16.12.2004

Bikaner

After racing around the Indian tracks, a chilled-out backpacker haven (i.e. Pushcar) is often a welcoming breath of fresh air. However, it's amazing how fast the atmosphere can turn stagnant after too much "where-you-from-come-into-my- shop-looking-no-problem-free-to-look-madam -good-price-very-cheap". Once we'd got our backpacker hit, we were itching to get away from the hoards once again. So where to next was the question. And Bikaneer seemed like the perfect answer.

Keen to avoid the tourist trail, we travelled to Bikaner to cash in mum's Chrissy present - a three-day camel safari. A mere eight-hour commute was required to get us from P to B. Now I'm fine with night buses, but nobody mentioned the artic blizzard predicticted to hit. Just the inside of the bus that is. After eight hours of travelling in a blizzard, we were almost frozen solid by the time we'd reached Bikaner. I guess it really didn't matter that we were void of sleep, due to our frozen state, because the driver decided on an all night Indian dance-party, where he was the only participant. The entire bus shook from the BLARING Bollywood tunes. Why these people act in such insensitive and strange ways, I will never know!

What I do know, though, is that being dropped in the middle of nowhere at 4am isn't the most pleasant experience. Not because of any potential dangers, but because 20-hours of no sleep is not conducive to haggling with an auto-rickshaw driver. In the end, we were taken to a gorgeous Arabian-style hotel which even had hot water and blankets. It was so gorgeous that I hardly remember stumbling into the room and tripping into bed.

Bikaner is a sprawling desert town, famous for its old fort, Havelis, and Jain temples. So famous that our auto-rickshaw driver drove us to the wrong location and we didn't get to see the famous sites. We did managed to get lost though, and stumble across this ancient Maharaja's Palace. It is now a beautifully preserved hotel, but has the ability to bring you back in time to an era of concubines, suitors and grand parties.

But at the end of the day, were were in Bikaner to organise a camel safari. And a fine camel safari we found. Three days of getting lost in the desert was exactly what we needed. Probably the furthest place away from the hoards of backpackers and auto-rickshaw wallahs - just what we needed.