11th Nov MON: New Delhi to Varanasi

We had a stressful start to our travels today.   We left our hotel in plenty of time (we thought) to catch our flight to Varanasi but we hadn't factored in the slow, inept check-in service at Air India's domestic flight desk.

We queued for more than an hour watching staff members make phone calls, wander off to speak to colleagues with no sense of urgency, and still we were only half way down the queue.  They were horribly short staffed.   Eventually a call went out for anybody who was travelling to Varanasi to come to the front of the queue so we checked our bags in with just 20 minutes to go before the gate closed but still had to clear security and take a long walk to our gate.  We made it but the experience didn't do our blood pressure much good.

Our hotel had arranged a taxi driver to meet us at the airport.   Its our first visit to Varanasi and our impression during the first 15 minutes was good.   The sort of street scenes we love.    Then the traffic snarled up and we spent 90 minutes in nose-to-tail traffic while our driver just leaned on his horn all the time. 

I don't know if the road from the airport is always this busy or whether its because tomorrow is the very important festival of Dev Deepawali and devotees are arriving early.

Dev Deepawali, celebrated on the fifteenth day of Diwali, is a tribute to river Ganges by the people of Varanasi and is known as the 'Festival of Lights of the Gods'

During this festival devotees take a dip in the River Ganges on the auspicious day of Kartik Purnima (full moon day) and light earthen lamps called diyas in the evening. After dusk the steps of all the Ghats on the riverfront of the Ganges are lit with thousands of these lamps and the place is packed with pilgrims.

Anyway, our driver eventually stopped and we were met by 2 'boys' from the hotel who carried our luggage on their shoulders through really winding narrow lanes for approx. 1/4 mile as the hotel isn't accessible by car.   We began to wonder what we'd let ourselves in for

We're staying at the Dwivedi Hotels Palace on Steps.     A palace it 'aint!  Its probably a 3 star in reality but by Varanasi standards a 4.5 star.     We have a 'suite' with aircon which is one room dominated by a very comfortable large bed, then a small seating area with a wardrobe a couple of chairs and a table with tea making facilities.   BUT the bedroom has windows overlooking the Ganges and we have a small balcony area also overlooking the river so that's what we wanted.    The alternative would have been to find a grander hotel further out of town and have to battle our way through heavy traffic each day to come to the Ghats.

Hindus worship the River Ganges as a Goddess.    The Ganga Aarti Prayer Ceremony takes place every day around sunset at the Dashashwamedh Ghat. It's also known as the fire ceremony as fire is offered to the mother Ganges by priests.  Lots of oil lamps, incense sticks and much blowing of conch shells!   We found out that this ceremony takes place almost beneath our room/balcony so we can 'enjoy' the experience without leaving our room.    Actually we can't see it properly, but we can certainly hear it.  

One huge plus point is that the hotel has a rooftop restaurant/bar and they serve beer!.   There's an indoor air conditioned section or an open air terrace overlooking the river.

We had a beer to de-stress then went out for a walk for a couple of  hours.   Although we'd walked through a maze of back streets to get here, the front of the hotel leads directly out onto the river front and Ghats (steps).   We hadn't got our bearings so decided to turn right and explore that direction.

Our path took us past the Manikarnika Ghat which is the main burning ghat, the most auspicious place for Hindus to be cremated.    Dead bodies are handled by outcasts known as doms and one of them stopped us to proudly tell us that he burned bodies!  We were surprised how 'gung ho' they seem to be with several pyres burning at once, cows and goats wandering around and no real mourners to be seen just the doms constantly tending the pyres for burning the bodies.    There were people sitting higher up on the Ghat/steps so maybe they were the family members and friends.  I'd assumed we'd observe discreetly and move on but people were taking selfies and laughing/joking …

David was tired and wanted to have an afternoon nap so we came back to our room and rested.   He isn't liking all the steps here - but I'm not sure what he expected as we're staying on the Ghats … I must admit some of them are pretty steep though.  

We ate at the rooftop restaurant tonight as we didn''t fancy getting lost around the back streets in the dark.   The food was really good and we were able to watch lines of candles/diyas floating along the river.   We also learned that what I'd read about the Aarti Festival going on for an hour was a lie, its still in swing now 3 hours later ....

The internet in our room isn't fast enough to upload  pictures to Blogger tonight and its struggling here (in the rooftop restaurant) so I'm going to publish this post with just a couple of pictures (not knowing whether they've uploaded or not) and  I'll have to catch up in a few days when we have decent internet.

UPDATE:   INTERNET SPEED HAS IMPROVED SO PICTURES ADDED 12/11

Meet the neighbours .... lots of these cheeky chappies living in the walls of our hotel ...

These steps and 'hills' are perfect environments for the local goats

Even the cows have adapted to climbing steps

Ladies making the Diyas (clay bowls with lights) in readiness for tomorrow's festivities.  This one is putting the wicks into the bowls

and these ladies are adding decoration (petals) and oil/ghee for burning

A few more 'people' pics:

Guess who?   I often get David to 'pose' somewhere near a subject I want to photograph discreetly .. but this was quite a good one of his lordship so its a keeper I think