Feb 17: Dawn on the Ganges part 2

I can't help bashing on about this day, but it was just so challenging, exciting, all consuming of the senses.  

We drifted along the river absorbing all the ritual, sights, sounds and aromas.

And when the sun rose everyone was just plain happy.  There was no cheering or anything, it was just a light and happy mood, despite the obvious poverty all around.

The birds are only around for three months of the year and it's another one of the rituals ... Calling out to the birds and feeding them.

Our guide tells us that as a teenager he used to swim across the river regularly at dawn, call and feed the birds, and in those days before pollution became too bad he would share his swim with fresh water Dolphins.

Again the boat dropped us at the hotel, where we picked our way through the locals bathing on the steps and doing their laundry.

The rest of the day was full too. And we loved every moment.  We visited just a few of the thousands of temples in Varanassi.  Yes thousands!  One we queued for 15 minutes in a narrow alleyway, went through a strict police security check, took our shoes off and had them stored and guarded by a police sanctioned shop!  And then, believe it or not, because we are not Hindu, we were not allowed into the temple - we were only allowed to take a 5 second glance through a narrow silver lined archway.

Another very large temple we went to, we were celebrities again - we, as foreigners are a novelty, this time when we were asked to have selfies taken with them, we asked them to return the favor.  This way I should get quite a collection of photos of the locals!!

Our guide wanted to carry on showing us a variety of temples, but we preferred to wander the streets and ghats on our own - much to his consternation! The traffic alone takes some tackling.  I think he was worried we'd get lost if nothing else.  But we insisted and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.

He was even more concerned when we said we would find our way out to dinner that night.  We headed out to a backpackers haunt, excellent, cheap food five stories up on a rooftop on the other side of town.  We neede a torch to pick our way through the unlit laneways dodging cow pats and goodness knows what else underfoot.  But we managed.  The proprietor told us that the guide kept phoning him to make sure we turned up ok!  

What an amazing day, it'll take some beating.  We all love Varanassi.