We are both wimps. Given the option between a local bus and a taxi we decided the taxi would be better. Although it did have air conditioning, and cut the journey from 6 hours to a gentle 3. We set out for Hampi first thing, and persuaded the driver to stop for breakfast after about an hour.
The taxi driver selected a venue, which was a small restaurant on the edge of the town. The men sat with their iddly and glasses of chai reading the morning papers. There was not a woman in sight. The papers were soon ignored, and there developed an intense competition of who could stare at the slightly strange foreigners the most. The winner of this was definitely the man who began at his table, walked outside to stare through the window for ten minutes before returning to a different table to continue looking at us from a different angle. Iddlys are absolutely delicious, they are spongy rice cakes and are served with vegetable curry and a thick coconut chutney. These ones were particularly good- three meals with chai came to £1.30.
We hopped back into the taxi and headed for Hampi. The dusty agricultural plains slowly transformed to mountains of red boulders that rose out of the emerald banana plantations. Scatterings of ruins began to appear by the side of the road, and then we reached Hampi Bazaar and found where most of the hippies had been hiding since the sixties.
One of our first jobs was to register at the local police station, and assure them we weren't going to fall into hippy ways. We then headed off for a walk around the temples close to town. Edd is getting close to reaching his temple saturation point. This was not helped by a trip to the Hanuman temple, which unsurprisingly given that Hanuman is the monkey God was teaming with many of Edd's favourite animals. We met a very friendly monk who gave us a tour (and assured Edd that the monkeys would not steal his shoes.) He finished the tour by smearing our heads with a stripe of red paint. This is surprisingly sticky stuff, a day later the red stripes survive.
The taxi driver selected a venue, which was a small restaurant on the edge of the town. The men sat with their iddly and glasses of chai reading the morning papers. There was not a woman in sight. The papers were soon ignored, and there developed an intense competition of who could stare at the slightly strange foreigners the most. The winner of this was definitely the man who began at his table, walked outside to stare through the window for ten minutes before returning to a different table to continue looking at us from a different angle. Iddlys are absolutely delicious, they are spongy rice cakes and are served with vegetable curry and a thick coconut chutney. These ones were particularly good- three meals with chai came to £1.30.
We hopped back into the taxi and headed for Hampi. The dusty agricultural plains slowly transformed to mountains of red boulders that rose out of the emerald banana plantations. Scatterings of ruins began to appear by the side of the road, and then we reached Hampi Bazaar and found where most of the hippies had been hiding since the sixties.
One of our first jobs was to register at the local police station, and assure them we weren't going to fall into hippy ways. We then headed off for a walk around the temples close to town. Edd is getting close to reaching his temple saturation point. This was not helped by a trip to the Hanuman temple, which unsurprisingly given that Hanuman is the monkey God was teaming with many of Edd's favourite animals. We met a very friendly monk who gave us a tour (and assured Edd that the monkeys would not steal his shoes.) He finished the tour by smearing our heads with a stripe of red paint. This is surprisingly sticky stuff, a day later the red stripes survive.
The last stop of the evening was surprise surprise another temple. The Virupakshur has an elephant sized added attraction in the shape of Lakshmi- the temple elephant. If you hand her ten rupees she will give you a blessing by laying her trunk on your head. While we were there she was very carefully having a drink from a tap- and not wasting a drop. We met the mahouts brother who explained that her parents are at Mysore palace (there seems a good chance we met them earlier in the trip.) He gave us a tour of the temple, and showed us where and how Lakshmi lives. Her morning begins with a long bath in the river, she then eats leaves for breakfast and lunch, but in the evening they feed her a large bowl of cooked rice. She seemed exceptionally placid and her face was painted with red spots. Apparently the temple used to have 6 elephants, but now there is only Lakshmi.
The day was finished by another couple of games of backgammon. The current score is two games each...
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