Greetings from a very warm and humid Mumbai...city of 16 million souls...some stats for those of you that are interested: No. of public washrooms per million people: 17! No. of people on a Mumbai train designed for 1,700 during rush hour: 8,800 (me thinks that this is low...after all anything is possible in India so why not 20,000 or so? No. of people per sq. km in Mumbai...27,700...you get the picture...lots of people and also the most beautiful buildings we have ever seen. We are in the Fort area called Colaba...made infamous by the book Shantaram and the well coordinated terrorist attack a few years back. Definitely high end tourist as the streets are clean, relatively few horns blaring etc...and for India very expensive (we are holed up in a nice Sally-Ann (salvation army) hostel. These old buildings date back to the 18th century and looking at old photographs, India (and Mumbai) was a paradise before a billion plus people put an end to paradise. The University buildings make anything we have seen in Canada (inc. Victoria/Quebec City, Parliament buildings etc. look like a "1"...they are truly spectacular and make us want for a wide angle lens. So as we are leaving Mumbai we were treated to a classic Indian scene...a ancient bus packed with Indians rolled by with an entire flock of crows perched on its roof...classic! Our travel book says "don't expect much sleep on the bus trip from Mumbai to Goa as it is one of the worst roads in India...truer words have never been spoken as we seemed to have made the trip constantly rolling from one side of the sleeper to the other!
We are heading to various locations in Goa today...but before Mumbai we visited the city of Udiapur (formerly Mewar)
Udiapur...the most romantic city in India! Or so it is known...looks like another BDIC (Big Dirty Indian City) to us, although the lake and clustered busy streets do have a certain charm in the morning and evenings. We spent several days exploring including a fantastic visit to Kumbalgrath Fort...dating back to the 14th century this fort had 36 km of walls and contained over 180 temples...and only a part of the fort has been repaired. The Indians have done a great job here...the fort and its 1044 gun bastions are a sight to see...to think of 36 km of huge walls (over 50 feet tall and 40 feet wide!) all constructed by hand is insane! The drive to here (over 7 hrs total driving time) runs through some of the first untouched jungle land we have seen in India (incredibly rugged...thus no roads, or people) and through small villages where we got a glimpse of an old way of life...oxen driven water pumps made of wood wheels...etc. Our next stop was the Jain temple at Ranakpur often referred to as the most beautiful Jain temple in India. Made entirely of marble the temple has 1400 huge marble columns, all intricately hand carved and none the same, 11 halls (all hand carved) and simply put is the most amazing piece of art that we have ever seen! (The Jain are a sect of Hindu that reject the caste system and do not believe in killing any creature...to the point that many brush the ground in front of them when they walk to prevent killing ants etc.
To visit these temples we took a taxi and it took over 7 hrs of driving on some sketchy roads (that trashed brakes, clutches etc.) and we paid....1400 R or 24 dollars! (this was just the two of us with a driver!) We also checked out the city palace in Udiapur...impressive and best of all there is a World Wildlife Fund office within the palace grounds. We had a good discussion with the supervisor...less than 1500 tigers left in India (and India has 60% of the wild tigers left in the world) and although there was a slight increase in the Indian tiger population this year the general trend is app. 50 tigers dying per year through various causes...poaching being the main one (mandatory 5 year min. jail time for poaching a single tiger) However the biggest species threat in India right now is the vulture population...it has dropped over 90 percent in the last two years due to a drug(diclofenac for arthritis and joint swelling that is used on cattle, which if they die and are eaten by vultures kills them by damaging their kidneys. The government cannot ban the drug as it would mean a major drop in cattle production so it appears that all of the Himalayan vultures (which include the massive Himalayan Griffon and Lamegeyer (impressive birds!!) are pretty much doomed. So much for boring animals eh! We also witnessed the incredible Muslim celebration where huge houses (up to 4 stories tall!) are packed around the narrow streets of Udiapur followed by thousands of Muslims dressed in traditinal head gear. We were warned to keep clear of the streets but ventured down for a few moments and it was pure pandemonium! We quickly retreated to our roof-top viewpoint...absolutely amazing and dangerous! These huge houses are constructed on logs that are carried on the backs of up to 30 people and you can imagine they hang up on all the buildings surrounding the streets. Ahead of each "house float" are people with big bamboo poles beating people out of the way and keeping the streets clear for the human house transport team!
On our trip back from the mountains we also captured a glimpse of true India...a large cow was sharing a dumpster with a pack of dogs..the entire front end of the cow was inside the dumpster where it was helping itself to a smorgasbord of plastic etc. with a pack of dogs!
So our trip to the South continues...Terisa says "look for the hidden India...it is incredible"....we are trying but she is hard to see beyond the piles of garbage, nosie and smoke filled sky!!!!
We are heading to various locations in Goa today...but before Mumbai we visited the city of Udiapur (formerly Mewar)
Udiapur...the most romantic city in India! Or so it is known...looks like another BDIC (Big Dirty Indian City) to us, although the lake and clustered busy streets do have a certain charm in the morning and evenings. We spent several days exploring including a fantastic visit to Kumbalgrath Fort...dating back to the 14th century this fort had 36 km of walls and contained over 180 temples...and only a part of the fort has been repaired. The Indians have done a great job here...the fort and its 1044 gun bastions are a sight to see...to think of 36 km of huge walls (over 50 feet tall and 40 feet wide!) all constructed by hand is insane! The drive to here (over 7 hrs total driving time) runs through some of the first untouched jungle land we have seen in India (incredibly rugged...thus no roads, or people) and through small villages where we got a glimpse of an old way of life...oxen driven water pumps made of wood wheels...etc. Our next stop was the Jain temple at Ranakpur often referred to as the most beautiful Jain temple in India. Made entirely of marble the temple has 1400 huge marble columns, all intricately hand carved and none the same, 11 halls (all hand carved) and simply put is the most amazing piece of art that we have ever seen! (The Jain are a sect of Hindu that reject the caste system and do not believe in killing any creature...to the point that many brush the ground in front of them when they walk to prevent killing ants etc.
To visit these temples we took a taxi and it took over 7 hrs of driving on some sketchy roads (that trashed brakes, clutches etc.) and we paid....1400 R or 24 dollars! (this was just the two of us with a driver!) We also checked out the city palace in Udiapur...impressive and best of all there is a World Wildlife Fund office within the palace grounds. We had a good discussion with the supervisor...less than 1500 tigers left in India (and India has 60% of the wild tigers left in the world) and although there was a slight increase in the Indian tiger population this year the general trend is app. 50 tigers dying per year through various causes...poaching being the main one (mandatory 5 year min. jail time for poaching a single tiger) However the biggest species threat in India right now is the vulture population...it has dropped over 90 percent in the last two years due to a drug(diclofenac for arthritis and joint swelling that is used on cattle, which if they die and are eaten by vultures kills them by damaging their kidneys. The government cannot ban the drug as it would mean a major drop in cattle production so it appears that all of the Himalayan vultures (which include the massive Himalayan Griffon and Lamegeyer (impressive birds!!) are pretty much doomed. So much for boring animals eh! We also witnessed the incredible Muslim celebration where huge houses (up to 4 stories tall!) are packed around the narrow streets of Udiapur followed by thousands of Muslims dressed in traditinal head gear. We were warned to keep clear of the streets but ventured down for a few moments and it was pure pandemonium! We quickly retreated to our roof-top viewpoint...absolutely amazing and dangerous! These huge houses are constructed on logs that are carried on the backs of up to 30 people and you can imagine they hang up on all the buildings surrounding the streets. Ahead of each "house float" are people with big bamboo poles beating people out of the way and keeping the streets clear for the human house transport team!
On our trip back from the mountains we also captured a glimpse of true India...a large cow was sharing a dumpster with a pack of dogs..the entire front end of the cow was inside the dumpster where it was helping itself to a smorgasbord of plastic etc. with a pack of dogs!
So our trip to the South continues...Terisa says "look for the hidden India...it is incredible"....we are trying but she is hard to see beyond the piles of garbage, nosie and smoke filled sky!!!!
