Omkareshwar

An early start to catch the bus to Omkareshwar.  We walked up to the main road and the bus came along.  This bus would take us to Barwaha where we would need to change bus.

The journey took us through many little villages and towns, taking over an hour, as it stopped to pick up many passengers.  We were dropped at the junction in Barwaha and tried to locate a bus.   We were told there was no bus, just shared autos.  We jumped in one and this took us the 10km to Omkareshwar.

As we arrived we saw many, many tour buses ... this important town in Hinduisim is going to be busy!!  It is one of the 12  jyotirlingas of Shiva and many pilgrims come here every day.   We grabbed some poha and a chai before walking towards the town. 

It is a pretty town set on the banks of the sacred Narmada River.   The main jyotirlinga is on an island in the river, accessed via a bridge.  We headed to the first bridge and came to a pretty pink Shiva temple.  Christine went to have a look and was invited into the temple itself.  She sat with a lady who was cleaning the shivling (the stand which holds the sacred stone).  Christine went to get Darryl so he could also join in.  We were invited to join the cleaning, using fresh lemons.  Once cleaned the lady performed her pooja.

As we crossed the bridge we could see all the boats taking people on river trips.  Over the other side there was an enormous 'Statue of Oneness' up on the hill next to a smaller statue of Shiva.  Below this the Omkareshwar Jyotirlinga.  

Over the bridge we could see the huge queue forming to enter the temple.. We joined the queue and waited .... and waited.. We moved a little way, but not far.  We saw many people passing in the 'out lane' and we discovered you could 'pay' to jump the queue!  This seemed rather wrong in such a divine place.  When people started to be squeezed in the queue directly in front of us others in the queue became angry.  Darryl decided to go and see exactly what was happening.  It turned out the temple closes for an hour ... around the time we joined the queue.

Darryl came back and got Christine to see if there was anyway we could just go in to see the temple, as we did not need to go for a blessing. At first the policeman said no and someone in the queue told us if we gave him some money he would let us through.  We did not give him any money and eventually he let us through.  The next part of the temple was complete chaos.  People we pushing and shouting and it was all a little crazy.  We were eventually ushered into the temple and got a small glimpse of the sacred stone.

Getting out was harder than getting in. At the exit, the people on the other side were literally crushing each other in order to get into the main queue and blocking the way out.  The man in front of us had his wife in a wheelchair which must have been awful for her. After a lot of jostling we were eventually out and back in the bridge ... phew! 

We walked through town and had a chai and some sweet lassi.  We then headed back to the bus stand and had some lunch at the same place we had had breakfast.

We enquired about getting the bus back but were told the only bau to Maheshwar did not leave for another 1.5 hours.  We spoke to an auto driver who, as usual, offered a rather inflated price.

We decided to start walking along the road and try to flag down a shared auto, as we did on the way.  We hadn't walked far when a man stopped and asked where we were going.  He was not going to Maheshwar but but said he could drop us at the junction where we could catch a passing bus.

A little way along the road and having chatted with Google translate we stopped for a coffee.  At the coffee stand there were 2 other men who spoke English and came to join us.  They were going to an ashram in the jungle and wanted to take us with them.  We were a little uncertain at first but eventually agreed to go.

We drove through a huge area of trees, passing an army camp and lots of monkeys.  This ashram  is one of the places the pilgrims stop for the night.  We were shown around the ashram and offered tea.

The 2 men then insisted on driving us all the way back to Maheshwar, even though this meant a 120km round journey for them.  We had lots of conversation in the way about religion, nature etc.

When we arrived back we all went for a walk down by the fort before we bade farewell and headed back to our accommodation