Rishikesh to Dharamsala (McLoed Ganj)

Rishikesh is located 263 km northeast of Delhi; a quick four-hour train ride. The guidebook describes the town as the point where the "wooded mountains of Garhwal rise abruptly from the low valley floor and the Ganges crashes onto the plains. The centre for all manner of New Age and Hindu activity, its many ashrams – some ascetic, some opulent – continue to draw devotees and follower of all sorts of weird and wonderful gurus, with the large Shivananda Ashram in particular renowned as a yoga centre. Rishikesh is also as adventure sports hub, with rafting, trekking, and mountaineering all on offer. In addition the arrival of the Beatles, who came to meet the Maharishi in 1968, was one of the first manifestations of the lucrative expansion of the yatra pilgrimage to the town." Jimmy and I stayed at the Green View hotel set back a ways from the center of town next to the Niketan Ashram. It was a quite nice place with great views of the mountains as well as the many monkeys that hug outside our window on the surrounding trees. We arrived and were immediately hit with the sense of calm emitting from every nook and cranny. We spent the next four days sleeping, reading, sitting by the river, drinking coffee and ginger lemon honey tea and people watching form Devraj Coffee Corner. Most people were western and looked like they went into one of the local shops and came out with: Baggy pants of all colors, covered with a long flowing tie die skirt, layers of linen tops, Indian bracelets, henna, dreadlocks, galore. I too wanted to partake in this weird fashion experiment but Jimmy looked at me with big eyes and said “really”?! We spent every night doing yoga for two hours at the Omkarananda Gita Sadan yoga studio. Our teacher was great, a mixture of calm relaxation as well as intensive pushing to stay in the postures longer and stretch further. He really liked Jimmy and everyone in the class was impressed with how flexible Jimmy is for not being an avid yogi.

After four days our time was up, way to short, we could have stayed there for a month, but we had a ticket to go to Dharamsala and so we packed our stuff and spent our last night in Riskikesh admiring the exciting Hindu wedding that was taking place right outside our hotel. The party went on way into the night with great music!

We woke up the next morning, had coffee and went to catch a taxi to the train station. We were way early again! But it makes Jimmy more comfortable so… we waited for four hours at a small train station outside Rishikesh, it was not the main station that we arrived at but another smaller one just outside the city. The train was only suppose to stop for two minutes so we did need to be there early to make sure we got on. When the train finally arrived we quickly got on and showed our waitlisted ticket to the attendant he informed us in broken English that no second class cabins were available so we were relegated to the third class cabin, which our guide book said was supposed to be an experience! When we got on I was the only women in the entire car and was stared at for two hours until another woman got on. There was also only one lower bunk available so Jimmy and I were crammed in there together. Our train ride north was ten hours, most of which Jimmy slept but I couldn’t, I watched a movie, listened to music, etc. It was finally 2 am and I woke Jimmy up because we were suppose to arrive a 2:20. However we were not sure which stop would be ours so we went to find the train attendant who was sleeping. We debated if we should wake him up and finally did because we had no idea what to do and where to go. We finally woke him up and he came and opened the door of the train while we were pulling into a station and announced that we weren’t there yet. He then went and sat on our bunk and fell back asleep. A couple more dark stops went by and then we came to Chakki Bank, the train attendant sat up and gave Jimmy and nod as the train was slowing down. Jimmy looked at me and said just jump out. I looked at him and then felt the weight of 35lbs on my back – I am not going to jump I told Jimmy! I thought he was going to push me but the train started to slow and finally came to a stop. We got out and found many taxi’s outside at 3 am. We got one and asked to be taken to Dharamsala, a three-hour drive away. We got in an off we were into the night. Our driver got lost several times, which made me very nervous because the roads were all torn up and we drove through sever shanty towns. Jimmy was fast asleep but I woke him up at several points because I was sure our driver was taking us to the place where he was going to keep us and ask for a hostage ransom or we were about to be hit by a on coming truck! But alas we arrived safely to Dharamsala at 6 am.