nestling on the Ganges. Instead we found a sprawling mess of a town, full of touts, fake sadhu's and lots of westerners hoping to be seen by other westerners looking oh-so-spiritual in Rishikesh. So we left pretty quickly, but not before escaping an ashram we had been led to, finding another ashram with a garden full of amazingly gory sculptures from the Indian epic texts, taking a dip in the Ganges and wandering up to the 13-story Swarg Niwas temple in Laxmanjula.

Lotus temple, Delhi

So a deluxe bus back to Delhi, scoffing strawberries along the way. We spent today at the Bahai temple south of the city, a beautiful building designed in the shape of a lotus flower built with shiny white marble. Although of course it does nor resemble the shape of it, it is somewhat evocative of the Sydney Opera House in that it is made up of white, curved structures. Inside it is cool and quiet and a perfect respite from the heat, which seems to have risen 10 degrees in three weeks up to the mid-40s. On the way back we stopped off at the former home of Indira Ghandi. An interesting museum has been built charting her life and the life of Rajiv and Sonia. It also shows the sari she was wearing when she was assassinated (complete with blood stains and gun shot holes) and has the remains of Rajiv's clothes after he was killed by a terrorist bomb. Interesting his trainers survived almost unscathed, this may have encouraged me to buy Lotto brand trainers in future, they withstand bombings. After the obligatory photo standing on the spot she was shot we left.