Jaisalmer-Bikaner
Sunday, October 9th, 2005
Ahh…To be connected again!
We went by the fort last evening as the sun set and walked around a bit. The haunting sounds from a folk musician captivated our attention (see photo). He had such a sweet face and the music that he produced from that instrument was so damn good. He was selling a cd of his music, which I eagerly picked up.
Today was an easy ride. Left Jaisalmer by 7 am fueled up, got one last glance at the fort city (see photo) and hit the national highway 15. The highway in Rajasthan is fantastic. Simple 2 lane road with hardly any pot holes and minimum traffic. Needless to say, we lost sight of Dinesh for quite a few stretches. Go Go speedracer!
We stopped after 130 km at a small desert town called Pokhran. There is a lot of military activity around this area. This place got notoriety a few years back for being the site for the nuclear bomb tests, which got the attention of the rest of the world.
So we stopped for breakfast at a modest looking hotel with restaurant. Inside they had quite a large gift shop with lots of local knick knacks and a fairly big selection of books. To my surprise, nestled in between books of Kama Sutra and the royal Indian monarchs and their jewelry was my book, “India Bazaar” .(see photo). Here in Pokhran, middle of rhe thar desert!
Navroze purchase a copy of it and managed to get an author’s discount. It was quite an unexpected little thrill, because we were just talking about the book the night before at dinner.
The ride was cool until about 10 am or so, after that it was very hot, around 38 degrees C. We had another 200 km to go and were determined to just ride on through to Bikaner. We stopped occasionally (see photo) to have some water and carry on. Navroze was lucky to get the shade before I got there. There were some stretches of the highway where we were all going at different speeds and i found myself completely isolated with not a soul in sight and absolutely no traffic ahead or behind. It was quite meditative as many thoughts drift through your mind.
We reached Bikaner city by 2pm and checked in to Basant Vihar Palace hotel. It’s a palace only in name. there seems to be lots of “palace” hotel/ motel??? (see photo)
I finally have wireless connection here and so managed to post my 2 earlier blogs.
Tomorrow we have a long day ahead. We are riding all the way to Amritsar, Punjab about 500 km.
Good Night!!
Technorati Tags: India Bike Trip
