A Little Walking Tour
We crawled out of bed, did a spot of laundry and ate a whole giant sized papaya!
We decided to walk the 5km journey into the Panchvati area.
On the way we drank masala chai and jaggery chai. We watched the road repairers and the big bosses blessing the area before work commences. We were invited to break a coconut each as our contribution and we were rewarded with Indian sweets. We waved at people in their houses, we visited a mini bakery making pav, pav and more pav. We were treated to a biscuit to try. Very nice.
We watched Hindu deity statues being moulded and carefully finished off.
We visited lots of old temples in the area and a few new ones too. By the river people were washing their clothes and bathing in the ghats. Boys floated past on pieces of rolled up foam - homemade boats. We even saw a temple expansion taking place that had many bricks labelled as though they had been reconstructed or moved. Fishermen sat in lorry inner tubes that were inflated to the max.
On the way back we walked along stainless steel pot street. We ate the local famous dish - missal pav, with onions and a giant papad. We walked along 'cars for sale' road and past hundreds of food stalls.
We arrived at our accomodation just as darkness was on its way.
We rested a while before it was eating time again. Just a few minutes away there are a number of street stalls and small cafes. Some food caught our eye so we tried it. It was pani puri with a twist. We then saw the same man making bel puri so we tried this too. It was also good! The snacks were quite small and we shared them so we were still hungry. Our food hunt lead us to a thali restaurant, where Darryl ate and ate until he couldn't eat anymore. Christine opted for a smaller meal and went for a toasted masala sandwich.
We washed dinner down with jaggery tea and hot milk before our friends arrived. We returned to their apartment and chatted about their early retirement plan involving trading foreign exchange and gold. They explained their strategy and we were impressed!
Now it was time for all of us to sleep Zzzzz.