על הוביטים בבני אדם

after spending 37 in Ladakh, it was time to move. I checked my options and choose the 13 hours jeep on real road with asphalt paving to srinagar in Kashmir.

 

I arrived in 6 oclock and snatched by Sagad, the 21 years old son of a house boat owner.

I brought on board and the son and father start a kashmiri hard pressure machine to make me use alot of money.

its concluded by 500 rupees to a sight seeing tour in srinagar, 350 rupees for a 2 hours boat ride in dal lake, 750 rupees for a rickshaw drive to a lake in east kashmir-marazbal lake, that was really nice, and 1000 rupees for a 3 hours ride each way in a rickshaw to pahalgam.

 

when at last I left Srinagar I felt so free,like Im of the prison.

srinagar had many soldiers, and we were on curfew one day and the city was in strike.

good thing about srinagar accept its spacial architecture, is the fact you can have chicken bar B Q in 20 rupees for a stick.

 

after 6 days, I took a jeep to jamu- 10 hours including 2 cool tunnels. we end up there 15 minets before my train to rishikesh left the station.

the night train was very peace full and in late morning I came to this Holli city.

 

the city center is noisy and not so nice to stay in.

the place to be is the village laxman julla, 10 minuets in a rickshaw from the city. its located on the ganges, when its clean, green,and young. 

 

Im staying in a nice quiet geust house on the east bank of the Ganges near a suspension bridge, where monkeys climb the bridge cables, all the day.

I found a yoga place and waking up every day at 6:30 to go to class.

 

about some hikes:

hike 1:

7 KM walk up hill to a small shiva temple called nilkathna. I went there with 2 people I met here: Brendon and juana. the "easy going hike" was steep climb of 4 hours, and the Temple was so small, we missed it completely and only a texi driver had told us we had to go back 10 minuets in order to see it.

 

Hike 2: I took a bus from rishikesh to a small place in the hills (beautiful road on the green hills) and walked for 1 hour to a temple called Kungapuri.it located in a high conical hill, with great views to the snowy Himalaya, the ganges and the plains of haridwar, when the ganges start its long way to the ocean. I had a conversation with several Hindu's who came to visit the temple from far away Bombay (one of them visited Israel).

the way back was breath taking. I walked alone (juana dont want to walk any more after the other day we took her to climb the shiva temple), and the path went down a green valley with rice fields,

climb again beneath small pine apple trees , and descend gently to another valley.

from there, the Ideal had terminated with knee breaking steep descend with millions of little stones that had the desire to throw you away from the cliffs... eventually I end up in a valley that joined the ganges. I walked on nice cement track, and a nice river with a few water falls and pools, stone bridges and rice fields, and 2 cows

 

my initial plan was go to sikkim, but maybe I'll hang out here for a while (nice towns, villages and temples). we'll see.