For the most part the bus to Pushkar, being only 4 hours, was a non-event in comparison to my other travels within India...except for one minor detail: about halfway through the ride I got tired of reading and reached into my bag to pull out my iPod only to immediately realize that I had left the iPod on my bed next to my pillow! Needless to say a bit of hyperventilating ensued but I eventually resolved that it was likely gone but just in case I would call the hotel when we got to Pushkar. As soon as we checked in to our rooms at the Paramount Palace I called back to the Paradise Inn in Jaipur and much to my surprise they told me that they did have my iPod and would hold it for me until I arrived to pick it up the next day. I let things go and tried to relax and we passed the night on the rooftop restaurant with a great Indian buffet dinner and listening to a local white Hare Krishna sing several seemingly different sounding songs whose lyrics were all the same.
The next morning I got up early and made it to the bus station just in time to catch the 9am bus to Jaipur. I spent 3 1/2 hours heading back to Jaipur, had the most harrowing rickshaw ride of my life (largely in oncoming traffic) as I hurried to the hotel grabbed my iPod (which was not quite as I'd left it, since someone decided to try and peel off the 'invisible shield' I had on it), and then braved more oncoming traffic back to the bus station, arriving just in time to catch the 1pm bus back to Pushkar. It was a long day and I was glad to have my music back, even if it was a little worse for wear, and then 7 hours on the bus did give me some good time to read most of my book, 'Middlesex'.
The following day I started my Pushkar visit proper. At 5:30am Jeff and Kerri knocked on my door and we rode on rented scooters to a small hill at the edge of town where we watched the sunrise, which too much longer than expected. After breakfast we spent a lot of the day cruising around on the scooters, narrowly avoiding people, cows, and giant, laden trucks headed straight for us. Having spent so much time in the crazy traffic in the back of a rickshaw it was fun to finally have some level of control in the melee; kind of like you always wanted to drive as a kid, with no rules and of course no helmet. We also came upon a monkey man down by one of the ghats; an older man in a big red turban who was feeding the large gray monkeys bananas from his hands, with the occasional monkey making a sudden lunge at the group of us tourists spectating nearby. Kerri and Jeff pressed on to Udaipur that night and I decided to hang on in Pushkar one more day.
Photos: Pushkar
The next morning I got up early and made it to the bus station just in time to catch the 9am bus to Jaipur. I spent 3 1/2 hours heading back to Jaipur, had the most harrowing rickshaw ride of my life (largely in oncoming traffic) as I hurried to the hotel grabbed my iPod (which was not quite as I'd left it, since someone decided to try and peel off the 'invisible shield' I had on it), and then braved more oncoming traffic back to the bus station, arriving just in time to catch the 1pm bus back to Pushkar. It was a long day and I was glad to have my music back, even if it was a little worse for wear, and then 7 hours on the bus did give me some good time to read most of my book, 'Middlesex'.
The following day I started my Pushkar visit proper. At 5:30am Jeff and Kerri knocked on my door and we rode on rented scooters to a small hill at the edge of town where we watched the sunrise, which too much longer than expected. After breakfast we spent a lot of the day cruising around on the scooters, narrowly avoiding people, cows, and giant, laden trucks headed straight for us. Having spent so much time in the crazy traffic in the back of a rickshaw it was fun to finally have some level of control in the melee; kind of like you always wanted to drive as a kid, with no rules and of course no helmet. We also came upon a monkey man down by one of the ghats; an older man in a big red turban who was feeding the large gray monkeys bananas from his hands, with the occasional monkey making a sudden lunge at the group of us tourists spectating nearby. Kerri and Jeff pressed on to Udaipur that night and I decided to hang on in Pushkar one more day.
Photos: Pushkar
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