Such a big day yesterday. We didn’t get down here until 11pm and we then had to eat our dinner, get our room keys etc and get sorted. It was well after midnight before I at least got any sleep. Now its up and on the road again.
For all of that yesterday was brilliant. It was a sightseeing day of Mumbai. Now I didn’t think for a minute that we’d be able to get any idea of Mumbai driving around in a bus all day but in fact we did. At least enough to know it is a brilliant city and one that I would really like to return to and spend some solid time in. It helped having a fabulous guide for the day.
We saw amazing colonial era buildings such as Victoria Station, the High Courts and many others, we saw Chowpatty Beach and drove down the Marine Drive walked around the Gateway to India and the magnificent Taj Hotel next to it (subject of a horrible terrorist attack), we watched the Indians out in force playing cricket in what looks like a 24/7 activity…all in their whites. We went to the Dhobi Ghat which is this massive area that is an outdoor laundromat where the washing of Mumbai is done, every day over 100 people wash hundreds of kilos of clothes and linen and hang them out to dry. We saw the biggest food moving operation of all time where Indians on bikes, on foot and on trains pick up the lunches of the office workers, bring them to a central point to reorganise the lunch boxes according to their destinations and then deliver them to the workplace…amazing.
We had lunch and then went briefly to the Afghan Church (dedicated to the 4,500 Indians the British sent into Afghanistan in 1819 and all but 1 died) and to the hanging gardens which are nice but birds of prey circle overhead because the Parsi’s lay out their dead next door in a forested area and the birds come and pick the bones.
Then it was to the airport. We had to say goodbye to Hassan then, that was very sad, we had become very dedicated to him and we were all sorry to see him depart. On the plane and down here to Kerala to meet a new guide, Aji, who seems OK but we haven’t really got to know him at all.
Sally has a cold again and is miserable…not much to be said about that. Off now for a day exploring Kochi which I’m looking forward to.