Silver Oaks Mountain Resort Palampur

... and generous owner. We also leanered a good bit about Cricket! Tea plants (trees actually) can gro to be very old. New plants don not deliver good tea from 5 years. Workers trim the new soft leaves to harvest the tea. Processing is done in Cooperative plants.

We then visited the Lobringka Institute. The Institute was built in 1985. This center's sole purpose is to ...

After a relatively tiring two months negotiating the thrills and spills of "real India" we were thoroughly looking forward to escaping the heat and the hassle in the Himalayas. Our first mountainous destination was McLeod Ganj - home of the exiled Dalai Lama and thousands of other Tibetan refugees who have been persecuted and forced out of their country by the Chinese Government. The journey into the mountains from Amritsar involved our ...

We just arrived in Mcleod Gange yesterday evening (it's where the Deli Lhama lives, above Dharamsala) we just found out that it's his birthday on the 6th (Sunday) so he should be coming to town to do talks and there'll be big celebrations and all sorts! The mountains are absolutely beautiful, out of out hotel windows we look into a ...

... CA), more National Parks (Yellowstone, Mesa Verde, Grand Canyon, Yosemite and Redwoods) and, of course, a few concerts (Phil and Friends, OAR, Stevie Wonder, Van Morrison...so far). If the price of gas doesn't drain our account, we may continue on to Central and South America but time will tell. We will continue to update the blog with our excursions back home and will get pics up from this last part of India in the next week. Hope to see you all this summer!

For the past 3 weeks I have been based in a small town called Palampur, Himachal Pradesh, doing voluntary work with an organisation called http://www.idex.in/. I signed up for a manual labour project (the other option was teaching - not my idea of fun!). There was a group of nine of us and our assignment was to paint two classrooms in a local government primary school. This comprised two stages - firstly whitewashing the ...

This was the last week of voluntary work. I sort of slacked off a bit because I knew I was leaving and I was thinking about the leaving party that we were going to have, which isn't a good thing! I made a birthday chart this week which, again, took ages! also the three of us working at the day care centre went in one afternoon to paint the wall. The aim was to make the wall smooth so it could be ...

... s Liberation Army marched into Lhasa to liberate the Tibetan people of their land and their culture. Since then, there has been reportedly 1.2 million Tibetans killed, and 90% of Tibet's cultural heritage has been destroyed-greatly disputed by China. More than 250'00 Tibetan refugees have left their home, over the Himalaya to seek sanctuary in India, as the 14th Dalai Lama was granted asylum in Dharamsala in 1959. So we ...

... we were greeted by the previous volunteers and we had a meeting about camp rules etc. Then we had a bit of time to relax, and after lunch we were taken into town to have a look around. After we got back we just chilled out and rested for the rest of the day. We were exhausted from all the traveling. The next day we went to visit the different work areas. All the kids were so cute, and no one could decide where they ...

One of the most significant things about my time in Mcleodganj was the growth in my knowledge of Tibet and its history. While knowing a bit before arriving, I learned much more during this time. Adding a personal element was the friendships and chance meetings I had with various Tibetans, hearing their stories about their homeland and how and when they left. Tibet has once again been catapulted into the headlines recently, with the various protests over the Olympic torch relay ...

... my back is out" position that seemed to work. The first thing I noticed about the Dalai Lama was his voice. He had a strong, gentle, and intelligent voice. It was an impressive voice, like that of a president, pope, freedom fighter and diplomat all at once (which I suppose he is depending on your opinion). This was the voice of a man who had recently won the Nobel Peace Prize, for his "Middle Way" approach to Tibet's troubles. A way that advocated non-violence and dialogue as ...