A whistle-stop tour through Andalucia – One day in Seville
As with all whistle-stop tours, I guess, there is very little time to stop and soak up all the sights and plant the memories of each place and this is particularly true of our day in Seville.
I do have two very distinct memories. The first was a visit to the Plaza de España, built to showcase Spain’s industry and technology at the Ibero-American Exposition of 1929 and restored in the noughties. It is in the form of a huge semi-circle with a moat, criss-crossed by four bridges and with a fountain at its centre. What struck me most were the fabulous blue tiles covering almost every surface, including the bridges and the four alcoves which represent different provinces of Spain (look out for the photo of the Jaén alcove).
Following our visit to the Plaza de España, we were dropped off in the centre of Seville to have some lunch and visit the Cathedral. I see from my diary that I had a very pleasant lunch of shrimp tortillas and croquettes with another passenger before we made our way to the Cathedral. We didn’t have much time, you can tell that I didn’t stop to take any photographs. After a rather hurried visit we tried to leave but kept getting lost and arriving back at the entrance, the trouble with this being that it was a one-way system and they wouldn’t let us out! We came across three others from our coach and together spent twenty minutes, increasingly panicking, trying to find the exit. When we finally got outside, the main group had left and we had to hurry through the streets until we caught up with them at the Golden Tower just in time for a boat trip up the Guadalquivir river (which we had seen a couple of days before when we were in the mountains outside Baeza).
After our run through the streets, the river trip was pleasantly cool but we then had another rather hot walk back to the coach and we were off once again, this time to Jerez. It will be no surprise to learn that we were met at our hotel – the Sherry Park Hotel – with a glass of sherry.
A whistle-stop tour of Andalucia – Ubeda, Baeza and on to Cordoba
I am only just picking up the second leg of my tour, having been mired in my own and family health matters, various household emergencies and trying to improve my input at the creative writing course that I attend.
So, back to Andalucia…….
Despite the hectic day at the Alhambra and the evening watching some even more hectic Flamenco, we were up and on our way bright and early. Our first stop was the small town of Ubeda, which is a World Heritage Site. We were met by a local tour guide who took us around the town. A quick check of the Andalucia Tourist website (www.andalucia.org) tells me that there is so much to see in this town but my main memory is of a large square with a church at one end. This is the Holy Funerary Chapel of El Salvador del Mundo. It is the interior of the church with its breathtaking golden altar which sticks in the mind. I don’t think I have never seen its like anywhere else that I have visited.
Our next stop was in another World Heritage Site, Baeza, where we stayed overnight. Another single visitor and I had a rather unsuccessful self-directed tour as we found the cathedral closed and a little train, which thought would take us for a tour around the town was not running. The highlight of the afternoon appears to have been the Kit-Kat ice-cream, which we discovered at our hotel.
Next morning we set off from Baeza for a tour of some of the local countryside. We drove up through a Natural (not National) Park to a stop atop the hills with a view of the Guadalqivir River and visited a small town (name unknown, I’m afraid). We returned to Baeza to spend a second night and left for Cordoba the next morning.
Ubeda and Baeza are both in the Province of Jaén, which is an are known for its olive oil and so we stopped en route for a tour of an olive oil museum, including tasting and a chance to buy some of the delicious varieties grown there.
After rather a strange lunch at a motorway services (omelette sandwich – shouldn’t have worked but did!), we continued on to Cordoba and a brief tour of the walled city.
Next day we went on a walking tour of Cordoba, I discovered the Mezquita, which I was surprised to find even more beautiful than the Alhambra. Constructed as a mosque in the 8th century, the Mezquita was developed throughout the following centuries by Muslim rulers until it was appropriated by the conquering Christian army in the 12th century and then re-dedicated as a Catholic cathedral in the 13th century. It has been designated as a World Heritage Site since 1984. I found the interior absolutely breathtaking, especially the beautiful lines of the structures from the Muslim era.
After more walking and a spell back at our hotel to escape the afternoon heat, we were dropped off to make our own choices of restaurant for dinner. As the temperature gradually cooled, I joined with some of the other lone travellers and sat outside a restaurant, watching the world go by and enjoyed shrimp salad with lettuce, broad beans, tomatoe jam and a curry sauce, followed by calamari, prawns and chips and finally a light mousse. Then it was time to return to our hotel to prepare for another prompt start, heading for Seville.
A whistle-stop tour of Andalusia– Granada and the Alhambra Palace
Phew! I have been caught up in Christmas and all its arrangements and the aftermath of general lethargy in January. I have decided to ease myself back by concentrating on a whistle-stop tour of Andalusia which I enjoyed in 2013. It was both excellent and exhausting and I don’t think I could repeat it now! But it gives me the opportunity to break a fortnight into easy chunks and an excuse to show a lot of photos.
Sometimes, I see a place on TV or amongst someone else’s holiday photos and I know I have just got to go there. It was looking at a relative’s photos of their visit to the Alhambra Palace in Granada that made me want to see it for myself. However, in addition to Granada, I was going to visit Ubeda, Cordoba, Seville, Jerez, Cadiz, Chiciana de la Frontera and Ronda.
Granada and the Alhambra Palace We arrived via the airport in Malaga, which is not so far from Granada. The tour started as it meant to go on. We hardly had time to settle in at the hotel, when we were whisked off for a walk around the city centre, visiting the cathedral, which was formerly a mosque (a recurring theme). I also made a brief visit to the hotel’s rooftop bar and caught a view of the snow, still on the peaks of the Sierra Nevada in early May.
The following day was our visit to the Alhambra. To call it “a palace” is rather selling it short. I’m looking at the huge visitor guide that I was given and remember that it actually comprises several palaces. Between them, they were everything I had hoped for. Set on top of a hill and looking down on Granada, the building was started by Muhammed Al Ahmar in the 13th Century as both a fortification and a palace. The Comares Palace and the Palace of the Lions, filled with more elaborate and beautiful decoration were built during the reigns of his successors. In the late 15th Century, Granada was captured by Catholic monarchs. Isabella and Ferdinand undertook extensive repairs and renovations, although I must say that I saw more beauty in the earlier parts of the building. Charles V commissioned a palace which was to be named after him In 1870, the Alhambra was declared a National Monument and, after more restoration in the 1920s and 30s, it was designated a World Heritage Site in 1984. Here are some photos, I cannot say exactly which part of the palace they are but just soak up the magnificence!
Coach visits were allocated to either morning or afternoon and, unfortunately, our slot was in the afternoon. As we walked round it became hotter and hotter and I missed the visit to see the palace’s gardens, choosing an ice-cream and a sit down instead.
This day wasn’t finished, though, as we spent an exciting evening in a bar (built in a cave), on top of another of Granada’s hills, watching and listening to traditional flamenco dancing and singing. I have written the word “passionate” in my diary!
So I had already achieved what I came to see but there was so much more to experience over the next couple of weeks. We left Granada early the following morning, heading towards Ubeda……
When I am on holiday, I am always interested in learning something about historical places and events but sometimes these things stand out and make me take more notice. In 2011 I had another great holiday, this time touring Sri Lanka. Amongst all the beautiful and interesting things I discovered there, two particularly stick in my mind. There were two places where I felt touched by the history of this small island. The first was an ancient city which dates from the 10th Century and the second was a devastating event in our own lifetime.
After flying from Manchester to Dubai and then onwards to Columbo for an overnight stay, we had a whistlestop tour of the capital before heading north to Habarana and the Cinnamon Lodge Hotel. Here the rooms were situated in small blocks around the beautiful gardens. It was necessary to keep your doors and windows closed to avoid the marauding monkeys who populated the gardens, eyeing you up as you walked to your room and jumping all over the rooftops early in the morning. To me the hotel is especially memorable for its deliciou food, with lots of choice and it is the only hotel I have ever stayed in where there were so many desserts to choose from that they had their own (chilled) room!!
We set off from the Cinnamon Lodge to visit the ancient city of Polonnaruwa, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Many hundred years ago, Polonnaruwa was the capital of Sri Lanka but today it is renowned for the ruins of a 12th century garden city built by King Parakramabahu.
As you can see, many structures are still standing and we spent some time looking around. Close to the buildings but quite separate in Gul Vihara (The Rock Monastery), containing four huge sculptures of Buddha, thought to portray him close to the time of his enlightenment, Polonnaruwa being a centre for the growth of Buddhism around that time. The seated statue is 4.6m tall, the standing statue is almost 7m tall and the reclining statue is over 14m long. There has been a lot of speculation about what was built between and around the statues as the fourth, smaller statue is within a cave. I think they are beautiful and amazing pieces of work.
Polonnaruwa is also home to a troupe of macacques, who live their lives amongst the old buildings. I’m always fascinated by monkeys, although I don’t always like their over-inquisitive attitude, especially when directed at me and I do find macacques quite scary at times. However, this troop were busy just getting on with their lives. Maybe they were holding back and preparing to appear in several nature programmes across multiple platforms. One tiny new-born member of the troop, Gremlin, was even the star of an episode of “Planet Earth Live” in 2012!
From Habanara, we made our way, via more temples and Buddhas to the town of Kandy. In Kandy we visited the Temple of the Sacred Tooth Relic (the relic being one of Buddha’s teeth). Another World Heritage site, it draws pilgrims from across Sri Lanka and beyond and we joined some of them presenting their petitions. The relic is usually contained within a room which we could n only glimpse from the doorway but we learned that, every four years, the relic is paraded around the town for a whole week .
When we left Kandy, we started to climb up and up along narrow roads with hairpin bends until we were among the tea plantations, full of tea pickers. Then on to Mackwoods for a look around their factory and, of course, a taste of their tea and an opportunity to buy (items that we will have a great problem stuffing into our suitcases at some point!). After a night in Nuwara Eliya we made our way down and down again from the hills, with even more terrifying drops at the side of the road and our heroic driver inching his way past roadworks which seemed to continue for miles. At last we found ourselves at Yala National Park, where we had an evening and an early morning visit.
It was during this visit that we found ourselves at a beach which, we were told, was one of the main beaches struck by the Boxing Day 2004 tsunami. Looking so calm and peaceful it was hard to even begin to imagine the horror of that day but there, in the first photograph below, is a memorial sculpture to remind us.
During the rest of our trip, as we visited Galle and arrived at our final stop at Beruwala, we constantly saw signs of devastation, with many houses left empty; some abandoned by their owners, some where whole families had perished. We visited a nursery and a school where many of the children were orphaned by the tsunami. We heard stories of loss, including one day, while on a river boat trip, the owner told us that his boat had been lifted up from the sea and transported onto the main road of the town. Luckily, he was elsewhere at the time. But we also saw the resilience of people getting on with their lives. The tourism industry seemed to be playing a valuable part.
This is a tale of both a huge disappointment and a bit of a fright. It happened in 2007 when I was on my fourth holiday, visiting Kenya and achieving that dream of seeing some of Africa’s wildlife that I’d had since I was a little girl and I’d first started watching natural history programmes in black and white on our tiny TV screen. This time I was travelling with a well-known over-50s travel company. I have been on many of their holidays but this was the only time I have been on one of their solo holidays. I should stress that the definition of a “solo” holiday is quite different from that of a “singles” holiday and you shouldn’t make any assumptions based on that word. Anyway, the two men, for some reason, mostly kept very much to themselves except when forced to mingle with 12 women at mealtimes and on safaris.
The first part of the holiday was already over. We had spent a couple of days in Nairobi, where we visited the house of Karen Blixen, she of “Out of Africa” fame, and I had been kissed on the hand by the long, soft, purple tongue of a giraffe in a nearby sanctuary. We had travelled on to Voi on the edge of Tsavo East national park, which is famous for rehabilitating and releasing the orphan elephants from the David Sheldrick orphanage. We had had many adventures on our twice-daily safaris. We had seen a variety of animals from the tiny dik-dik to the mighty giraffe and four of the “Big 5”, lion, leopard, elephant and buffalo. We had even spent half an hour staring into the distance at a large rock, which our driver was convinced was a lion which would “get up and move at any moment”! We had also visited Tsavo West national park, where we caught a tantalising sight of Mt Kilimanjaro, with its snow-capped peaks just sticking up out of the clouds and we drove through an enormous rhino sanctuary, without seeing a single rhino (which was lucky as I was asleep most of the time). The local guides provided chalk and talks and even walks and talks and in the evenings we enjoyed our cocktails on a bridge with a herd of elephants wandering below us.
At the end of ten days, eight of the company left for home and the remaining six of us set off on a hair-raising seven hour drive, heading for the coast, weaving around potholes like volcano craters. We would then suddenly hit a few miles of good surfaces in an area where, I think, China’s influence was starting to be felt. Eventually we boarded a ferry which took us across to the Island of Mombasa and we drove on to our resort. This place was more conducive to holiday hanging around, enjoying the excellent food and drink, swimming and avoiding being pounced on by the traders as we checked out the beach. Whatever we had done in the day, I would meet up with five other ladies in the evening, for dinner and entertainment, such as a display of dancing by Masai warriors and, on one occasion a talk about snakes which involved one climbing up my arm!
On our second evening, I had gone to bed and fallen asleep, only to be woken around 1am by the sound of fireworks. I checked the time, fought my way out of the mosquito net, jumped out of bed, muttering something about people who thought it was alright to set off fireworks in the middle of the night (or the language might have been something stronger) and hurried to the window. It only took a few seconds to realise that there were no fireworks but that the building opposite mine, which was another block of bedrooms, had huge flames leaping from its thatched roof! I threw on my dressing gown and rushed out of my room banging on the doors of the adjacent rooms, where my friends were sleeping.
“Wake up! Wake up! Come on! There’s a fire and we need to get out!”
They emerged one by one, sleepy and shocked. When we were all standing outside, we agreed to put some clothes on and meet again outside our rooms, which luckily were on the ground floor. We managed to do that pretty quickly and we were all about to leave when we realised that amongst all the noise and milling about, most people leaving our block had taken the time to pack their suitcases first! So, although the fire was spreading across the rooftops towards the main hotel building, from where it would possibly move on to our block, we agreed to go back into our rooms to do the same. I have never done such a quick pack of all my favourite items and essentials. We joined the other guests, gathering on a grassy area in front of but well away from the main building, down towards the beach. I phoned our tour manager, who we had only met the previous morning and who was very surprised to hear from me in the middle of the night. “The hotel is on fire”, I said, trying to sound calm. At first, I don’t think he quite grasped what I was saying but, as soon as he did, to his credit, he got straight in his car and drove for over an hour to check on us. (I hope he learned never ever to give out his personal phone number to guests). We really couldn’t see what was going on as far as firefighting was concerned but eventually the flames began to die down and it appeared that the fire had been confined to the thatched roofs of that one block and to some of the staff accommodation. Meanwhile, some of the staff were passing among us, serving cups of tea and the manager was reassuring us that we were quite safe – and so we were!!! Of course that didn’t stop some of the guests shouting at the hotel manager and each other, rather than sitting back and appreciating the tea and biscuits as most of the rest of us did. At last, as the block where our rooms were situated was undamaged, we were eventually allowed to go back to bed and, back to sleep. The guests from the smoke-damaged rooms were taken to other hotels.
When I got up, breakfast was in full swing in the dining room as if nothing had happened. Afterwards, we sat down and discussed with the tour manager whether we should stay at the resort or move elsewhere. Our own rooms were not touched, the pool was being cleaned and was available later that morning and, as people headed off in droves, it looked as if the hotel needed as much support as it could get, so five out of the six of us decided to stay put.
A couple of days later, we had a day out to visit Mombasa. The contours of the coast mean that the easiest way to travel into the city was to get on the ferry again. We first visited Fort Jesus, built in the 16th century by the Portuguese and, apparently the first successful attempt by a Western power to establish influence over the Indian Ocean trade. The fort is considered a masterpiece of late renaissance military fortification. However, as Fort Jesus was captured and recaptured at least nine times between 1631, when the Portuguese lost it to the Sultan of Mombasa, and 1895, when it fell under British rule, this claim might be subject to some question. The British converted the fort into a prison but later declared it a national monument and, in 2011 it was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site. From there we hit the centre of Mombasa to do the usual tourist things and buy overpriced items that we were never going to use at a local market, when we all succumbed to the patter of the owner of a spice stall. I also purchased two oil pastel paintings from an artist who I saw working inside the market.
I was so excited about the next stop that I hadn’t really stopped to think it through. We drove along Moi Avenue to see the famous elephant tusks which were installed to mark Princess Margaret’s visit in 1952.
We got down from our coach and walked up to get a close look at the two tusks arching across the road. Well, to say I was disappointed was a huge understatement! The tusks were made from aluminium plates fastened together by bolts! Had I really been expecting the real thing? You might well laugh and I deserve it because I consider myself an intelligent person but I had not for a single moment considered that expecting to see real tusks of this size was, well ridiculous!
Moi Avenue and “those” tusks
My spirits were restored by our final visit of the day to a craft co-operative, where we could see artisans working and where their goods were then sold for a fair price in the showroom, with profits then returned to the them. Sadly, or maybe fortunately, I had no room left to carry anything more.
And, with that, our time in Kenya drifted slowly to a close. I made it home with my paintings and a collection of gorgeous painted wooden birds, all of which still have a home with me.
Soon after I arrived home, I was watching my local TV station and saw a family talking about the “dreadful fire we experienced on our holiday in Kenya”. They said that we had all been placed in tremendous danger, while the hotel staff did little or nothing to help us. The events they described were far from what I remembered but, try as I might, when I phoned the TV station to tell them about the fire from my perspective, no-one was interested. I shouldn’t have been surprised because, at the hotel, we had all overheard people saying that they were going to exaggerate and even lie about what had happened in order to get some compensation out of the hotel or their holiday company. In truth, the only people who suffered were the hotel employees, several of whom were laid off because there was not enough work for them with the hotel only half full. It left a bad taste in my mouth!
The five of us who had stayed on agreed that we would send very positive feedback about our holiday in general and about our experience at the resort in Mombasa, especially our kind and dedicated tour manager. I asked, if possible, that there should be some compensation for the staff who lost their jobs. I was delighted to receive a lovely bunch of flowers from them by way of thanks.
Strictly speaking I was not here on my own this year, as I was visited by family members and friends throughout my French adventure, but it did begin that way.
In 2008 I decided, for a change, that I would stay closer to home but take a longer than usual holiday. So I asked my French friends if they could find somewhere, fairly close to their home, for me to rent for a month. They would have been happy for me to stay with them – they told me as much – but I didn’t want to impose and I did want to be able to invite family members to join me. As it was, they found me a wonderful old farm house in the same village and my invitations to stay soon found me with almost a full month of guests.
I set off from home, with my car full to the seams and with my trusty satnav. This was the “here on my own” bit. I drove down from Yorkshire, took the 5pm ferry, arrived safely in Calais and managed to find my way to my overnight hotel. Luckily the journey to my friends’ home can now be done mainly on the motorway, although there are a few tricky junctions where motorways intersect and this was where my satnav came into its own. It is also a bit awkward when you come to the douane on the motorway and have to get out and walk around your car to pay, while the furious drivers are queuing up behind you. Anyway, I found my way the 260 or so miles to their home, including a stop for lunch. I spent a few days staying with my friends before moving into my new “home” on my first Saturday.
“My” farmhouse
My younger daughter and her partner arrived later the same day and stayed for a week. It was the following weekend that we witnessed “The great duckling rescue” in a small town called Les Riceys and this is what happened.
The Champagne region in France is far more widespread than the well-known towns of Reims and Epernay. It extends southwards into the department of Aube, which is where my friends live and which is where the small town of Les Riceys is situated. However, the producers in the north can be very sniffy about the quality of the champagne produced in the south. We once stayed a few days in Reims on our way to visit our friends and any discussion about the champagne produced in these southerly parts of the region was shut down with absolute disdain.
However, every year there is a celebration of the smaller producers of this wonderful wine called “La Route du Champagne” and every few years it will be the turn of Les Riceys (actually 3 communes: Ricey-Haut, Ricey-Haute-Rive and Ricey-Bas) to host the event. In addition to its Champagne, Les Riceys is known for Rosé de Riceys (pink and sparkling) and two still wines, Cộteaux Champenoise Rouge and Cộteaux Champenoise Blanc. I can vouch for the quality of these wines, because I have tried them all!
When you visit “La Route du Champagne”, the premise is that you buy a book of vouchers and a glass, which allows you, over the weekend, to visit producers and sample their champagne. In 2008, this involved 30 producers and cost €8. This year I have read that it cost €30 – still great value, I would argue! As luck would have it, we just happened to be in the right place at the right time.
We drove the short journey to Les Riceys, parked the car and bought our tickets (apart from my daughter who was not well and so didn’t drink). The whole commune was decorated with flowers and little scenes created with model figures. We wandered around the village, calling into a number of producers, including Champagne Morize, where we found our friends helping out. They have family links with this Champagne house and I had visited it many times before to buy rather than to sample.
As we walked along, we noticed that a crowd was gathering around a bridge across a small river. There was a family of ducks swimming near a weir and one of the tiny ducklings had been washed over the weir and wasn’t able to get back up to its mother and siblings. A young lady was berating her companion and seemed to be suggesting that she was about to do something about this, which obviously worried him and, all of a sudden, he was removing his trousers, moving along a barrier by the weir and climbing down into the water. The water came up to his waist and must have had quite an undertow as it rushed under the bridge. He made his way towards the duckling; the crowd held its breath but the duckling managed to flap its way out of his grasp. He followed it back towards the barrier and it managed to avoid him again. In fact, he followed it around for several minutes with the crowd becoming increasingly worried about the fate of both man and duckling! Finally, he cornered it, close to the weir where its anxious mother was looking for it. He scooped it up and threw it back over the weir to where its family was waiting and the water was smooth. A huge cheer went up through the crowd and the hero of the afternoon was applauded as he climbed back up the barrier, took off his wet shirt and replaced his trousers. It was the highlight of our afternoon, even more so than the 7 glasses of champagne that we managed to taste. We could have gone back the next day, to use more of our vouchers but my companions were setting off for home and more members of my family were about to arrive. There were beds to be changed and dust to be swept up.
I thoroughly enjoyed this long stay, which included a trip to EuroDisney (never again), to Aube’s own theme park, Nigloland, visits to Burgundy and Chablis and a guided tour around Essoyes, where I learned a great deal about the Family Renoir (from painter/sculptor to filmmaker). Before I left for home, I was tootling around the countryside with my GPS language set to French and was regularly being asked if I had a loyalty card at the local Atac supermarket. Best of all, I was able to spend time sharing good times with old friends. My family and I were lavishly entertained by my friends and their family (all of whom I have known for years) and it was good to be able to entertain them occasionally, even when it was simply for an aperitif (very French!).
I hope you enjoy the photos of the “Route du Champagne”. It was a very small part of a great 5 weeks…. with mostly good weather!
“I did not climb Mt Everest…but touched it with my heart”
Nepal 2012
I was back in the airport where I had arrived only two days before, although I was feeling much wider awake this time and very excited about being there. When I landed, I was at the end of around twenty-four hours of travel. I had been collected on a September afternoon to drive to Heathrow. Two other travellers were already in the taxi and I was pleased to discover that they were going to be on exactly the same holiday as me. We caught an overnight flight to Indira Gandhi Airport in Delhi, followed by a long wait and a second flight to Kathmandu. Don’t get me wrong, I really enjoy long-haul travel and, in my mind, my holiday starts the moment I step out of my front door. I enjoy people watching at the airport, seeing the latest films during the flight, I usually quite enjoy the food and then there is the anticipation of what I am going to be doing when I arrive. But, even with a lot of napping on the planes, I was feeling pretty exhausted by the time I made it out of the airport, met the other eleven people on our trip, together with our guide and climbed onto the minibus to travel to our hotel.
The following day was packed with visiting some of Kathmandu’s most famous landmarks. Our morning was spent visiting the World Heritage Site of Pashupatinath Temple, Nepal’s most sacred Hindu shrine and then the Boudhanath Stupa, a centre for Nepal’s community of local and exiled Tibetan Buddhists.
The Boudhanath Stupa
This was followed by a lovely lunch of mixed vegetables in Nepali spice with rice and then a walk around Durbar Square, another UNESCO World Heritage Site, which is important for both Buddhist and Hindu ceremonies. In the evening, we were taken for a traditional Nepali meal of several delicious courses accompanied by traditional dancing and some very strong alcohol.
Nevertheless, I was up at 5am the next morning for breakfast and a departure for the airport at 6am. I think that I have mentioned before that I am usually very keen to go on most of the trips which are an important part of the type of holidays I like. So – why would you come to Kathmandu and miss out on a flight around Mt Everest? I seem to remember that it was an expensive trip but, as an experience, you cannot put a price on it.
We passed quickly through the internal flights check in and I was re-assured to discover that we were travelling with Buddha Air. Surely, he would keep us safe? We were escorted to a small plane. It had just sixteen seats, each at one of the windows. It was cloudy and so we didn’t hold out a great deal of hope of seeing much but we took off and climbed through the clouds until, all of a sudden, we were emerging through them into a clear sky with a view of a range of snow-capped mountains. We flew alongside the peaks as the anticipation grew until we reached Mt Everest. From our window seats we could see the mountain from different angles but then, to everyone’s surprise, we were invited to leave our seats one by one and go to stand beside the pilot to get a better view and take a photo. We then flew back, alongside the peaks again, then across the green fields and, finally, we saw the tiny buildings of Kathmandu before everything disappeared into the clouds and we landed safely.
It was the most wonderful experience and one that still stays in my mind after all these years. Buddha Air even presented us with a certificate to prove we had actually done it!
However, no allowance was made for our early start and we were met by our bus and whisked straight off to visit the ancient city of Bhaktapur, where we spent the morning exploring the little alleyways, more temples and shrines.
Bhaktapur
Our exciting day finished with a talk about the next stop on our tour, Tiger Tops Tharu Lodge, tucked away in the jungles of Chitwan National Park.
In search of T27 – The Dhawajandi Female – Part 2 (or it might have been T31 Chhoti Mada Female)
India 2017
It’s hard to explain the feelings of excitement and anticipation as the gates open and you drive through into the Park. At first the jeeps drive in line until they reach the point where they separate to visit the different zones of the park. From our entry point at the Mukki Gate, we could visit the Mukki Zone, the Kanha Zone and the Kisli Zone. Each of these have different habitat and different inhabitants.
There is little to see at first, until the jeeps have split to go off into “their” zone. Then you are going to marvel at the sight of so many animals and birds, which you have never seen before. I believe that, in 2017, there were around 20 Bengal tigers with territories within the Mukki Zone. Of course, there is no guarantee that you will see a tiger, although that is what you hope for and on the morning of my last day at Kanha, of course I had tigers on my mind. My wish to see these beautiful creatures in the wild was what had brought me on my first visit to India. However, I kept reminding myself that I should just be amazed that, at the age of 70, I was really here, bouncing along in a jeep in a forest in the heart of India. On that first visit to Kanha, most days I went on two drives. I saw several species of deer and antelope, including rare Barasingha (or Swamp Deer). Kanha is home to the only population of the sub-species of Southern Swamp Deer. As their name suggests, they like to spend their time grazing, often up to their bellies in water. I saw other rare species, including sloth bears and wild dogs and, thanks to the naturalists who were able to point them out far in the distance, so many birds whose names I had never heard of, many species of owls and eagles and, of course, the more familiar peacock. In fact, I had so many wonderful experiences in Kanha that I am sure I will write about more of them another day and I still hope to return there some time.
Back to that morning….
We had not been in the park for long, although the sun had come up and it was starting to warm up a little, when we were called over by another jeep, who had seen and heard signs of a tiger nearby. It happens regularly – there will be an alarm call, perhaps from a group of langurs, which is heard by the naturalists and so jeeps will head towards it and wait to see what appears. It may be nothing. You can wait and wait and no tiger will appear, or the alarm calls will move away from where you are waiting. You may even catch a tantalizing glimpse of an orange stripe and then it just disappears.
On this occasion, the other jeep soon left but we stayed on and we were eventually rewarded when a female tiger appeared from the forest and walked straight onto the path in front of us. She sat down for some time and then stood up and began to walk towards the jeep as we just sat there silently, totally mesmerised. We had been warned to stay seated, remain quiet and not lean out of the jeep in order to take photographs. Then, we were told, the tiger would simply be aware of a single large “mass”, which she would ignore. And so she did.
Our naturalist reversed slowly up the path towards a junction where he waited as she walked straight past us without a glance.
We were able to follow her as she paused occasionally to scent mark. Suddenly she stopped and crouched down, as if she was starting to hunt. There was a spotted deer ahead of us and she had seen it! She crawled through the grass on her belly, finally hiding behind a tree just yards away from the deer. We stopped and turned off the engine. We could hardly breathe. Then the deer saw her and ran. To be honest, I was relieved! The hunt was exciting but I’m not sure I wanted to share in one which ended with a success for the tiger rather than the deer.
The tiger wandered back across the path and, in a second, disappeared into the forest. Afterwards, we couldn’t stop talking about her; her size as she walked towards us, the fact that we could see the individual hairs of her coat as she walked alongside us, that hunt and how it ended and just our luck to have spent almost half an hour in the company of such a magnificent animal. The conversation carried on at our breakfast stop. By the time we returned to camp, it was late morning and the day had heated up so that I had peeled off my excess layers of clothing. We were met with cool flannels to wipe our hands and face and even cooler drinks and, of course, we couldn’t wait to tell everyone else about our exciting morning! That early morning start was vindicated!
I have a book called “Tigers of Kanha”, complete with photographs of all the known tigers living in the park. They each have an identifier and I believe that this tiger was either T27, also known as Dawajhandi Female or, more likely, T31, also known as the Chhoti Mada Female. I have been looking at two editions of the book and, while I know that T27 had a litter of four cubs, they were not born until mid-2017. On the other hand, T31 had two cubs born in 2016, of whom only one survived. From my diary, I can see that we had briefly seen “our” tiger the day before, accompanied by a single cub (although she was alone on the second occasion) so I think that might be her.
After lunch, we left for our second drive full of hope that the morning’s tiger sighting might be repeated, but although the drive was filled with all sorts of life and totally engaging, the tigers all remained elusive. The next day, I bid farewell to Kanha National Park and Shergarh Tented Camp and set off, first by car the 77 miles to Jabalpur, then 110 miles by train to Pipariya (with delays this took a massive 3 hours!) and finally an hour to drive the last 22 miles to Reni Pani Jungle Lodge for the second part of my adventure in Satpura National Park.
I was in the middle of an early morning dream when someone called out to me “Hello”. I was about to respond when the voice called out again, a bit louder this time. “Hello”. At the third time of calling, my bedside alarm also went off and, suddenly, I was wide awake.
“Hello. Can I bring your coffee?”, the voice continued. “Yes, please”, I managed to reply. I heard the zip go around the tent door and a member of the Shergarh team stepped through it carrying a tray of coffee and biscuits. When he had put the tray down and left, I forced myself to get out of my warm bed into the chilly March morning. Over the last few days, I had learned just how cold it could be getting up in the dark at 5am and, as a precaution, (and I have never told anyone this before), I had gone to bed wearing some undergarments and a pair of socks so that I could dress as quickly as possible, without too many shocks. I put on the layers of clothes that I had laid out the night before – T-shirt, cardigan, (these were blooming cold. “Is there a way I could have warmed these up too”, I wondered), then long trousers, a fleece and a waterproof, while at the same time eating the biscuits and drinking the welcome, hot coffee. Luckily, there was also hot water available for a perfunctory wash.
As I was dressing, I remembered fragments of my dream, as you often do when you are woken suddenly and I wondered why, whenever I do remember dreams, I am always busy organising things for other people who seem to be relying on me. How great it is that, for once, someone else is doing all the organising and I just have to relax and appreciate where I am!
This was my last day at this Shergarh Tented Camp and tomorrow I would be setting off to travel to Satpura for the second part of my holiday. I was sad to be leaving this place where I had had my first taste of India but excited to be visiting somewhere else new, especially as I would be travelling part of the way by train. This was a special holiday, to celebrating reaching yet another year with a 0 on the end and I had left the planning in the hands of a travel company. I had given them just two words as the basis of my requirements and these were “India” and “tigers” and here I was, thinking what a wonderful choice they had made for the first few days.
My rucksack was packed ready for the day and on the spare bed. The camera battery had been charged during the evening, I had my flask of water (no plastic bottles here), I had picked up my phone in case I wanted to video something, I had my passport (or did I? Better check again, as they won’t let you in the park without it). Yes, my passport is here, with some money for tips for the park ranger, then finally my thermal gloves and even a woolly hat.
I began to hear voices passing by my tent, as my companions for the morning made their way down towards where our naturalist would be waiting by the jeep. I stepped out of my tent into the dark and someone from was immediately there with a torch to light my way over the bridge and down the path. A fellow guest rang the bell for luck and we climbed into the jeep, wrapped our knees in the welcome blankets, tucked the hotties in among them and headed for Kanha National Park. The jeep was full today as there were two new guests who must have arrived last night after I had gone to bed.
This was my last day at this small, tented camp and tomorrow I would be setting off to travel to Satpura for the second part of my holiday. I was sad to be leaving this place where I had had my first taste of India but excited to be visiting somewhere else new, especially as I would be travelling part of the way by train. For this special holiday, I had left the planning in the hands of a travel company. I had given them just two words as the basis of my requirements and these were “India” and “tigers” and here I was, thinking what a good choice they had made so far.
We bumped along the path to the main road and headed for the park. I was grateful for all my layers of clothes as we sped along. It was still dark and the cold air whipped our faces. There was always a queue at the park gate and every jeep wanted to be at the front. When we arrived, the naturalists jumped down and collected our passports to be checked against the booking list and there was always a buzz amongst them and amongst the waiting passengers. At last he returned and we were joined by a park ranger who settled himself at the back of the jeep in the highest row of seats. Between them, our naturalist and the ranger would listen for sounds and look for signs that there could be a tiger nearby and they would point out the deer, antelopes, lemurs, drongos, peacocks, eagles and all the other animals and birds that we would meet on our drive.
At last, it was 6am, the gates opened and, as the first red morning light began to appear on the horizon, we set off on our search.
In the daylight – my tent in the beautiful, peaceful Shergarh Tented Camp
If Costa Rica was a person, I would describe them as being “Comfortable in their own skin”. This is a country which displays artefacts from 1200 years of cultural history in its National Museum in San José, accessed by walking through a flurry of free-flying butterflies of every imaginable colour. Not far away, in one of the town’s squares, there is a sculpture on a plinth celebrating the patriots who successfully defended the country in 1857 from annexation by the Texans, who were constantly trying to extend their borders. Today Costa Rica is the most stable country in Central America, with one of the lowest poverty rates in Latin America, a long history of democracy, and with no standing army. I learned this from our Tour Manager, who was also a lecturer in ecology, when I managed to engage him in a conversation about politics while the other travelers were off shopping.
In the Butterfly House at the entrance to the National Museum in San Jose
Costa Rica’s Heroes!
Another thing about Costa Rica is their commitment to the environment. We had plenty of information about this from the Tour Manager, of course, and we learned to tell the difference between a natural forest and a managed forest, where trees had been replanted following eruptions from any of the country’s still-active volcanoes (there are 5 of them).
Costa Rica is certainly one of the most beautiful countries I have visited. It offers the traveler jungles, forest canopies, rivers, and two amazing coasts, the Caribbean and the Pacific, as well as the volcanoes, of course. Its wildlife, which is usually my reason for visiting a country, is magnificent. It is home to over 900 species of birds, including the scarlet macaw, which is actually blue and yellow as well as red and which will screech at intruders (like us) who swing up high into their home in the forest canopy. More welcoming were the tiny birds of many colours who joined us every day at breakfast to feast on pieces of fruit put out for them by the staff. There are four species of monkey, of which I saw spider monkeys, capuchins and howler monkeys, who reminded me of angry neighbours shouting at each other in the street. We came across one group trying to defend its territory and a huge battle of the voices had begun. I would have given them all an asbo. And then there were the monitor lizards and crocodiles! It was the first time I have ever come across monitor lizards while wandering around the grounds of a hotel and it was the first time that I have stayed close to a river, just a few hundred yards from my room, which was home to crocodiles, who occasionally came out to bask – and eye us up as a tasty treat, perhaps! In fact, it seemed that you couldn’t drive alongside, cross over or sail on any river that wasn’t bursting with crocodiles.
Those crocodiles!
…. And a Monitor Lizard
Some of Our Sweet Breakfast Companions
One thing I always do at the start of a holiday is to sign up for all the available trips. What is the point of visiting a country if you don’t visit the country? This holiday was certainly action-packed, with walks through the jungle in Manuel Antonio National Park and across walkways suspended in the canopy, ascents up through the canopy in trains and gondolas and, for some brave souls (not me), a zip-wire descent afterwards, then boat trips on some of the country’s rivers.
The first one, on the Rio Grande de Tarcoles, was a fairly sedate outing. We sailed up the river in a sizeable boat, eventually visiting a large mangrove forest. We saw a lot of different species of birds, and I was pleased to have my binoculars with me and to make them work for me. I’m not the best with bins’ and other people have often moved on to look at something else before I have managed to focus on the first bird. On this trip, I became aware that there were some very serious birders among us. We had all been given sheets to keep a record of all the mammals, birds, insects and reptiles we had seen. The birders, however, were also recording not just species but sub-species in their serious looking journals. I enjoyed seeing the birds, of course, but was rather disappointed not to see any animals – other than the ubiquitous crocodiles.
When we had moved on to the second part of the holiday, in the centre of the country and close to the Arenal Volcano, two trips were particularly notable for very different reasons. About ten minutes from our resort was the San Carlos River and, on a day when I had already been on a crocodile hunt and then, by contrast, had an amazing reflexology treatment, we arrived at the river bank by coach in the afternoon. There were several large dinghies waiting for us and we were issued with lifejackets. We swept down the river through a series of small rapids and sometimes we got stuck in shallow areas. There was much banter among the oarsmen when this happened and a jolly atmosphere everywhere. I was happy to see both birds and howler monkeys, while enjoying the scenery on the riverbank and the eye-catching sculpture of old tree trunks where they had been caught as they washed down the river. I thought that the birders were missing something as they seemed to spend their time ticking off bird sightings and some began to complain that they were not seeing all the species they had expected to see.
Swirling Down the River (I should have known it wouldn’t end well!)
We were heading for an eco-farm established over 60 years ago by two brothers. Sadly, the last brother had died only two weeks before at the age of 101. However, his family had asked that we still visit. The dinghies arrived one by one at a small pier and everyone climbed out. Mine was the last dinghy to arrive and, as I took my turn, my legs suddenly went from under me, the dinghy shot backwards across the water and I fell in the river up to my chest, taking with me the two men who were trying to help me! My camera went in too. We eventually made it out of the river, luckily there were no crocodiles in our vicinity and, dripping with water I climbed the steps to Don Pedro’s house, where there was a welcome cup of coffee and some tasty treats waiting for us. The family seemed to be touched by our condolences and spoke to us about the work of their farm, most of which I must say went over my head as by now I was very aware that everyone knew what had happened to me and I was concerned about the opacity, or otherwise, of my wet clothing. It was a relief to get back in the dinghy and climb out safely to get on the coach, where I had to sit on a carrier bag in order to protect the seat. Arriving back at my room, I threw my dirty clothes on the floor and headed for the shower. To cheer myself up and try to regain some dignity, I dressed in my best outfit, and I had a couple of large pina coladas at the bar. Some of my fellow travelers told me about saving my camera by burying it in grains of rice and I managed to beg a small amount from the kitchen. And it worked! Not for a couple of days but it was a great relief when it eventually turned on, and I was snapping away again before the end of the holiday.
After that, it might seem rather foolhardy to opt for another river trip but I am nothing if not adventurous when on holiday and so it was that, a couple of days later, I set foot in a rather larger boat to head up a tributary of the San Juan river. We saw the usual bird, primate and reptilian suspects, although the monsters were, on this occasion, not crocodiles but cayman. We came to a rather abrupt halt and were told that we had crossed the invisible and rather porous border between Costa Rica and Nicaragua. We pulled into the river bank and landed, back on Costa Rican soil, where we were directed to a small gap in the border fence and told that we could slip through and photograph ourselves standing quite safely, if illegally, in Nicaragua. As I filmed myself stepping back through the gap, I was greeted by our smiling Tour Manager who said, “Welcome to Costa Rica Madam. You have just entered the country illegally, and I must ask you to accompany me to the police station”.
Would I ever go back to Costa Rica? Well, I survived my first viewing of “Frozen” and a hectic three-hour transfer through Miami airport on the way there. I survived a trek through the heat and humidity of the Manuel Antonio National Park. I survived my river dunking and I survived the inevitable embarrassment when someone decided after all to tell me that, yes, my clothes were almost transparent after my dip. I survived being arrested by our tour manager after my moment of anarchy. These were only a handful of the adventures we had. More than anything, I survived a holiday soon after finishing 3 weeks of daily radiotherapy, so I felt invincible! Altogether, I saw some amazing sights and some beautiful animals and birds, I learned something about Central America and I laughed a lot. Unlike some of my earlier holidays, I never had to eat alone and I made two special and lasting friendships. And so, yes, I would go back again, in a heartbeat!
One Anne and Her Dog 