Maharashtra Ancient cave Temples
Ellora and Ajanta caves.
We arrived in Aurangabad at 7:30 am – we’d only been awake about twenty minutes. We were shocked by how cool it was – probably about 6 or 7 degrees – which felt very cold after basking in the heat for so long, but we were now perched up on the Deccan plateau – a long way from the tropical coast.
We dived into a Chai shop for breakfast with another backpacker and then wandered around viewing the local hotels. We decided on the "Tourist Home" which was good value at 75 Rps per night. It was clean and the staff reasonably friendly. There were not many tourists about in Aurangabad and at first glimpse it seemed to be a pleasant place.
After breakfast we headed out and a miracle occurred. We got into an auto-rickshaw and without a single word or mention of price, the driver put the meter on (yes - the fabled meter) and set off! Never before had a meter been used without at least five minutes of debate and several rejections by various drivers. Wow. The cost for a ten-minute trip was 5 Rps. I was that chuffed I tipped the driver 5 Rps!
We took the state bus to Ellora caves, which took about an hour through rolling countryside with the odd rocky area, and lots of small villages.
Ellora caves were reasonably quiet and we wandered around without interruption. The site consists of 34 rock cut shrines representing Buddhist, Hindu and Jain art dating from the 4th to 9th century AD The most remarkable among them is the Kailash Temple (cave No 16), meant to be a replica of Lord Shiva’s celestial abode. Kailash is one of the most spectacular works of art I have ever had the pleasure to visit. It’s a huge temple carved from a solid chunk of rock. The skill that must have been used to make such a large, detailed building is an engineering marvel. It blew me away.
We spent most of the day exploring and admiring the caves and returned to Aurangabad in a shared taxi later in the day. Unfortunately we couldn’t find our honest rickshaw driver and I felt it was shame to hire a ride from the usual rip-off crowd, so we walked the mile or so back to the hotel.
The next day we took a bus to Fardapur, and booked into the MTDC Tourist Lodge – a clean and tidy place with a restaurant. 129 Rps per night for a double with facilities. Fardapur is the nearest village to the Ajanta caves, which we walked to after a quick brunch.
The Ajanta caves are older than Ellora – dating back to the 2 BC (although someone claimed that they date back to 400 BC!). The site was also much busier than Ellora and lots of school children were there on day trips from nearby towns. I felt that Ajanta was far more "touristy" and organised than Ellora, yet not as interesting. One or two of the caves were interesting and some contained well preserved Buddhist carvings and paintings. Most caves were pretty ordinary, but it was worth visiting.
We ate in the hotel restaurant, as there was nothing else happening and had an early night.
Jalgaon
We checked out early and flagged down a bus on the main road to take us to Jalgaon – the nearest town on the railway. On arrival at the train station we managed to book bunks on the 2nd class sleeper to Varanasi leaving at 6:30 p.m. the same day.
Jalgaon is a pretty boring town – nothing much to do – but still a good place to wander away from the tourist trail. We returned to the station at 5:30 p.m. only to find that our train was running seven hours late, due to arrive at 1:30 a.m. I was a bit concerned that the train due in at 14:00 still hadn’t arrived and suspected trouble. Dibs went to see the Stationmaster – who was very helpful but couldn’t give us any more information. We wandered around a bit more and when it started to get chilly we returned to platform 3 and settled down – waiting for something to happen.
At 11:30 p.m. I found out that the train was to be further delayed and was now expected at 4:00 a.m.! Not fancying a cold night huddled on the platform we decided to cancel our tickets and find somewhere to bed-down for the night. Cancelling the tickets and getting a refund was remarkably easy. We headed off in search for a hotel and found a place called the "Aram". It seemed OK and Dibs went to the room to unpack, but then after I had signed in the owner wanted me to give him a 200 Rps deposit! I’d never had this before and decided that I wasn’t going to pay it. He was taking advantage of us. I went to get Dibs, who had already unpacked our sleeping bags and other things. She wasn’t happy and stormed down to the reception where she proceeded to start a blazing row with the hotel owner and rip his guest book up - even I was scared! The owner was left in a state of shock. We left quickly and looked for another hotel and found most of them full or closed up for the night. Shit – for a while I thought we’d be heading back to the platform, but our last chance – the "Tourist Home" had a room. It was excellent – 160 Rps a night with hot showers and a superb restaurant.
The next morning I headed to the station, fought with some queue-pushing Indians and eventually got a reservation for the 2:00 p.m. train to Varanasi. I was still a little worried that last nights train still hadn’t arrived.
After breakfast we returned to the station to find out that the train we had booked had been cancelled! Aarrghhhh!!! The joys of Indian travel. Again, we cancelled our ticket and sat in the TC’s (Ticket Collectors) office where we found a nice group of men who were all very friendly. We sat chatting for a while and looked at other travel options, eventually deciding to book onto a train heading to Jhansi – expected 3.5 hours late at 6:00 p.m. Going to Jhansi means we could visit Khajuraho before heading up to Varanasi – that’s if everything went to plan!
During the day I fancied a beer. I found the only place in Jalgaon that serves beer and we sat at a table and ordered. Unfortunately (due to some weird licensing restrictions) the only place they could serve beer was a small room with one chair in it! Bizarre! I decided to skip the beer and we left.
At 8:30 p.m. our train arrived. We’d sat on the platform for quite some time and chatted with the friendly locals. The "T.C" office staff even came and showed us to our carriage and made sure we set off OK. That’s one thing I’ll remember about Jalgaon – just how friendly and honest everyone was.
The overnight train journey was OK, although the carriages were jammed full. Early on in the trip a stowaway came into our carriage and tried to hide under my seat. He looked old and bedraggled and begged for me to let him stay. The other men in our carriage decided he was a thief and would "take our things in the night", so they called for the conductor. The conductor was an evil bastard and slapped the stowaway around the head and threw him off the train. That night I slept lightly as most of the carriage occupants were both loud snorers and champion farters!
We arrived at Jhansi at 11:00 a.m. and headed on auto-rickshaw to the bus terminal. The bus to Khajuraho eventually left at 1:20 p.m. Amongst the locals, the odd Indian family (who always seem to take their entire worldly possessions on their journey) and the one other backpacker, was a group of Italian tourists. They were all dressed in smart Italian designer gear, complete with Ray-ban sunglasses and huge plastic Samsonite suitcases. They were really out of place, but didn't seem to care!
This journey turned out to be our worst bus journey so far. It won the award for:
- Jamming in the most people. I estimate over 100 people were rammed on a "50 person max" bus.
- Stopping at every town and driving around three or four times to try and cram more people on.
- Using the horn almost non-stop.
We finally arrived at around 8:00 p.m. We walked into town, booked into the Yogi Lodge – 60 Rps per night and crashed out.
The Yogi Lodge is quite good and the owner gives free Yoga lessons on the roof. The town itself is also a nice spot – not a very big place but well set-up for the traveller. It’s bang in the middle of no-where in northern Madhya Pradesh.
The temples at Khajuraho are famous for their erotic art. We found them to be in excellent condition (and there was plenty of them) and the erotic carvings were very erotic.
The temples date from the Chandela dynasty, which flourished for many centuries before the onslaught of Islam. The Western group of Temples is the more interesting and contains some huge complexes with so many intricate carvings; it’s quite easy to spend days here. The carvings depict various Gods, numerous sexual activities and even bestiality! The insides of the temples are also very ornate.
We spent two days looking around all the temples and found it very pleasant. Without a doubt the best preserved temples we saw in India. The town itself is pretty peaceful and a good place to chill out for a while. I think it’s out-of-the way location is the reason why it’s so good – even though transport in and out is hard going.
One evening we found an Italian restaurant, run by an Italian woman. It sounded promising, but the food was pretty average. Khajuraho also boasts a Swiss café!
The next day we set off on a bus for the town of Satna. The bus was the dirtiest and smelliest yet and the journey was very bumpy. We booked onto the 20:00 sleeper train to Varanasi. (2nd class again – we tried to get 1st class for a change but it was full).
We wandered around Satna – another shitty town – for hours and briefly split up to get food, etc. This was a mistake as disaster struck. While Dibs was walking alone a "gang" of youths harassed her in the street and somehow managed to steal her new engagement ring. Robbing Bastards! When I returned we searched for hours and asked every rickshaw driver possible for information, but it was a waste of time. We reported to the police and got them to give us a report for insurance purposes (in Hindi). We were both pretty upset, but at least Dibs wasn’t hurt, and in the end the insurance company paid out without any problem.
Our train left on time and arrived in Varanasi sometime around 5:00 a.m. It was dark and cold. We asked a rickshaw to the take us to the Ghats, but he decided to take us to a hotel instead! Cheeky – but we got our own back by drinking tea and eating breakfast before leaving without taking a room!
The hotel was miles from where we wanted to be and was called "Yogi’s Lodge". Apparently a well-known and very popular backpacker hotel is called "The Yogi lodge", so clever businessmen have set-up with names like "Jogi Lodge", "Yoggi Lodge", etc, to try and con people! Funny really.
We wandered the streets and watched some mad bulls running around after each other, until eventually we got to the old town and Ghats next to the river Ganges. Dawn was breaking and the atmosphere was serene. The streets are very narrow and it’s very maze-like, and we were struggling to get any bearings or follow our map. A man approached us and offered to take us to a selection of hotels for a small fee. Sounded good – so we followed him to various places and decided on the "Shanti Guest House". The room was nice and clean and good value at 80 Rps. We paid him a 10 Rps commission and agreed to visit his brother’s silk shop tomorrow!
Varanasi (or Banares as it was once knows) is the holiest of Hindu cities - an important pilgrimage site and a fascinating place to spend a few days. The streets are narrow and mediaeval feeling – full of tumbling buildings, temples, stalls selling all kinds of stuff, and lots of cows and cow shit. It’s quite possible to get blocked into one of the narrow streets by a cow.
The Ghats themselves are split into different areas. Bathing Ghats for men and women – people come to wash themselves and even drink the horrible water, and the burning Ghats – where all day and night bodies are burned and the charred remains sent into the river. The Hindus believe that anyone who ends their days here will transported straight to heaven.
We stood near the Manikarnika gnat, the most important burning gnat, and watched for hours. It’s an amazing experience to observe the funerals take place. The dead are carried through the streets down to the river with the bearers chanting "Ram Ram Sita Ram…". The bodies are then blessed and burned on pyres. It’s hard to describe how it feels to watch, but I found it hard to pull myself away from it.
Depending on caste and the wealth of the family, the funerals vary from a quick-burn on a small fire to a full traditional burning with fine silk sheets and sandalwood. The charred remains are dumped straight into the river.
There didn’t appear to be as much sadness at the funerals as say a Christian funeral. I didn’t see a single tear being shed, and when I asked someone to explain I was told me that this was a happy occasion, as the person was being released from life on earth to his their new life. No one minds you watching as long as no photographs are taken. I did see some tourists taking snaps – which I thought was extremely rude – I wouldn’t want people taking photos at my funeral!
I saw the logs, used to burn the bodies, being carefully weighed out, and the cost of the funeral being calculated. I also saw a dog with the burnt remains of a human hand in it’s mouth – a local man just looked at me, smiled and said "lunch"!
One morning we walked down to the main bathing gnat – the Dasaswamedh Gnat – and haggled with a few boatmen until we agreed on a price of 10Rps each for an hour on the river. It was a great way to see Varanasi and get a good view of all the Ghats. Afterwards we walked along the waterfront and visited some temples. The Ghats are a hub of activity with all kinds of things going on. I spent a few rupees on a massage – by two blokes! It was a bit rough but I felt great afterwards.
We stayed in Varanasi for a few days and enjoyed wandering around the streets, along the river and around the various bizzares taking in the sights, smells and sounds of this great place. The Shanti Guest House was a nice place to stay and had a superb rooftop where we would hang out at night with other travellers. Most days the skies were full of kites – the local kids enjoyed "fighting" each other with them. We bought a few gifts for people back home and confirmed our flight to Kathmandu on Tuesday 20th January. We spent out last few days in India relaxing and reflecting on what a great journey we had.
We took a rickshaw to the small airport, and our Indian Airlines flight to Kathmandu in Nepal left on time and took about one hour.
We spent three months in India and looking back it was the best travel experience I’ve ever had. Maybe that’s because it was my first experience, or maybe it’s because India is just so different. It’s the sort of place that you remember for a lot of the wrong things as much as the good things. One minute you’ll see something so beautiful that you’ll never forget it, then you’ll turn the other way and see something so horrible that you’ll never be able to get it out of your mind. India is chaotic, dirty, smelly and extremely hard at times, but it is very rewarding.
