Day 35: It's over

That’s it, the journey is over. Tonight we are flying back to Paris.
What is left from this trip: few useless artifacts and over 3,000 pictures that I promise, I will not bother anyone with. But mostly we are having our eyes filled with stars from all the splendors we saw and all the people we met.
Thank you for having spent some time with us reading this blog.
So long, and do not drive like the Indians.
Philippe

Day 34: Bombay

Elephanta Caves
The Taj Mahal Hotel
Now we are riding a bus which is comfortable but less poetic. We saw the city and its contrasts (rich districts, poor slums). The Taj Mahal hotel is operating but still under repairs following its recent terrorist attack.

We had a boat cruise to visit Elephanta Island and its amazing VI th century carved caves dedicated to Shiva. This was our last visit ending our tour with a bang.

Day 33: Vadadora - Mumbai (Bombay)

Strange encounter on the highwayReturning the cars at the docks
The day was spent mostly driving to turn back the cars to the shipping company for loading on containers for shipment to France.

The road was not too bad, mostly 6 lane highway, with the peculiarity to encounter shepherd and its herd of various animals or a truck coming on the wrong side for obscure reasons. However the fourteen 2CV Citroen did perform miraculously well, not a single accident in more than 10,000 km (exactly 10,100 km for us).

Overall our car did very well, if I except two blown up tires, two front shock absorbers shot, few torn rims and a collapsed frame, everything was repaired mostly with a big hammer.

We are going to miss our car, we feel like a knight without his white horse or Lucky Luke without Jolly Jumper (this for the French readers only).

We only spent 4 hours waiting for the custom officer to accept our cars and 2 more hours to reach our hotel, so there was not time to visit Bombay, which is tomorrow program.

Day 32: Udaipur - Vadodara

Lake Palace where James Bond movie "Octopussy" was shot

Washing time on the lake

Morning visit of the palaces of Udaipur, the Venice of Rajasthan. The desert is gone and water is changing everything. Now the palaces are built in the middle of lakes, and it is refreshing.
Then driving again to Vadodara, not because it has specific places to visit, but to get closer to Bombay that we should reach tomorrow.

Day 31: Jodhpur - Udaipur

Water carrier


Jodhpur Fortress

Morning visit of the fortress of Jodhpur(XVth century) and its correspomdind Maharajah palace. These palaces seem repetitive, however each place is very different. This one, besides its massive protective walls, houses delicate collections of elephant silver saddles, ornated cribs and very inventive arms to maximize mauling of the enemies.
Then back to the cars and our regular 43C. There is no cloud in the sky and the sun is scortching us. We buy water and/or Coca Cola that never felt so good.

Day 30: Jaisalmer – Jodhpur.

Durga festival is over, going back home


Fortress of Jaisalmer


Fortress of Jaisalmer

Daytime visit of the fortress of Jaisalmer, it was very different from our evening escapade. We could see the narrow street with small boutiques housed in old palaces made of lace of stones.
We drove in the Desert of Thar again to reach the major city of Jodhpur.

Day 29: Bikaner – Jaisalmer

Fort of Junagarth


Another Maharajah palace


Getting ready to enter the Temple of the rats

We started the day in Bikaner with an individual visit (meaning few people without the group) to a temple full of rats that are worshiped because they are supposed to be the reincarnation of children. We were lucky to be there during one of the two annual festivals. It was very crowded and very colorful. However being obliged to walk barefoot in the middle of herds of rats is a pleasure I could have done without.
Then we visited the fort of Junagarth and the palace of its Maharajah housing many collections of arms, material for tiger hunting etc.. including a De Havilland biplane offered by the British for the Maharajah behavior during WWI aside the allied forces.
From there we kept crossing the desert of Thar, sand with scattered thorny bushes, to reach another city-fortress, Jaisalmer. All the Rajasthan cities owe their fame and fortune to the trade and the caravans during the Silk Road era.
Today they rely on tourist and Indian Army that guard the Indo-Pakistani frontier.
On evening we went for diner on a nice quaint restaurant on the fortress overlooking the city (courtesy of the “Guide du Routard”) and we also discovered an antique shop in the very home of a collector of collections.

Day 28: Jaipur - Bikaner

Amber Castle


Maharadjah Palace


Lining up to worship Shiva and Durga

We spent the morning at Jaipur visiting the castle where an immense line of pilgrims, men on one side, women on the other, came to worship Durga, wife of Civa and mother of Ganesh.
Normaly we get to the castle on an elephant back, due to the number of pilgrims, for security we used jeeps instead. I am not sure the security improved drasticaly.
We then drove to Bikaner, getting deeper in the Rajastan desert, close to the Pakistan border. It is hot, still 43C in the car. For the first time we took some rest in the pool. Refreshing.

Day 27: Delhi - Jaipur

Short drive to Jaipur; 222 km, however it took us 5 hours, or an average speed of 44km/h. This in spite of a 4 lane divided highway. The notion of a highway is slightly different here. Nothing keep people from making U-turns, drive on the wrong side, use ox-cart, so minimum speed may be close to zero, mostly if a truck drivers takes a nap next to his truck, right on the highway itself.
The scenery has changed, sand and palm trees have appeared, together with camel driven carts and elephants. During this journey, we will have seen a very large sample of the animal kingdom.

Camel cart

Elephant ride

Jaipur is called the “Pink City”, which is the color of the st cartones used to build the palaces, the fort and the walls. It is where we spent most of the afternoon.

The gate of the winds
We visited also the bazaar where you may find anything except what you are looking for. Next to each and every monument, there is a cloud of souvenir sellers that will never give up, they follow you until you buy or until your car is at full speed.
Surprisingly there are no beggar, this mean that the country, however poor, has made significant economic progress in the recent years.

Day 26: Delhi

We had a full day at Delhi, a bus took us to different monuments, mosques, tombs, all the names confuse me and they do not add anything to the blog. So I will not mention them.

16th Century precursor of the Taj Mahal, it had not reached the perfection yet.Stone cutters working along the same traditional way to repair some of the monuments

A Sikh Temple

I left the group to visit the National Museum that is at the image of India, some magnificent piece of art in a museum where half the rooms are closed for repair and most of the shelves lack correct lighting.
However today we had our first real lunch of real Indian food. Usually we have no time for lunch or we eat at a little joint on the road where we have rice and some fried chicken. On evening we arrive late and we have the buffet consisting mostly in international dishes which, while being reasonably good, do not deserve a picture or a description. Today was real Indian food, as good as what we eat in Arlington…

Day 25: Agra - Delhi

Since the distance to Delhi from Agra was relatively short, we spent our morning to visit the Taj Mahal and the Red Castle.
Like everyone else, I had seen the Taj many times on picture, movie, TV etc... so it was another visit of something known. Well, when I saw it, it was a complete aesthetic shock; this monument must be the most beautiful on earth. It is the ultimate masterpiece; it is for architecture what Mona Lisa is for painting. It is perfection. I think that in spite of all the talent of the architect, it took also some luck to obtain the exact proportions that are so pleasing to the eyes. Again only this visit was worth the whole trip.

The Taj Mahal early in the morning
Early after noon following the steps that Claudine left 39 years ago, I went to Fatepur Sikrit to visit the palace of one of the Moghol King and the one he built for each of his three official wife’s, he had several hundreds of concubines too, hard life. We were lucky, it was the end of a Muslim festival and the 16th century Mosque was full of colorful people and women in multicolor saris.

The Fatepur Sicrit Mosque

Mullahs preparing for their homely.

A faithful one
Then we drove to Delhi that we reached by 7 pm. That was the good part of the day. Then the nightmare started. It was night; we were caught in a massive traffic jam. Two hours to progress 10 meters. The temperature in the car was 43 C (112 F). The cars overheated and out of the three cars travelling together, two broke down. Not mine, then I got separated, I was alone in the car, Jacques being in the organizer car for this “short” leg. The right road being blocked, I went off-track and I could not find the hotel. No taxi to help, no one that I asked new it. After going in circle, I found an Ibis hotel and the French manager offered me his driver to lead me to our hotel that I reached after midnight. The lesson, no more trips like this without a GPS. It would have given me, at least, the distance and the direction of the point of arrival. (By the way the two other cars restarted and we arrived all at the hotel at almost the same time).

Day 24: Khajuraho - Agra

Another long day driving, 10 hours. We had our secong tire blow up. We hit so many pot-holes that we tore the rims of most of the car wheels and sometimes, bang, the tire goes.

Road scene: a corpse is being taken to its last burial place.

We arrived in Agra after the Taj Mahal closed for the day, but our visit is scheduled for tomorrow early morning. However we had time to climb on a terrace nearby and see this magnificent monument in the sunset.
The Taj Mahal in the sunset, viewed from a local hotel terrace.

Day 23 Varanasi - Khajuraho

This day was mainly spent driving, the roads are so congested that our average speed is 45 Km an hour, a faster car would not be able to do any better. The sceney is not very interesting, rather flat and not luxurious like what we saw in China and in Nepal. From time to time we may se an old palace or an old temple slowly decaying.
While hesitating for the right direction, we made a U-turn and drove in the wrong lane, we were stopped by a police offcer who asked: Papers!
Me: Papers??, Which papers?
Officer: Papers!
Me: No papers!
Officer: OK, you may go!
Next time I am stopped by a police officer in Texas, I hope I can get away that easy.

Jean-Pierre and Jerome passing a scooter with only 3 passengers (we have seen some up to 5)

The temperature is very hot, 43C (110F) stabilized in the car, outside may be worse, but I am not there.

It is the celebration of the Godess Durga, who slayed a demon while ridding a lion, or the contrary, I am not sure. Anyway, there are tents with the image of the Godess and her 8 arms in every village and a mass of people are worshipping her during 5 consecutive days.

The Godess Durga and her lion

We arrived early at Khajuraho and were able to visit the splendid temples, pretty much intact (at least those still existing, 22 out of 80) that were built in the 9th & 10th century. They were built by a Lord that had a religious deviation and tried to get to the Nirvana through sexual practices. The temples are covered by exquisite sculptures but rather risque. sorry guys, I will not upload specific pictures, otherwise my blog could be rated XXX.

Sample of sculptures (decent one) covering the Temples

Day 22: Varanasi (Benares)

Day off from driving. In the morning we had a slow start, we took the bus to visit Sarnath, the town where Buddha did his first speech. It was excavated by the British and they found this extraordinary quadruple lion head from the 3rd century BC, now the symbol of India, that we admired at the local museum, with other masterpiece from the 5th to 10th century AD.
The afternoon was more spirited, we used a tricycle powered by a skinny guy while we were sitting on the back, Jacques and I. We went to the edge of the Gange to see some cremations. To get there the road were as crowded as a rock concert but with more noise from all the horns blasting at the same time from all kinds of vehicles.

Crowd in the streets

We could hardly move, but we got there. After spending some time at the cremation scene we move down to the river and took a barge that sailed along the banks at we saw the dawn coming on an ever increasing crowd, as if it was possible.

Cremation area

Day 21: Lumbini, Nepal - Varanasi, (Benares), India

Early in the morning we reached the Indian border with Nepal. After a mere 5 hours wait we were in India.

Waiting at the Nepa;ese-Indian border
It is where the real traffic started. We spent the rest of the day reaching Varanasi, and we checked in our hotel past 11 pm, an hour ago from this post.
The roads were crazy by day time, really dangerous by nightime. Imagine a one & 1/2 lane where coexist your car, cows in every position, pedestrian, ox-carts, huge trucks, other cars, tricycle-taxis and about every imaginable means of transportation. By night time it is a nightmare. The high beam of the trucks blinds you, you do not see anything for few seconds and you know there are human beings very close to you, walking, sleeping (yes, on the road side), or bicycling. We did not kill anyone, and it is not by lack of trying.
We arrived nervously exausted at our hotel and it is why I do no upload any picture tonight, I will try tomorrow, time permits. (PS: Today I am trying but it takes too long to upload, and I have to go so I am uploading only very few pictures )

Day 20: Kathmandu - Lumbini (Nepal)

One day vacation in Kathmandu, and we took the road again to get close to the Indian border. After an almost eventless ride, if I except a 3 hour stop on the road that was blocked for an unknown reason,

JP & Jerome going down the valley

we arrived with enough day time It was the city of Lambini where the Buddha, named Siddharta Gautama, was bornto see the Ashoka pillar. That is a stone column, engraved in sanskript, that was erected on the 3rd century BC by the king Acoka to mark the place where Buddha was born and the only historical evidence of the existance of Buddha. U-Thant, former general secretary of UN, who was Buddist, dedicated a large piece of land where every Buddist country could built a temple in its own style dedicated to its version of the Buddist faith. The result is a very strange mix of styles that looks like a religious Disneyland without the rides. Bizzare!.
However the pillar is real and ther is a certain emotion that grabs you when you are in its presence.
It is too late and I am too tired to include pictures, I will do it a t a later time.

Day 19 Kathmandu

Relaxing day, visit of Kathmandu and its surroundings in bus.

The eyes of the Buddha see you wherever you are
What a striking difference from the Kathmandu I have known about 40 years ago. Then the few streets were used by bicycles and the temples were busy with pilgrims and worshipers.
Today it is a city of about 2 millions people, massive traffic jams between cars and motorcycles. The temples are sterile from worshipers but taken over by small boutiques selling fake antiques and souvenirs. We are constantly surrounded by a horde of people trying to sell us anything, it is painful. The monuments kept their majesty but lost their souls. Monuments in Patan
This is not the mythic Kathmandu, it is a busy metropolis with some tourist sights.

Day 18: Zhangmu- Kathmandu

That day was simple, passing the border between China and Nepal.
It took us 6 hours. Passing the border itself was simple, Chinese immigration impecable with officers in white glove. However they were searching all our baggages only to see if we had images or articles concerning the Dailey Lama. If they had found one, they could have traced it back to the person who would have given it to us and then... Happily no problem, but when you have a total of 20 cars, it takes time.
Then we entered the Nepal side, no custom, immigration without problem, but the road was very narrow and there was many trucks. Hence the delays.
Eventualy we moved on and 50 km from the city we were awaited by a Gurka's detachment (Toughest regiment of the Army) who opened the road for us and got us to the hotel. Thank you, thank you. It was madness, we only hit 2 motorcycles on the way. Other from the group did better, no one hurt and another scratch to a 2CV is only a mark of pride.

At the hotel, I went to the internet and what I had suspected all the time was right, I could access easily my blog. It was blocked by the censors in China. From then on, time permiting, I will updating it myself and add the pictures that Laureline never received.

Day 17: Shigatse - Zhangmu

We are still in Tibet. We slept in Shigatse, or I should say some slept, not me, at 3600 m altitude, I could not grasp enouh air while dozing off and I was immediately waking up out of breath. The 5 am waking up call was a deliverance.
We left in the dark at 7am for a long day. The first pass was just practice, only 4350 m. The road sides were sprinkled with small villages made of same type one storey houses. People would work on field or attending cattle (Goats or Yaks). Obviously when the animals were not grazing they were crossing the road.
Then suddenly the mountain summits appeared, it was a dream, the Everest was in front of us snow covered, shining against a blue sky, surrounded by several 8000 m plus, mountains.
The Mount Everest from the road 318

It was breathtaking but serious business was still ahead: two passes: the first one at 5020 m, Passing at 5,137 m

The pass at 5,137 meter with prayer-flags"

the next at 5,137 from which we could see again the 8,000m mountain range. It was incredible, that was the good part, the not so good was to descend a vertical drop of 2,600m
The rough beauty of the scenery made us forget the real danger of this descent. The vertical drop from the edge of the road was at least 1000m, the road was narrow. No one had seen such a valley in their life, and it was going down and down, untill everything stoped. The road was narrowed to one lane because of a collapse and we spent a couple of hours waiting.Then it moved again and we reached our hotel located in a frontier-like town build on the slopes of the road just before the Nepalese border. Essentialy money changers and brothels, but it could not spoil our incredible journey through China. These 17 days leave us a memory of scenic beauty, kindness of people and massive infrastructure development. Bye bye China, tomorrow Nepal

Day 16: Lhassa - Shigatse (Xigatse)

I made a mistake on the blog yesterday, the three passes are scheduke for tomorrow.

Today was an eventless drive to Shigatse, the second Tibetan city and the home of the Panchen Lama. As usual we stopped along the road to take picture and to enjoy the scenery

Women beating wheat

We arrived early and had enough time to visit the Tashilumpo, large monastery still very active

The Tashilumpo monastery

It is a city in a city and we spent plenty of time admiring the humongus bronze statue of Boudha and observing the busy schedule of the monks. There are a lot of Chinese tourists and the place is pretty crowded, mix of business and religion, but we were given our silk white scarf with some blessings. We spent some times browsing the Tibetan streets and shops, ther are still some, in spite of the massive Chinese modern city development, and it was a fun evening.

Day 15: Lhassa

Today, no driving, only taxis at $1 the course. Morning, Thibetan market and the holiest temple for the Bhudist. It is where the pilgrims end their walking journey that may take up to two years.

Large prayer mill

The market, otherwise the old city, is constently patrolled by the army, there are snippers on roofs, it is an eerie atmosphere of a peace time country while controlled by its own occupation army. It is strickly forbidden to take a picture of army personal, the trouble, they are everywhere, so we have to be very prudent.
Small prayer mill
Afternoon visit of the Potala (one of the "World Heritage" site), and home of the exiled Dalai Lama. I thought the palace was empty. Not so, it is one of the most beautiful place I have ever visited. The richess are stunning, gold Budha's, precious stones, paintings etc.. etc.. Visit authorisations are sparsely given and it may not exceed an hour. No picture allowed, so I am not sure of the foccusing quality of the hundred I took from the hip.

The Potala
At night we went back to the Potala to see it lighted. It was magic again, only that sight was worth the trip. From now on everything is bonus.
The Potala at night

Meanwhile our car was getting a face lift. Its frame had been twisted and need to be straighten up and reinforced . The brakes needed a major rework together with other minor repairs. By noon it was done and ready for tomorrow, one of the hardest day in the Himalaya chain with 3 high altitude passes.

Part 10

Day 14: Bayizhen – Lhassa

This is the last day before reaching Lhassa one of the highlight of our trip and my personal objective.
Everyone is in good health and has a high spirit. The cars are no so fresh, they have several ailments quickly cured with a hammer and duck tape.
One of the trailers has lost a wheel and its axle. It has 3 left, that will do.

The highest pass
Today was mostly a big climb, but what a climb, to 5,018 m. We reached it to be welcomes by the usual multitude of prayer-flags. Time to take few more pictures and we plunged down to the valley, the last one before Lhassa. At first there was some tents of nomadic tribes and their yaks, then slowly it started to be covered by golden wheat

A typical Tibetan farm
Suddenly the Potala appeared gleaming in the sun, our goal had been reached.
Tommorow is driving day off. We will visit the city while the mexhanics will try to fix the cars, our has lost most of its brakes, its acceleration and its lights, however we managed to recovered the hood that flew in the windshield after a deep hole encounter and fixed it ourself with our suitcases straps.


Day 13 Baxoi – Bayizhen

Usual wake up at 7 am, departure around 9 am after breakfast and minor (sometimes major) car repairs. They take a heavy toll of the holes and on the stones, which sometimes are the only choices short of hitting a truch or goind down in the river.
Along the road we started seeing a lot of pilgrims going to Lhassa on feet. They walk 4 steps, they raise their hands and they lay down on their face arms streched in front of them.. All of that, of course, on the road.

Pilgrims going to Lhassa, only 800 km left to go

So on top of trying to avoid the stones, the holes, the pigs, the cows, the donkeys, the dogs, the kids, now we have to watch for pilgrims.

Getting yaks to better pastures
The road was however much better today, except for a one lane bridge to be crossed one car at a time under the scrutiny of the Army, even the climb was seamless. The passes are always stunning, with thousands of multicolor prayer-flags floating in the wind.

Reaching a pass, prayer-flags

In fact these praying-flags may be found on any landmarks such as bridges, mounts, passes, steep turns and they always grace an already spectacular scenery.
While we are being controled relatively often by the police (or the Army, it is not clear), we are let go very quickly because there is no means of communication and they do not know how to handle us with our French car license plates.


Day 12 : Markan – Baxoi

In spite of sleeping at an altitude of 3,600 m everyone seems to have had a good night. The road to Baxoi were hard on people and on cars, it seems that all China is being built up or being repared. In Tibet, the Army is building the roads, everywhere at the same time. So some sections are pretty much completed and some other are hardly starting.

Jacques checking the car in the morning in front of the hotel
To reach the pass we had to go through pastures because the official road was blocked by trucks. Several times, I had to exit the 2CV to lighten it and to push it, that was the necessary edge to keep us moving. Obviously pushing a car at an altitude over 4,000m is a serious exercise. Nevertheless we reached the pass at 5,008 m. Very few roads in the world stand at that altitude, one in Chile and some in the Himalaya. Few cars and even fewer 2CV have ever been able to do it.
The way down was simple, you just let go in the hope you brakes are not completely gone. The scenery is breathtaking with deep ravines and torrents at the bottom, the feeling is a mixture of pure admiration and sheer terror. One more pass at only 4,644m and we were in Baxoi in a rather spartan accomodation but happy to find a bed.