Rishikesh and haridwar

  Rishikesh, India
Saturday, June 30, 2007

rishikesh hotel view

Ohhh man, best weekend trip ever!! Me and Jaimini went by ourselves to Rishikesh and Haridwar this weekend. First, we had to find a way to get to Rishikesh, and a lot of other groups were taking taxis to the city, so we talked to the guy and asked him how much it would be for the cab ride, and they told us it would be 1200 rupees each way, which was a ridiculously hiked up price, so we were really pissed and we called our director to see if he could somehow arrange something, but the guy wouldn't budge so we just decided to just do it since we really wanted to go see the two cities.

rishikesh

   
    The taxi ride was awesome because it was just me and Jaimini so we had tons of room to stretch out and no annoying people to bug us during the ride. We stopped for some chai on the way (best chai we had the whole trip- really milky and spicy) and the drive was beautiful. Our driver told us that the forest we were driving through was known to be dangerous because tigers could attack at night and elephants could knock over trees or just walk in the middle of the road. We didn't see anything though...just a few monkeys. But dude the ride was amazing.
So we checked into the Bandari Swiss Cottage at Rishikesh and the first thing we did was drop our bags and go up to the roof and see the view.

night hotel view at rishikesh

OH MY GOD, so amazing!! We were astounded and were like ok definitely just sitting up here and chilling. So we saw the sun setting and it was just beautiful seeing the huge mountains with the Ganga (Ganges River) flowing through dotted with the lights of temples and hotels, and in the background we could hear the faint sounds of the songs at the temples, but of course the sound was also interspersed with the traffic and honking on the street nearby. But, even with the road sounds, it was sooo cool. Then, coolest part, we got to see the moon rise, my first ever.

moon rise at rishikesh

The moon itself was beautiful and huge and bright, but then add to that the huge mountains it's rising above and the stars in the sky, oh man amazing. So, we sat there for like three hours, ate some dinner, then went to sleep.

jaimini at rishikesh

    We set the alarm for 4:30 AM so we could see the sunrise, but it went off and we both just looked at each other and said uhh no and went back to sleep. When we woke up for real, it was around 9:30 and Jaimini really wanted to take a shower, but there wasn't any soap, so we just went out in our American clothes to get some soap. So we start walking and quickly realize there's no place nearby that sells soap, so we caught a rickshaw and Jaimini told him to go to the bridge figuring we'd see a store on the way. We see a store and we're like dude stop and he wouldn't cuz his fare would be lower, so we ended up going to the bridge in our American clothes and having tons of people staring at us. We got some soap and went to a little bakery for some breakfast. So cool, it was like right on top of the Ganga and next to the bridge. Then, we figured we'd go back, but none of the rickshaws would go the way we wanted to go so we just started walking back waiting for a rickshaw to pass. So we were walking and saw a Hindu temple and Jaimini was like dude let's go in, so we did.
    We ended up staying there for three hours. We saw the mundir, then saw a ghat going down to the river, so we went down and just chilled there next to the river for like three hours. It was so pretty. The river was really cool and clean and there was a breeze blowing(which apparently rarely happens so we were lucky it wasn't burning hot). Jaimini went all the way in after a while, but I just went up to my knees cuz I was wearing these pants that wouldn't dry. It was pretty cool just sitting there relaxing and looking out at the river. After that, we decided that Rishikesh had definitely been a good time, and we were ready to go to Haridwar.

haridwar aarti 2

   We took the bus to Haridwar, which was totally awesome. We got a perfect view of the countryside, it wasn't crowded, and we got to listen to old Hindi music during the ride. And that's not even the best part- it only cost us 20 rupees!! So we finally got to Haridwar, found out it was pretty expensive for hotels so just went to the one that our rickshaw driver took us to. 500 rupees for the night, and it wasn't even in a really good location. So, we were kinda bummed cuz the hotel in Rishikesh had only been 250 and we had an AMAZING view. But, eh, we just needed a place to sleep, so we checked in (after this whole hassle with the guy because we didn't have our passports and he wouldn't let us stay, but we called our director and he worked everything out, thank god!) and went straight out to the river to see the aarti prayer that happened everyday at sunset. That was pretty intense man. We sat there for about an hour in a crowd of a bunch of people, and we were sweaty and there were lots of flies, but it finally started and it was fine. It was kind of weird for me cuz I didn't really know what was going on, but it was still cool seeing all the people that were there.

haridwar aarti

    After, people had these little offerings that float on the river and we got to move up and put our feet in the river. It was pretty chill, there were a lot of people just relaxing and having a good time taking a bath in the river. But, there were some crazy old ladies. This one lady was splashing herself so vigorously that another younger lady went up to her and was like little slower please haha I had to turn so she wouldn't see me laughing right in her face. Yeah, so pretty chill, but definitely waay more crowded than Rishikesh.

ganga at haridwar

    The next day we went back to the river and chilled by the river for like an hour, but it was really really hot and there were so many more people around. Plus, Jaimini accidentally dropped her camera in the river and it wasn't working so that totally sucked. We definitely liked Rishikesh better than Haridwar, but it was still cool to see how many people were there and everything that went on. It was also better cuz we were both wearing Indian clothes so people didn't really hassle us that much and we could just walk around in the middle of everyone and experience what everything was like.
    Over all, a pretty awesome two days. The next day Jaimini took her camera out and it was working perfectly fine. Guess it got blessed in the Ganga haha ....we were kinda relieved to be back to the calm of Musoorie after Haridwar but Rishikesh was definitely worth everything.