What we did: Ellora Caves, Daulatabad
Budget: 3500 Rupees/$70; Spent: 2522 Rupees/$51
Again I woke up feeling exhausted and ill. We were to meet up with Victor and Therese (the Swedish couple we met yesterday) at 10am at their hotel. We got down for breakfast at around 9:15am. Our stomachs have been so sensitive lately that we were scared of eating so we only had some toast and a boiled egg each.
We quickly paid our bill and caught an auto-rickshaw to their hotel where a taxi would be picking us up to take us to the sites for the day.
About half an hour later we arrived at the Ellora Caves. We were greeted by many vendors offering us things and encouraging us to go to their stores.
Similar in purpose to the caves of Ajanta, Ellora consist of 34 religious caves, of which 12 are Buddhist, 17 are Hindu, and five are Jain. These "caves" were carved out of a high basalt cliff between 600-1000 AD. We started at the largest cave, called the Kailasa Temple. This temple was completed in the 8th century, after more than 400,000 tonnes of rocks were scooped out over hundreds of years. The temple is considered a "megalith" because of how it was constructed. Amazingly, the entire structure is made out of a single piece of stone. The temple was built through vertical excavation - carvers started at the top and worked their way down. Three huge trenches were bored into the sheer cliff face with hammers and chisels, while taking care to leave behind those sections that would later be used for sculpting. As you can imagine, this leaves a margin for error of exactly zero. And this place is gigantic. According to our Lonely Planet book, it covers an area twice the size of the Parthenon in Athens. We nearly instantly agreed it was one of the most amazing sites we've ever seen, if not our top site. It literally seems out of this world. We loved it so much, we spent about two hours enjoying the intricate carvings and immense size. We could have stayed longer, but there are 33 other caves and we agreed to meet Therese and Victor for lunch.
On our way to lunch we saw so many monkeys. This one was by far the cutest:
We had a decent lunch at a restaurant on-site. Neither Jeff nor I felt much like eating. We both ordered rice dishes. Unfortunately, mine had a little too much spice, so I ate less than half of it. Jeff seemed to enjoy his egg fried rice a little more, since he finished his. I still can't believe how little we are eating these days! Unfortunately, this seems to be catching up to me, at least. After lunch I had very little energy to do any sightseeing at all. Jeff coaxed me to a couple more caves before it was time to meet Therese and Victor at our taxi and drive to the Jain temples, which are about 1 km away. The day was excruciatingly hot, which really didn't help, since I was already not feeling great. I think Jeff was feeling the heat, as well, and he didn't show that much interest in the Jain caves.
At last, we ended up at cave 29, which is a Hindu cave, and we both showed some interest in this one. It was neat in that an entrance/exit to the cave was through a fissure in the rock that was maybe 30-40 metres tall. It was another large cave with many pillars and even more bats. At first, I was absolutely terrified of the bats, but by the end they were tolerable. I think I still would have screamed if they had touched me in any way, but when they are just hanging from the ceiling, they are actually pretty cute. They look like wee acrobatic mice wearing capes.
After this last cave, it was time to say good-bye to Ellora and head to Daulatabad. Daulatabad has a fascinating history: this 12th century hilltop fortress was originally conceived of as an impregnable fort and, in 1328, when it was christened Daulatabad (City of Fortune) by Delhi's sultan and named the capital, the entire population of Delhi was relocated over 1100 km to populate it. The fort, although strategically superior to Delhi, lacked a sufficient water supply for the population and, two years later, the city was abandoned and its residents marched back to Delhi. Naturally there were many people who died during the perilous trek to and from Daulatabad.
The palace sits atop a 200 metre-high outcrop known as Devagiri (Hill of the Gods), and it's no wonder why. The outcrop boasts hundred-metre tall cliffs surrounding the palace. It's amazing people were even able to build anything on top of this thing. As our Lonely Planet book describes it, Daulatabad is literally out of a Tolkein novel. It's defenses include multiple doorways with odd angles and spike-studded doors to prevent elephant charges, three distinct city walls, a moat, and an ingenious stairway through caverns that are pitch-black, have steep and oddly- and differently-shaped steps, and sheer drops. The amount of thought and detail that went into the building of this city is truly remarkable. It was a wonder to behold.
We had less than an hour to see the whole site, which is huge. It was once a capital city. Much of the huge site is closed off to the public, particularly the areas that would have originally been part of the city itself. However, most of the palace remains in tact. It's about a 20 minute walk just to get to the base of the outcrop and Victor really wanted to get to the top, so he decided to run. The rest of us were too tired, so we decided to just walk up.
We were stopped on several different occasions to get our pictures taken by locals. I still can't understand peoples' interest in taking our pictures. I think we're getting more used to it though!
The walk to the top of the hill was arduous to say the least! It was an amazing climb though. The countryside is beautiful and the city is marvelous. The walk through the caves was tricky, especially since we didn't have a flashlight or anything, so Jeff ended up using the flash on the camera to guide us around for the parts where there was literally zero light. At one point a bat flew in Therese's hair. She screamed, but thankfully she didn't fall!
Up and up we went, until finally we reached the summit. The palace is not much to look at anymore. It must have been quite impressive back in the day and it has a spectacular view. The city must have been something when people were actually living in it!
We didn't find Victor for some time once we reached the top, but it turned out that he had just headed even further up to get a better view of the surrounding countryside. Unfortunately, we didn't have time to climb up to the top part, but it's something we would have definitely liked to do. Next time.
We took many great pictures from the top. Victor was crazy enough to climb out a window onto a small ledge to take a look around. He seems to have a crazy side to him. It made for a hell of a picture!
It was near to closing so we headed back down to the taxi. The walk down was uneventful, although the cave proved challenging again. We are amazed that there are no lights to help people up. They've really left it authentic!
The ride home took only 20 minutes or so. We got Therese's email so that we could send them pictures and then said our good-byes. We'll miss them. They were extremely nice people and we got along with them great. We learned today that they have only been together for 10 months. I can't imagine traveling to India with Jeff after only dating for 10 months! I guess they're in a different stage in life, but still...well, I guess it's a good test! They seem to be doing well!
Another thing is that they haven't gotten sick at all yet! They've been here for three weeks and nothing! They even stopped on the street and tried some of the fruit. And here we are avoiding everything and still sick as dogs! It's not fair. Who knows though, maybe their time will come. Or maybe they will just be lucky. Or maybe we've just been unlucky! I hope we just get better soon. It's hard to enjoy our travels when everything is such an effort. India is definitely starting to wear us down.
We had a very simple dinner tonight of just soup and some lemon soda to calm our tummies. Hopefully it will help us recover.
We were so exhausted that after our showers we pretty much just went to bed. It's been a long day and it's going to be an early morning tomorrow. Our train back to Mumbai leaves Aurangabad at 6am. I think we both need a vacation!
Budget: 3500 Rupees/$70; Spent: 2522 Rupees/$51
Again I woke up feeling exhausted and ill. We were to meet up with Victor and Therese (the Swedish couple we met yesterday) at 10am at their hotel. We got down for breakfast at around 9:15am. Our stomachs have been so sensitive lately that we were scared of eating so we only had some toast and a boiled egg each.
We quickly paid our bill and caught an auto-rickshaw to their hotel where a taxi would be picking us up to take us to the sites for the day.
About half an hour later we arrived at the Ellora Caves. We were greeted by many vendors offering us things and encouraging us to go to their stores.
Similar in purpose to the caves of Ajanta, Ellora consist of 34 religious caves, of which 12 are Buddhist, 17 are Hindu, and five are Jain. These "caves" were carved out of a high basalt cliff between 600-1000 AD. We started at the largest cave, called the Kailasa Temple. This temple was completed in the 8th century, after more than 400,000 tonnes of rocks were scooped out over hundreds of years. The temple is considered a "megalith" because of how it was constructed. Amazingly, the entire structure is made out of a single piece of stone. The temple was built through vertical excavation - carvers started at the top and worked their way down. Three huge trenches were bored into the sheer cliff face with hammers and chisels, while taking care to leave behind those sections that would later be used for sculpting. As you can imagine, this leaves a margin for error of exactly zero. And this place is gigantic. According to our Lonely Planet book, it covers an area twice the size of the Parthenon in Athens. We nearly instantly agreed it was one of the most amazing sites we've ever seen, if not our top site. It literally seems out of this world. We loved it so much, we spent about two hours enjoying the intricate carvings and immense size. We could have stayed longer, but there are 33 other caves and we agreed to meet Therese and Victor for lunch.
On our way to lunch we saw so many monkeys. This one was by far the cutest:
We had a decent lunch at a restaurant on-site. Neither Jeff nor I felt much like eating. We both ordered rice dishes. Unfortunately, mine had a little too much spice, so I ate less than half of it. Jeff seemed to enjoy his egg fried rice a little more, since he finished his. I still can't believe how little we are eating these days! Unfortunately, this seems to be catching up to me, at least. After lunch I had very little energy to do any sightseeing at all. Jeff coaxed me to a couple more caves before it was time to meet Therese and Victor at our taxi and drive to the Jain temples, which are about 1 km away. The day was excruciatingly hot, which really didn't help, since I was already not feeling great. I think Jeff was feeling the heat, as well, and he didn't show that much interest in the Jain caves.
At last, we ended up at cave 29, which is a Hindu cave, and we both showed some interest in this one. It was neat in that an entrance/exit to the cave was through a fissure in the rock that was maybe 30-40 metres tall. It was another large cave with many pillars and even more bats. At first, I was absolutely terrified of the bats, but by the end they were tolerable. I think I still would have screamed if they had touched me in any way, but when they are just hanging from the ceiling, they are actually pretty cute. They look like wee acrobatic mice wearing capes.
After this last cave, it was time to say good-bye to Ellora and head to Daulatabad. Daulatabad has a fascinating history: this 12th century hilltop fortress was originally conceived of as an impregnable fort and, in 1328, when it was christened Daulatabad (City of Fortune) by Delhi's sultan and named the capital, the entire population of Delhi was relocated over 1100 km to populate it. The fort, although strategically superior to Delhi, lacked a sufficient water supply for the population and, two years later, the city was abandoned and its residents marched back to Delhi. Naturally there were many people who died during the perilous trek to and from Daulatabad.
The palace sits atop a 200 metre-high outcrop known as Devagiri (Hill of the Gods), and it's no wonder why. The outcrop boasts hundred-metre tall cliffs surrounding the palace. It's amazing people were even able to build anything on top of this thing. As our Lonely Planet book describes it, Daulatabad is literally out of a Tolkein novel. It's defenses include multiple doorways with odd angles and spike-studded doors to prevent elephant charges, three distinct city walls, a moat, and an ingenious stairway through caverns that are pitch-black, have steep and oddly- and differently-shaped steps, and sheer drops. The amount of thought and detail that went into the building of this city is truly remarkable. It was a wonder to behold.
We had less than an hour to see the whole site, which is huge. It was once a capital city. Much of the huge site is closed off to the public, particularly the areas that would have originally been part of the city itself. However, most of the palace remains in tact. It's about a 20 minute walk just to get to the base of the outcrop and Victor really wanted to get to the top, so he decided to run. The rest of us were too tired, so we decided to just walk up.
We were stopped on several different occasions to get our pictures taken by locals. I still can't understand peoples' interest in taking our pictures. I think we're getting more used to it though!
The walk to the top of the hill was arduous to say the least! It was an amazing climb though. The countryside is beautiful and the city is marvelous. The walk through the caves was tricky, especially since we didn't have a flashlight or anything, so Jeff ended up using the flash on the camera to guide us around for the parts where there was literally zero light. At one point a bat flew in Therese's hair. She screamed, but thankfully she didn't fall!
Up and up we went, until finally we reached the summit. The palace is not much to look at anymore. It must have been quite impressive back in the day and it has a spectacular view. The city must have been something when people were actually living in it!
We didn't find Victor for some time once we reached the top, but it turned out that he had just headed even further up to get a better view of the surrounding countryside. Unfortunately, we didn't have time to climb up to the top part, but it's something we would have definitely liked to do. Next time.
We took many great pictures from the top. Victor was crazy enough to climb out a window onto a small ledge to take a look around. He seems to have a crazy side to him. It made for a hell of a picture!
It was near to closing so we headed back down to the taxi. The walk down was uneventful, although the cave proved challenging again. We are amazed that there are no lights to help people up. They've really left it authentic!
The ride home took only 20 minutes or so. We got Therese's email so that we could send them pictures and then said our good-byes. We'll miss them. They were extremely nice people and we got along with them great. We learned today that they have only been together for 10 months. I can't imagine traveling to India with Jeff after only dating for 10 months! I guess they're in a different stage in life, but still...well, I guess it's a good test! They seem to be doing well!
Another thing is that they haven't gotten sick at all yet! They've been here for three weeks and nothing! They even stopped on the street and tried some of the fruit. And here we are avoiding everything and still sick as dogs! It's not fair. Who knows though, maybe their time will come. Or maybe they will just be lucky. Or maybe we've just been unlucky! I hope we just get better soon. It's hard to enjoy our travels when everything is such an effort. India is definitely starting to wear us down.
We had a very simple dinner tonight of just soup and some lemon soda to calm our tummies. Hopefully it will help us recover.
We were so exhausted that after our showers we pretty much just went to bed. It's been a long day and it's going to be an early morning tomorrow. Our train back to Mumbai leaves Aurangabad at 6am. I think we both need a vacation!
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