It's Friday 13th!
..........which although I'm not at all superstitious, is good enough to take a day off the saddle. Yet I feel guilty, like I'm bunking off school, or having a duvet day. I need to work through this.
I haven't been sleeping well since I left home for a variety of reasons. Last night was different, a quiet, cool room, comfy bed and I was out like a light. I'd like to experience that again tonight just to fully recharge my batteries.
Let's do some online planning. I want to be in Mumbai by 10 April to have a look round and prepare the bike for the flight home. That's 28 days away.
Tomorrow (14th) is a short ride to Agumbe from where, apparently, from Sunset Point at 2100ft, I can watch as the sun sinks into the Arabian Sea. Wiki says 'Naxal communists are active in Agumbe and surrounds'. Ok, I'll bear that in mind.
From there I'm going to push for Hospet (Hampi) to arrive 17th. I'll ignore the temperatures. It will be a dry heat won't it?
Leave Hampi 20th heading for Goa (Panjib) (arrive 25th)
Leave Panjib (27th) heading north up coast 700k (give tent an airing on the beaches maybe) to Mumbai.
That's it with a bit of contingency, so in the end nothing north of Mumbai this year. I'm happy with that.
It's my day off, so as appears to be the norm on my day off I'm sat alone in the hotel lobby wifi zone with being observed by the staff. After a while a woman, I' m not sure what her role is in the hotel, wants to be photographed with me. "Why?" I asked, fearing it might be some impromptu wedding ceremony. I never did get an answer. I suspect that because I'm always tapping away on the keyboard, they think I might be a famous travel writer. Ha!
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| This young lady brings a tray and offers it to me. What is it? It has bananas chopped up and some dried fruits, crystalised sugar and raisins and some red stuff on a banana leaf which I assume to be cinnamon. Is this a kind of afternoon tea? I signify my confusion and she indicates that I should eat banana, then she puts some of the 'sweetmeat' into the palm of my hand and dabs a red spot of dye above my nose. I feel blessed.......that's India! |
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| Feeding the carp in the temple grounds |
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| Dressed in her Temple best. |
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| Where's Wally (the painter) |
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| Most of the houses in Sringeri High St were the original mud-walled construction, this one using granite supports exactly like our overhead vine supports in Portugal |
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| I'm travelling through small-town India........narrow pot-holed roads, umpteen little temples, old traditional houses with clay-tiled or shingled roofs, or new garishly painted ones. It doesn't fairly represent the whole of India, but probably 75%.
I'm not attracted to the shiny glass and steel of say, Bangalore where all they want to know is what business your in. Not at all.
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