Mapple The River Crescent Resort, Manali

... although at present it is supposed to be illegal and travellers apparently get stung for bribes when caught with it.<br><br>We wandered around town and played with giant white, hairy rabbits which for the record had nothing to do with the charas.<br><br>Manali itself is popular with Indian holidaymakers and there's lots of adventure activities on offer like zorbing and even yak skiing? but we were more into the survival sport of shopping for clothing to keep us ...

... stretched his back out, and fed him sweets (he also fed me, so i wasn't too jealous...). <br><br>So far, our days have been really relaxing and lazy up here. We've been reading books like crazy and catching up on our sleep. There are lots of good little restaurants up here, and it's been nice to consider a 3 dollar meal "pricey". The last few days we went hiking around, and also went up to Rohtang Pass. We took a bus up to the Pass, and along the way ...

... no big deal to take your chances with the mountains or with the Chinese who would surely throw them in jail indefinitely. I asked them why they left and two young men who were brothers said that they wanted to meet the Dalai Lama, the monk said he wanted to study philosophy. Again, I was shocked, I was all ready to hear horror stories of Chinese oppression and instead heard something very different.<br><br>We were so engrossed in our conversation that we seemed to ...

... more bombs had gone off. Now we were all really frightened. We called all of our friends who had stayed in Delhi over the weekend to make sure that they were safe. All of them had thankfully made it back to their apartments safely. We all decided that we didn't want to go back to Delhi the next day, and would cancel out bus tickets in the morning. The next morning I woke up at 7 and was very restless. I decided to go for a walk to try to find a ...

... at last and it's like putting on a pair of old shoes. There is more to be experienced here tomorrow - walking, rafting and maybe even ZORBING before heading on again. Can't wait! PS - special mention to my peeps at or heading to Glastonbury for the festival this weekend. Depite all my conjecture about travelling, there really is only one place to be on the planet this weekend and that is the Vale of Avalon. ENJOY you lucky people, hope JZ rocks the joint! Peace out.

... at leisure..manali i thought was only about snow and rohtang ..but it has a very interesting mythological background integrated with all the peaks and the temples down in manali...it is all beauty by itself..totally a diff.world.little mysterious..some of it mythological..and some adventurous..

... air up high is so thin, so clear, the colors are just amazingly bright! The camera agrees that there is a LOT of light - and so does my bottom lip which keeps trying to fall off from sun/windburn. Does anyone know of a chapstick IV? Then down, down, down. Lest one think this is a joy-ride, let me describe the road types in this 475km stretch of this one and lonely road across the Himalaya: 5% is absolutely horrible. This is usually where "improvements" are in progress ...

... weekend. It took us 6 hours to get there with 11 of us in a jeep, a rather fun but sometimes unpleasant squeeze. We had to stop twice for me to wee, once behind a haystack, it was so embarassing. Well Amritsar itself is pretty dirty and you can see the pollution when you go to blow your nose - revolting. It seemed much more polluted than Delhi and someone said apparently in Delhi there's a rule about the type of engines which are allowed to lessen the ...

... knowledge of physical sciences and technology, Tibetan Buddhists were advancing the inner workings of the mind (metaphysics) and writing all findings down. (Neurosurgeons now work with the Dali Lama and other Tibetans to understand how thoughts affect the body and mind). Anyway, most of the texts were destroyed by the Chinese. The Tibetans that successfully fled Tibet for McLeod Ganj are in amazingly high spirits. The goal of Tibetans is to get their country back ...

... his head - a definite shake. "Um, do you have chai?" An abrupt "No" and a shake followed. "Ok, what do - right, cup of coffee?" "Wit milk?" "Yes please, two." "Two milk coffee," he repeated briskly and walked away. What else would they be serving? We ate a quick lunch there in a setting that, without sound, could pass as a backroom in Sicily. There were no menus, so when the waiter returned with the milk coffees we ...