Monday, February 18, 2013

A cow out my window...

No really!  Cows are everywhere here and it's great how they hang out with the people in town.  Sunning in the traffic circles during rush hour etc.  One sweet bull put my motorcycling skills to the test yesterday.  I nearly shit my pants as he seemed to be charging me while cruising desert road.  Once again the agile Royal Enfield Bullet seemed to perform better than expected.  Could it be my red jacket?  like in the bull fights?  I have no idea, but thought about it this morning.  They also worship there cows here and really believe in the after life turning into animals etc.  Maybe this was some old guy that knew I loved cheeseburgers and was out for revenge?  

On with life!  Maybe we will gets some hamburger yet!  "Salzbrun takes down 1,200 pound bull" could be the next Blog post!

So yesterday (Monday) we woke up in "Jhunjhunun".  This small resort was pretty hilarious.  We were the only guests at the place it seemed.  It may have been the real deal back in 1920.  The power went out many times!  After a while we just started to laugh!  The workers here were as though we were American diplomates!

We pulled out it was very cold and damp from the rains of yesterday.  We road through Jhunjhunun and it was a very large neat city.  Traffic was bustling as it was Monday morning.  Children everywhere heading off to school etc.  Think of people in crowded corridors leaving an NFL football game, but now put them all on motorcycles...  that is what it is like riding here in the cities.  If you are not bumping back tires elbows and handlebars, that can only mean one other thing.  Your on the ground and being run over!  Whats cool is nobody is angry, everyone is very calm and just trying to keep things moving.  Dodging people walking cows, pigs, tractors and what ever else might be on the move.  It's very cool actually.  My head hurts thinking about all the rules we have back home...

So the hwy was interesting, and we went through what seemed like farm land of sorts.  Actually some very nice large homes.  The road on the other hand looked like it survived some war back in the mid 1800's.  This was a one lane road.  What you do is ride full speed ahead and at the last second each vehicle trust and cooperates with each other and you both quickly slow down pass slowly and move on.  

We stopped for lunch at a very cool town called Mandawa.  This was awesome because we had Wi-Fi!   Breakfast was great and the town was fantastic!  These people are the best and so generous!  

After breakfast we had to do some Mud riding!  The villages and towns were all flooded from Sundays rain.  Overloaded semi trucks stuck in the middle of the roads made it difficult to pass.  With cows on the left and goats on the right sometime the only path was deeper than anticipated.

The Landscape continued to change into a more desert feel.  We stopped for lunch and met some great young guys with a cool little restaurant in the town of Dungargarth.  These young guys and there kid brother were super fun to hang out with.   They mad us some excellent lunch and were so happy we stopped.

We pulled into Bikaner around 3:00.  This is a very large city known for the Red Palace (Very old Fort).   Mike and I took our own tour.  We went through a construction type entrance and told them we were studying to be engineers.  It was hilarious!  The place was built in like 1492?  And they let us ride our motorcycles inside to park.

From there we put some hotel in the GPS.  A few miles of handle bar bumping cow dodging riding through the city...  Suddenly 3 guys on a motorcycle pulled up to me and started saying something.  I thought they were maybe mad at my aggressive nature in this traffic.  They kept bumping into me and tapping me on the shoulder saying something.  They figured out we were American and started speaking broken English.  They said "we have beautiful guesthouse".   We refused and said we have plans.  They wouldn't give up and kept following.  When we arrived at the GPS location in some back alley, the motel was no longer there.  But these young guys were.  And then they said "We have Wi-Fi"  Now they were speaking our language!

One of them jumped on mikes bike and one on mine as we followed the third (Khan).  As Kahn was riding looking back he crashed into a pole.  He was okay, but it was kind of funny.  Anyway, these guys could not be better guys!  They have been absolutly wonderful.  They know everyone in town and there family owns the guest house.  We met another couple at the guest house Victor and Ollla.  They have been traveling here for 4 mmonths on an $18.00 a day budget.  We learned a ton from them and shared stories dinner and drinks along with Khan and Lucky.

It's time for breakfast and Khan and Lucky are sitting here waiting to take us on a tour of there town.  A day off of distance riding.  This will be great!  Aslo, they have family in other towns, so our route has been changed a bit.  We will be heading south to Deshnoke, then Pushkar and eventually our goal is Udaipur.

So Cheers!  Most of youare in cold Minnesota and I heard it was giong to snow!  More pictures tonight!

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