Political Rally, Cattle Drive and different rules for every vehicle

First, I want to thank Ruby, his family and friends for giving me a chance to get used to India before I struck out on my own. I am now on my own, somewhat, since I am traveling with a taxi driver who has been vetted by his family. Now I only have to make sure that I am up and ready to go, tomorrow morning, as there will be no 6:30 wake-up call to make sure that I was ready for the taxi to Delhi. After a final firecracker, (it was payback for the dog, who was barking like early this morning), I started my trip down the mountain. There is no way to describe the actual trip, so I will just add a video, that shows what we saw through the front window. When watching the video, note that many times the road went right to the edge of the cliff, and we never really encountered a car passing a bus on one of the curves coming at us in the video, but it happens all too often, and sometimes you are the car passing.



On this trip, I was traveling with the driver and one of his friends, (which is good, since he will have someone to keep him company on the way home, and he had someone to help with the navigation to the hotel). After about 5 hours of driving we stopped for lunch, and I would have the opportunity to try my skills ordering food. In terms of time, I probably should have went with the thali, but I was not willing to risk it. So, I ordered vegetable and cheese porgoras, (sp?) and a coke. I figured that deep frying this stuff would have killed anything that I might not have an immunity to. Did you know that hot peppers look suspiciously like green beans, but are A LOT hotter.

After this lunch stop, we were ONLY 120 km from Delhi, so I might be able to do something when I got in. HA, let me repeat, HA. I don't know how it happened, but somehow we ended up off the "fly-over" in Panipat, and took the local streets. Even, though we were not traveling at the lightening speed of 80 km/hour, we were moving, not like the other side, where a political rally, stopped traffic. I was glad we were not heading that direction, finally we made it back to the fly-over, and were well on our way. WRONG, there was a rally our side of the highway. Yes, I said it ON THE HIGHWAY, well in typical Indian driving, everyone who did not want to follow or attend the rally, crossed over the divide and traveled on the other side, (a sudden Diversion, as they would call it here), until we were able to cross back.

Then clear sailing to Delhi, NOPE, we ran into a cattle drive, coming at us on the highway. At this point, I can only shake my head and like a good tourist, take a picture. I may be getting used to the traffic, but I don't think so, since I still tense up when I see someone crossing the highway with a bag full of straw on their head, or cars coming at us from the other direction in the wrong lane. It is all good, and part of the story I have been telling.

Finally we reached the hotel, about 3.5 hours after leaving our lunch break, I was so happy, that I probably over tipped the driver by 500 rupee's, (or just over 10$). I will not get used to the large numbers. Once in my room, and dropping off my bags, I had to check out the bathroom, THERE IS A SHOWER and TUB, thank you for luxury hotels. Once again, I found myself eating after 8pm, but I wanted a light meal, so I had some tomato soup, and vegetable biryani, so far so good.

Next: More adventures, or I should have listened to Ruby, and not mixed vegetable dishes.