Steven Raucher's World Tour

2001-02-03 in Hampi, India
Walking the Ruins in Hampi

So finally we decided hit the road. The first day felt like going back to school. Lesson One: never try to play chicken with a suicidal bus driver who believes in re-incarnation

While Robert decided that 6 weeks in Goa was not enough, Reut and I headed for the tranquil boulder-scape of the ruins of Hampi. it is funny how the guidebooks only mention the ruins and forget the mosquito infestations and perilous pot-holed roads - a better description would be offroad highways punctuated by the odd bit of tarmac. apparently I took the wrong route from Goa to Hampi, for anyone planning to do the same I strongly suggest travelling south to Karwar before going east to Hampi. This road is 160 kms of pure blacktop! What was it doing in India?

We got to Hampi the following day after an overnight stopover in Hubli, a bustling town with nothing of interest. Hampi proved to be as spectacular as the Guidebook promised. The landscape is strewn with boulders that looked like the remnants of some giants' game of marbles. There is something for everyone in Hampi: temples; rivers; mosquitoes (the most I have seen in India) and the best schnitzel I have tasted in two years! (The Goan Corner cafe on the opposite side of the River). The only way to cross this river is by coracle, a small basket of a boat that the boatmen manage to squeeze twenty tourists into (see picture of two coracles at sunset). Sunsets, is something that this scenery complements very well and people make quite a big deal of them (see pictures of The Sunset Baba and the Sunset Guru).

Not much more to report on Hampi, except that there is an overwhelming lack of energy in this neck of the woods. Maybe it is something they put in the tobacco?

We knew it was time to leave when 12:30 AM a drunken local tried to climb into our window. When I turned the light on we found a huge mouse in the room. So much for making the tourists feel welcome! There was one not so funny inicident as we were trying to escape the clutches of the gurus, babas, chay sellers and Israeli backpackers (have I mentioned these - they are everywhere!). I went to the nearest major town, Hospet, where in the process of putting air in my tyres the nozzle shot off the air hose and broke one of my spokes. This was of course remedied almost instantly with the help of a Hero Honda mechanic and his trusty set of Indian spokes. We hit the Karwar road as mentioned earlier and headed for Om Beach!

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the river crossing at sunset

The main temple in town

A Baba enjoying the sunset

Oh God! Another westerner trying to find himself!

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