Trip to India - Part 7 Ahmedabad and Home

In Ahmedabad we stopped at a very nice stepwell with lots of stone carvings and then visited the mausoleums of some Sufi Saints from the 1400's- 1500's - before the Mughal Empire formed in India. Jim then checked into the House of MG where we had stayed two times in 2010. The place was the home of an industrialist in the colonial era and converted to a nice hotel.  It changed quite a bit since 2010 with the addition of a large wing and courtyard and much more formal lobby and desk than before.  Jim's room was downstairs and quite large with a sitting room next to the bedroom. It was well decorated with textiles.  However, it was a little creepy because there was really only one way out of the room- through the main door. In case of a bad fire or other catastrophe it could be bad, but such events are rare so he did not lose much sleep over it!

The hotel has a pleasant outdoor sitting area that serves fairly simple food from 7AM to 10PM or so and it was a good place to get meals.

On Monday Nov. 20 we visited a used textile dealer. While there Jim realized we had been there in 2010 with Chota. They have 3 floors full of all sorts of textiles from across India and elsewhere. Many are in only fair condition but many are also in very good condition.
We visited two more very nice stepwells including a famous one in or very near the city limit- Adalaj Ki Vav built in 1498.
We also visited the Art Book Center in Ahmedabad- this is a well known shop run by father and Son. We went there both times we were in Ahmedabad in 2010 and bought books mostly on textiles but some on other art topics.
Jonny knows a Kalamkari artist in Ahmedabad so we went to visit his home/studio. Kalamkari is a fairly complex process for decorating textiles and takes a lot of skill to do well. The fellow here learned it from his father who had won a national award. The son has also won an award.  Jim bought two of his works which seemed of high quality.
On Tuesday we visited an enormous antiques warehouse.  It was full of doors  and columns and other carved wood work removed from old homes and palaces.  There were all sorts of glass pieces and wood sculptures too- much coverd with lots of dust.  There were crews of men and women working on sanding and repairing and repainting old wood.   It was fascinating too see but hard to grasp it all. Apparently, some overseas dealers come here to buy containers full of stuff to ship to other parts of the world.  Jonny told of a couple who bought an old place in Goa who put deposits on some old doors that were around 10 feet tall.

Chota left us in the afternoon to catch a train home and Jim went back to the hotel to pack bags and relax. An attempt to sleep was not very productive. Jonny picked him up around 1AM to go to the Ahmedabad Airport.  The security arrangements at some airports seem strange- but it may keep people planning bad things off guard and unprepared but it is also confusing.   But Jim got through.
Jim's original plan was to fly to New Delhi and then home from there- airing home on Thanksgiving Day, but Janet was not feeling well after her trip to Japan and news reports from Delhi about the pollution levels were bad so Jim canceled his flight to Delhi and was able to change his return flight to leave from Ahmedabad instead of New Delhi.  There departure time was similar to from Delhi and the layover on Etihad in Abu Dhabi was a few hours, so the fact that the flight from Ahmedabad was a half hour late or so was no problem.
In Abu Dhabi Jim was able to go through US immigration and customs, which was nice to have done.  The plane to JFK was an Airbus 380 and business class seats on the upper deck were very comfortable!  It was about 14 hour flight to JFK . Jim slept a little and ate only a little and watched some movies and other small entertainments for the long flight.
At JFK the luggage came out fairly fast, but the car to take him home had not yet reached the airport so he had to wait about 20 min. or so.  He had not taken a warm jacket- not needed in India, so he stayed inside as long as possible at JFK.
It was close to rush hour in New York, but we managed to get out of the city before traffic got bad there, buit it was heavy in Westchester county.  Jim was wide awake until it got dark outside- them he got very sleepy and slept awhile in the car. He awoke at one point to see a SUV or pickup truck Completely engulfed in fire on the opposite side of the highway! There were no fire trucks there so it must have happened very fast.  It appeared to be just the one vehicle.
Jim arrived home exhausted from lack of sleep over the past 24+ hours and fell into bed after saying hello to Janet and Ziggy and Zoe!
Because he came home a day or two early he was able enjoy a Thanksgiving dinner with friends despite being in the completely wrong time zone. That was fun but exhausting.
After about 3 weeks of getting up and sleeping at all sorts of times Jim finally felt more or less adjusted to the local time... and climate... but the cold of winter and short days are getting harder to tolerate.   Jim has been working on editing his pictures and picking a few to post and to print. This has taken a long time for two reasons- there are a lot of pictures and the storage on the computer is not enough to have them all on at one time! So, it is being done in stages.  This is why there are no pictures at the time this is being written.
Overall, it was a fabulous trip- the MET group was great to be with- so many bright and interesting people- and the opportunity to travel around Gujarat and see many new places and see lots of wonderful textiles was terrific too. Having such good company and our friend Chota and great guides in Salim and Jonny made it extra special.

A Trip to India- Part 6 - Gujarat Gir, Veraval, Somnath, Palitana, Bhavnagar

(pics to be added)
We arrived at Sasangir early in the evening. The primary purpose of staying here was to see some of the last wild asiatic lions. There are supposed to be around 200 in Gir National Park.  Jim tried to arrange permits through their web site but was unable to do so because it would only accept payment from Indians. Fortunately, Chota was able to may the reservation for the 3 of us and he made this a gift.  We arrived at the registration center and were checked in but then learned that there is an additional fee for use of a vehicle and another for use of a "professional camera" which totaled almost as much as the entry permit which was 4000 INR for 2 Indians and a foreigner.  The vehicle was not old and beat up, so that was good! We drove off on to one of the many rough roads through the park. We sometimes saw people walking and huts with cows and learned that there are tribal people who live in the park areas and very near who farm and raise animals. They say the lions never attack people but do attack cows sometimes.

We drove around awhile and saw many deer- evidently a prime source of food for the lions- and came upon a couple vehicles pulled to one side. They saw a lion lying on the ground  among some trees back from the road and we could get glimpses of it but it was far away. We waited and waited. There was a vehicle and some men on the opposite side of the road - about the same distance away.  Apparently, they were trackers.  After awhile we moved up the road a bit to an area where they had placed a water trough.  There were many of these in the park- probably to help keep the lions in the park in the dry seasons.   We waited and the various drivers said things to a couple of the men we thought were trackers.  After a little while were learned the lion had moved closer to the road so we moved back and got a better view of a sleepy looking lion!  Did the trackers prod the lion to move? We did not see them move toward the lion but we were not tracking the trackers so they might have done so.  In any case we saw an asiatic lion in the wild and could leave satisified with some pictures!
Back at the registration center we heard others say they saw no lions and others say they saw three.
Jim rested in the afternoon at the hotel.
Late in the afternoon Chota and Jonny asked if I wanted to go see a new lodging that belongs to a former royal cousin or friend of Chota.  He accepted and we drove off to see this place. It was fairly easy to see from the road as it is a large hunting lodge on top of a hill. The road in was mostly dirt and it was not obvious where we could park or drive to but we got close and walked.  We met the fairly young owner. The place had been his grandfather's and Father's hunting lodge and the family had owned all the land around it  for a very long time, but most of the land was taken away in the 1970's by Indira Gandhi.  Now they own the bill hill and lodge and road in but mosy of the rest of the land belongs to the Gir Forest.  This meant that there were lions roaming around the grounds!   He said they see lions fairly often and cow was killed by lions two days earlier and they saw a group walk by below the lodge the day before- near where we parked...
He is trying to convert the lodge in to a hotel/guest house and has built a newer building as a guest house as well.  We had tea at the newer place while he spoke and talked to Chota about family matters.  It could be quite a special place but will likely take a large investment to get it to to point of attracting big spending guests.  We walked to the car in the dark- with a guide with a light- aware that lions might be around us.   The owner said he would call us if he learned of lions on the property. On the way back to the Taj hotel we saw a coyote cross the road.

In the morning we drove to Somnath on the coast to see a famous temple and see the shore- it was very pretty but a little boring because Jim did not want to go through to whole process of checking shoes and camera to go in a temple that is very modern. We then drove to a nearby fishing town- Veraval. It was very interesting to see a large fishing fleet unloading their catch. These were nearly all wooden fishing boats of beautiful coloring and we could see where they took the fish and we saw people fixing nets.

Chota remembered that another distant royal cousin is in the fish packing business here so he made a call and we then went to a large packing plant and met a fairly young owner of this large company. He took us on a tour and we saw factory buildings where they processed and froze all sorts of fish and squid.   He said they ship about 175 large containers a year to China, Europe and the USA.  We saw the fish being put into boxes and loaded in to refrigerated containers. It wa svery interesting to see.  He said that they buy fish from the local fisherman, but they also have their own fishing boats which go as far south as Goa. Those boats must have processing and freezing on board as he said they are out for several weeks at a time.  The best fish are usually exported.  He gave several pounds of fish to Chota and Jonny and offered some to Jim  too. Chota and Jonny had some of theirs cooked at their hotel.  Indians generally seem to know smaller inexpensive places to stay or they stay with friends or relatives.
Jonny got a call from one of the caretakers of the hunting lodge saying that a cow had been killed by lions and if we came back he would take us to it- and to see the lions for something like 2000INR. Jim said no.
The next morning was Sat. Nov. 18 and we left at 8AM to drive to Palitana.  There were cotton fields all over the countryside.  We arrived near noon and walked the road to the entrance of the temple complex.  There are many fine buildings along the way to the entrance.  The guide books say that the temples on top of the mountain are very much worth seeing. However, one has to climb about 3600 steps to get up there! ( Jim learned that there is a back way up with ONLY 800 steps- but it is much steeper!)   We climbed the 630 or so steps at Shravanabelgola in the south in 2009 and survived quite nicely but 3600, and 8 years older would be too much, so Jim had decided before the trip not to exhaust his energy or knees attempting this. Another key factor is that photography is not allowed at the temples on top, so this sealed the decision as photography was a main purpose of this trip!
We walked a few streets in the center of town where there are many British era buildings and took pictures.

Jonny said that when he brings other people here who want to climb the mountain he tells them to  stay at the Vijay Villas and start around 6AM. He then picks them up at the bottom of the 800 steps on the other side where they go back to the villas and probably collapse.   We went to the villas and had lunch. This is another former royal home that is now also a hotel and , of course, Chota knew the family, so the owner sat with us for a bit while they spoke about old times and caught up on family matters.
We left and stopped in a smaller city- where we drove up a very narrow road to an old fort. Here again, through the efforts of Jonny and Chota, we got inside. The caretaker took us around. There is an old building still in reasonable shape with lots of old carved teak.  There is some evidence of painting outside but the caretaker said that the Indian Archeological Institute painted over these because they did not want possible vandals to think there might be valuable things elsewhere in the building.   The inside is quite amazing with wall paintings in several rooms that we were allowed to see and photograph.  In one room Chota spent a lot of time- he explained that the story being illustrated -about a royal family from this area sending troops to help support a neighboring family in the 1700's is about his wif'e's ancestor!  Very interesting to learn these connections.

We drove on to Bhavnagar where Jim stayed the night at the Nilambagh Palace- another one that is now a hotel.  We arrived early evening and checked in. This one also has huge rooms but not a lot of charm.  The next morning we walked around a bit in the old town and took pictures of the people and colonial era architecture before heading north.

We drove into the Blackbuck sanctuary - for the somewhat scarce Blackbuck deer- and saw a very nice pond full of a variety of birds and also saw a lot of deer- mostly from a sizable distance. We had seen some of these deer near Jodhpur in Rajasthan in 2010 as well.  We drove on to Ahmedabad.

A Trip to India Part 5 - Gujarat Wankaner, Rajkot, Junagarh

(pics to be added)
Near Wankaner, by some miracle, which are pretty common in India, we spotted our friend Chota and  driver-guide Jonny, standing near Jonny's Toyota Innova amidst a few hundred people and a few dozen other vehicles waiting for us by the side of the busy road.  Jonny had driven from Ahmedabad and picked up Chota along his way to this place by the road.  We had our mobile phones and numbers, so we would have, eventually, found each other, but this was easy.  Jim paid the driver from Bhuj and we then went onward in the Innova.  When we lived in Bangalore we had an Innova with A/C and found it to be a very comfortable vehicle.  Since then Many people in the tourist industry have gotten these spacious and comfortable cars and many tourist companies use them-  as we had on the earlier part of this trip in many places.
A couple of phone calls were made about getting in to see Wankaner Palace and we had not gotten a certain reply so Jonny suggested that we go to an Art Deco Hotel that he knew about in the interim.

He took us there and the caretaker said it was closed as there were no guests booked- the last had left that morning.  Jonny and Chota made some calls and persuaded the caretaker to let us look around. Chota is from one of several royal families in Gujarat and these families generally know eachother  or are distantly related and are one friendly terms, so his connections allowed us to visit several places that we would not have seen easily otherwise. Wankaner Palace and this Art Deco Hotel were two such places.
In the 1920 and 30's the Maharajas had a lot of money and power and influence and often spent some of that on modern buildings, furniture, autos, air planes, etc.   This hotel was built as a guest house- long ago, but apparently, was updated around 1930 with Art Deco furniture and decorations inside. It is really very nice to see so many rooms with consistent styles of decor in such a faraway place from Europe or the USA.  We later saw a number of old buildings with Art Deco style exterior decoration in Palitana and Bhavnagar and wondered what they look like inside.  At this hotel the swimming pool is enclosed and has a strong Art Deco feel to it as well.
We got the word that they were expecting us at the Palace so we drove there. It stands high up on the hill with great views over the area.  It suffered some damage in the 2001 earthquake- especially to one tower.  Were taken inside and allowed to walk around several huge rooms on the main floor that have their original decor with lots of stuffed animal trophies all around from times up into the 1960's.

The Maharaja from here was a minister in the government of Nehru.  It was in the early 1970's when Indira Gandhi, essentially, revoked the agreements that had been made with the many royal families across India and they lost much of their income and property.  There is still much animosity about that.   Our visit to this beautiful mansion ended with them serving us tea on a porch.  On the drive away from the home we saw a mongoose looking for food.
We drove to Rajkot and had lunch at a well known eatery.  The entry way had around 50 people waiting to be seated and served.  Indian lunchs tend to be fairly quick, so it took only around 20 minutes or so for these many people, and us, to be seated. The lunch was a thali where servers came around and gave small quantities of various foods- it was really quite good, but felt hectic with the many people talking , eating, coming and going... a typical Indian scene for middle class Indians.
After lunch we went to the Rajkot Museum which also goes by the name of the British Colonel who collected items and set them up here long ago.  Chota had been there long ago and expected it would only take 15 minutes to tour, but he was very surprised to find that it had been compeletely

reorganized and now has a flow and sense to it rather than just being a collection of odd stuff.  The woman museum director greeted us once she learned of Chota's royal connections and gave a bit of a tour before going back to her duties.  Like in many countries, where royals have no real power, they still have some influence, and are usually treated with extra respect.
The museum was interesting to see but not a high point of this trip.
We drove on to Gondal where Jim stayed the night at the Orchard Palace. This is another former royal guest house that is now a hotel. The room was on the first floor above ground level (second floor in USA naming).  The room was huge and had A/C but it was a bit dark.  He had a good dinner and met a couple from the UK who were traveling a similar route- he saw them again the next day in Junagarh and the day after that in Sasangir.  
The Orchard Palace has nice grounds and a nice car collection, but Jim has seen plenty of older cars and did not feel the need to see the ones here. So, we left fairly early the next day because we expected it to be a full day in Jungarh.
On the way, Jonny said there is a Buddhist cave group, so we took a detour and went there. The caves were rather minimal.  Nearby there was a fairly large new complex that is unoccupied- apparently built by the government with intent to be part of a " Buddhist Trail" .  It was great to walk around this site that is becoming overgrown with vegetation and pigeons.  It has the "feel" of a Buddhist place and there were a small number of Buddhist images, but it is largely unfinished and unoccupied and was a good photo-op. In the distance, a large Hindu temple that looked fairly new, is visible.

We drove on to Junagarh (often written as Junagadh).  Jim saw descriptions in the guide books that  did not really give a good feel for this place- though it was obvious there was much to see here.

As we drove into town we came to a beautiful mausoleum - it was quite amazing, but in fairly poor
state of repair- it is clear that it is not beeing maintained.  It has been suggested that upkeep of many muslim related sites is not being supported by the present government of India. This could be true, but it is also still a country - like all others where choices on where to spend have to be made. The feeling seemed to be that the chouce not to spend on Muslim related sites is worse than in the past.

We then went on to visit a place that Jonny had seen when staying in Junagarh in the past. It is a set of mausoleums apparently built in the 1700's for members of the local ruling families. It is





surrounded by buildings and walls and not easily found but very interesting to walk through.  It is overgrown with weeds and shrubs and in a state of decay, but some of the sarcophagi had newer textile covers over them- probably from newer generations of the families interned here.   There was one woman in one of the structures- she might have been living there- with no other home, or she might have been a caretaker.  In any case, it was fun to see such a relatively un-visited place.
We went on to see the "Ashoka edicts".  Ashoka was a ruler who embraced Buddhism more than 2000 years ago. He had certain inscriptions put in stones in several places across his empire and one of these is at Junagarh.  Today the stone is inside a large building... and it was CLOSED for some sort of maintenance !   However, the attendant said that there is a copy down the road that was made by an englishman.  So we drove down the road a short way to find there is a large bould with a lot of inscriptions that were difficult to discern as well as some writing in English that is also difficult to discern, so we took some photos and left.
The guide books mention buddhist caves in Junagarh and Jonny knew of 3 groups - maybe 4. It was a bit hot in the sun but we made our was to three groups and walked around them. One is quite extensive with many chambers and wells while the others were smaller.

We then went on top of the hill in the city to see the old fort and remnants there.  This was quite interesting, but we were tired too, so it was less thrilling than it might have been. Jim met the UK couple from the Gondal hotel while viewing a step well on top of the mountain.
We had some lime soda and rested and then drove back down to the city center.  There are some wonderful colonial era buildings-  mostly in a poor state of repair but great to see.  This was an important city long ago and during the British rule too.
Jonny pointed out a group of boys riding in the back of a truck who looked African. He said that long long ago (1300's?) the local king had a princess from Ethiopia (or thereabouts) as a wife and she brought something like 50 families of servants with her. Their descendants are these people who look more African than Indian.
We drove on the Sasangir where Jim Stayed at the Taj hotel for 3 nights.