The Grand Tour
A late start today. We tucked into an Indian breakfast before leaving for our "self made' city tour.
The Ahmedabad metro was our first stop. It was new, air conditioned and quick, with no traffic jams or beeping horns. We arrived at our stop and used our tokens to exit. This wasn't as easy as it sounds. You had to scan the token and then drop it down a slot before the slot closed up again. It took multiple attempts to get it right but eventually the gate opened!
The metro is not underground but high in the air. We exited the station and were greeted by a cheeky monkey sitting on a motorbike. Next, a large bison with enormous horns walked past pulling a fruit cart. We were stopped by a security guard, who wanted us to try the food in the small shop. We were given a variety of different dishes to try. We thought the patra was the most delicious, so purchased some to accompany our picnic, provided by our friend. Baba tea served up a tea break outside the shop. Outside the shop a man has rigged his bike up with a sharpening stone and was sharpening the knifes for the food shop.
Having followed Maps.me and ended up down a few dead end roads and crossed a large bridge, we eventually arrived at our first destination - Kankaria Lake - only to find that it is closed on a Monday!! We found a spot outside the lake and ate our picnic lunch whilst a man hung up his freshly washed clothes to dry.
We continued towards our next stop but a railway track proved difficult to cross, forcing us to walk along a major dual carriage way in the road. This is of course perfectly normal here in India! We were definitely off the beaten track, as many locals stopped to talk to us. A shop selling dahi caught our attention so we grabbed a pot.
We ended up in a residential area where we saw kite strings being painted. Apparently, this involves adding glass and painting. The glass helps cut the opponents string or so we were told.
Next we came upon a lassi shop selling all different flavours. We settled on the saffron one which was delicious. On to a busy market area inside the old city walls. There were bikes parked on each side of the street and chaos ensued. One auto rickshaw caught a bike on both sides with his bumper and dragged them both along. It was narrow!
There was a lot of beautiful coth for sale at amazing prices .... if only our bags were bigger!! Another pitstop, this time for a kulfi, a traditional Indian ice cream. It may seem like we ate a lot of cold things today ....this is because the temperature hit 36 degrees!!
We came across an old mosque. Darryl went inside and took some pictures. It was very old and the inner courtyard was huge. Other buildings nearby were very ornate, including an old fort. There was a fruit and vegetable market and a lady was selling something we hadn't seen before. It was black with a white inside. She gave us one to try and it turned out to be a kind of chestnut.
We walked back across the river and along the riverbank, which gave us a good respite from the fumes and noisy traffic, so we sat and rested for a while before heading to the extremely busy Law Garden Market. Here they are selling the beautiful dresses for the upcoming 9 day Navrati festival, where the women have a different dress for every day. We then headed for the airconditioned metro and paid the princely sum of 5 rupees (5p) for our journey back.
Dinner was great. We shared 4 different meals with our friends. We tried a Punjabi Thali and Daal Bhati plus 2 chickpea based dishes. Once 'home' we headed to check out the roof terrace which was much cooler than being inside.
