Gopalpur to Puri

 Beautiful morning on the beach... 

 The world is my toilet.

 Devotees sleeping on the side of the road with Shiva's sacred bull Nandi.

 One of the devotees.

 Water buffalo doing their thing.

 Dry your grain on the road... so a bike can ride through it.

 Goodbye Euan, goodbye overland truck.

 Our group, Liz, Euan, me and Nico.

 The entrance to Jagannath Temple.

 Jagannath Temple as seen from the rooftop of the library across the street.

 

 Sweet treats.

 Souvenirs for pilgrims.

Our hot and tired bicycle rickshaw rider.

Saturday, April 7^th.

Nico and I got up at 6:00 to go to the beach and see the fishermen and their catch. When we got there the sun was poking out of a cloud just above the horizon, but looking either way there were no signs of fishing boats or men bringing in their nets. So, while Nico took more videos, I decided to walk north on the beach to the fishing boats I saw yesterday. On the way I saw numerous men squatting on the edge of the beach and relieving themselves and leaving piles of their waste behind them. On the way back, I saw a number of these little human deposits waiting for the waves. I get it, I mean, our ancestors were undoubtedly doing the same for thousands of years. In many ways, it is more sanitary than doing it on the ground. After all the incoming tide will wash it away, and there is water and sand to clean yourself up afterwards. I get it, but it definitely takes away the idea of this being a beach holiday place, yikes. It offends my sensibilities as I like to think that I am more civilized than that and I was hoping they were too.

I headed back to the hotel for the last truck trip of the tour. Euan drove us north for about four hours. On route was saw a group of yellow and orange clad devotees sleeping on the side of the road beside a statue of Nandi, Shiva’s bull. We stopped to take a few photos with them. We also saw a herd of water buffalo doing what they love, eating while wading.

When we arrived in Puri we offloaded from our overland truck for the last time and checked into our very nice little hotel. This hotel is owned by Tomo’s father. As soon as we got there we met Will, our new guide. He is from South Africa. I had one of the hotel workers take a group photo of us and then while Euan and Will had some time to change the guard, so to speak, the three of us made use of the really nice, clean pool. 

At four we gathered again for an afternoon excursion. Puri is a small town and one of the holiest pilgrimage places in India and has a wonderful long sandy beach. We set off in cycle-rickshaws to explore the old pilgrim route taking in ashrams, Hindu monasteries and the awesome Jagannath temple.  Puri is one of the oldest cities in the eastern part of India and an important destination for Hindu pilgrims - it is considered by Hindus to be one of the holiest places in India and is the eastern point on the revered Char Dham circuit of pilgrimage sites (along with Rameswaram in the south, Dwarka in the west, and Badrinath in the north). It is considered highly sacred to complete the Char Dham circuit, and the centrepiece of this pilgrimage in Puri is the huge Jagannath Temple, an enormous complex which is home to more than 5000 priests and aides. Unfortunately, only Hindus are allowed to enter the temple's interior. We walked around the temple to a library where we were able to climb to the third floor and the roof to get a good view of the massive complex.

Then we went back to our hotel. At dinner time Will took us to a little bakery that he knew about. It is run by a friend of Pulak’s. This was our goodbye dinner for Euan who is leaving to drive the truck to Kathmandu by himself. It was take him three days. Then he will fly home to Scotland for a break and the truck will start another Dragoman tour of India. We all ate pasta on the roof, as we had brought a couple of beer and it could not be consumed inside. While we were up there, there was a good thunderstorm with a great lightning show. Luckily part of the roof was covered with a sheet metal roof and ate there, but it was hard to talk with the rain on the roof. We stayed there until it dissipated, then we headed back for bed.