India Pt 3, 02 - 16 Jan '26

This was the peaceful portion of India...yoga and calm on the Mother Ganges, no horns and limited chaos...until we got to Kolkata, at least. India was much more than I expected...so much so that it required three separate posts. This post could have had an entire section for monkeys and their antics - they're like little drunk humans, especially the babies. And apparently they don't understand how glass works. The pic above was from outside our room. We set a couple of bananas down in the room after breakfast without thinking about it. What followed was slightly mean on our (my) part but so hilarious we couldn't stop laughing...or moving the bananas from sight. There is a video below that is even funnier.

More words at the bottom...

A monkey with an Ice Cream Cone...check out the ice cream drops on her face - I've been there, sister!

Rishikesh - The Ganges River, Yoga retreat, lovely hippies and a death-defying safari ride

Watch this but don't hate me..

I know, I know - this was mean and I'm probably going to Hindu Hell for it. It wasn't intentional...I just laid the banana there and then they swarmed us, but it was frigging funny!!! If you are interested, get Lyd to send you the Monkey Kama Sutra pictures - we had a Primate Hook-Up going on on our patio. Oooooh, they're nasty little creatures...

Kolkata - the Honking capital of the world.

We spent 10 days in and around Rishikesh, with 7 of them at a yoga and Ayurveda retreat, Veda5. Rishikesh (or the City of the Divine) is somewhat famous as the place the Beatles went to an Ashram (Hindu Temple/School) in the 60’s. It was known as a hotbed of spiritualism for millennia and then yoga and Ayurvedic treatments but got more famous after the Beatles. Since then it’s turned into a little hippie Mecca, offering lots of different yoga schools and trainings, Hindu teachings and Ayurvedic medicinal treatments. There is a renowned Ayurvedic medical school in the city and lots and lots of yoga retreats. And tons of patchouli and dreadlocks. Stinky hippies!!! Just joking - they’re always my favorite people!

The retreat was just outside Rishikesh…on a steep hill looking down on Hiwal stream, a tiny little tributary to the mighty Ganges River (Ganga in Hindi). About a mile in the distance you can see the Ganges and occasionally hear the rafters screaming and cheering as they make their way through the rapids. I sat on its rocky banks near Rishikesh one day for a couple of hours and watched the rafters float by, some shivering but all howling or cheering and enjoying the class I and II waters. The water is a beautiful greenish silver as it comes from the nearby Himalayas, so it’s cold AF. I dipped my hand in and quickly lost any interest in getting on a raft on this trip!!!

So the retreat is a cool little hippy sanctuary, nestled on a mountain overlooking a valley. Our rooms were pretty nice but only had a little space heater so it got really cold at night. Fortunately we had an electric blanket, but the stinking floor to the bathroom at 4 in the morning was torture. I’m not sure how monks sought enlightenment in those cold mountain caves - how can you meditate when your toes are numb??? Even worse is the frigid toilet seat - holy hell I squealed a few times it was so cold. I tried to get wife to go before me and warm it up but she said she doesn't love me that much.

Aside from the freezing toilet seat and floor, the retreat was amazing. My only real problem with it was that they only had one or two yoga classes each day…and for a yoga retreat, that seemed a bit sparse. The major focus seemed to be on the Ayurvedic and holistic lifestyle, which was fine but it would have been nice to have some more stretching classes. But I learned later that all veg and stretching don’t always mix that well. Especially in a quiet yoga room. Also, it was really cold in the yoga room at 6:30 so people were yoga'ing in their beanies and puffy coats - my hot-yoga hamstrings don't love the cold like that.

While I loved the week there, the biggest WIN for me was, surprisingly, the food. After four or so weeks of wonderful food in all parts India (I love Indian food!), I wasn’t expecting a lot from a secluded retreat. But the chefs were excellent and the totally vegan food was far better than anything I’d had before. Actually, it was some of my favorite food of the entire yearlong trip so far. They also practiced Satvic (Sattva) cooking, which I’d never heard of, but was, among other things, cooking without Onion and Garlic. Lyd had some issues with it because she is a five year old and hates pumpkins and a couple of nights they had an entire pumpkin based menu, but the quality of the cooking was amazing. They also did some cooking classes that were really only a way for me to eat more between meals.

So, what is Ayurveda?

Ayurveda, meaning "knowledge of life," is an ancient Indian holistic system of medicine focused on balancing mind, body, spirit, and environment through diet, herbs, yoga, and massage, emphasizing personalized wellness and prevention.

Yeah, that’s pretty nebulous, I know. I was pretty ignorant of it before we got there but our private physician, Dr. Hunt, said it was based on thousands of years of practice and the methods are actually still sound, so try it. The Ayurvedic doctors go through years of training and are NOT quacks - we learned they work with western doctors and are quick to pass you along if it’s something better suited for a modern practice. The Ayurvedic practice combined the healthy eating habits with different therapies, including yoga and different types of massage. Each day we’d start with yoga, head to breakfast for a gourmet meal, and then either go to a specialized treatment or attend a rotating list of classes, such as sound therapy, healing arts, meditation, etc. At the start of the week we met with a team of doctors and they prescribed a course of treatments and diets based on the maladies we each discussed - mostly related to sore backs and feet. So each day we had a 90 minute session with a massage, a heavenly steam box that Lyd coined the ‘Dumpling Steamer’, and some other random treatment. I think the staff even started calling it that after she mentioned it. Her cute little therapist even said once “How is my little dumpling doing??? I think my dumpling is cooked and ready…” My treatments were similar but they also focused on my sinus problems - after lots of broken noses I continually suffer from sinus issues, so they had some oil and steam treatments for me that really helped…especially after the hideous pollution from the rest of India.

In general, I felt like it was basically a week long pampering, which I’m not used to. BUT, in money terms, it was amazing. Since it was off-season, the entire week was similarly priced to our regular hotel costs for a week and included all meals and treatments. So overall, I can’t recommend it enough…plus the people that we met were all interesting and fun to hang with. Lyd celebrated her birthday while we were there and the chef cooked a special cake that we shared with the hotel guests and staff and everyone sang her happy birthday, in English!

While there, we took a couple of afternoon side trips. One was to a national park for a game safari with our new friends Laura and Aniela. We were searching for elephants, leopards and tigers and it was funny because it was right next to a main highway. It was like, Take a left at Farmer Ted’s house and there’s an elephant waiting for you. We got really lucky and saw a leopard hunting but never saw any elephants or tigers. It was a beautiful but cold afternoon in the back of an open truck. The safari was also the biggest “This is where we die” moment and “what the hell did we sign on for” and “What about that Travel Insurance conversation, again??” of the entire trip. This was probably the LEAST safe thing we did for the past year…not because of the animals but the crazy-assed driver. We were in an Indian safari truck with no seatbelts, which, even WITH seatbelts wasn’t all that safe, and the top was completely open. This wasn’t so bad in the park, but driving down the highway at 70 miles an hour or around curvy mountain roads we thought we were going to eject with every pothole or competing driver playing chicken with us. In addition, it was friggin cold in the open back, especially after the sun went down, so we were all bundled up and hanging on for dear life. We laughed about it afterwards, but I think in the future we’ll be vetting our excursions a little more closely! But we got to see a leopard!

The other excursion was actually quite a famous one - to a sunset Ganga Aarti, or ceremony, at the Parmarth Niketan Buddhist temple on the Ganges. This temple is the largest in Rishikesh and houses numerous worldwide events each year, including the International Yoga Festival. One of the notable things about the ashram is that there is an American woman that is one of the chief gurus or swami's, Sadhvi Bhagawati Saraswati. She is a PhD from Stanford University that went to India and found her path and is a fascinating story - if you want to dig deeper, here is the web - https://sadhviji.org/about/. The Aarti is a nightly ceremony at sunset on the river with chanting, music and celebration as they pray to the sacred river. Unfortunately the night we went there were no speakers but the service was interesting and captivating. Lots of older monks and baby monks (children that were being raised by the ashram) were singing, playing instruments and chanting, all while the river rushed past in front of us. The crowd grew and grew, numbering a few hundred or a few thousand - it was tough to judge, but is was definitely packed. We thought that someone would get up and do a blessing but then, all of the sudden, they played some music and passed along some open fire candle holder things and then everyone rushed to the water to release little flower offerings to the Ganga. It was quite the clusterf*&$, as is much of India, but we went with it. Our friends had given us some ashes of their cousin to release in the river, so Lyd carefully deposited the ashes onto the little boat made of leaves, lit the candle in it, and set it free down the river. It was actually quite beautiful, if very chaotic, but that’s India in a nutshell.

We finished our India leg in Kolkata (Calcutta) after an amazing month and a few days. And it ended, coincidentally, on the one-year anniversary of the start of this trip, 15 Jan. From Mexico to India via 21 other countries. What an amazing year!

Kolkata was similar to the other major Indian cities with the hustle and bustle but had a different vibe going on. It felt like they had a bit of a chip on their shoulder in relation to the rest of India but not in a bad way. They had different foods, different festivals and a definitely more British colonial feel. But the same population, traffic and poverty problems existed. This is where Mother Teresa began her worldwide mission and actually put a focus on helping the most impoverished rather than simply converting them. We visited the original mission and wandered up to her sparse apartment/office and offered a quick prayer/thank you at her grave. What an amazing human - to think how many downtrodden lives she positively affected over her lifetime…and not for money or fame but simply to help them. This was far more moving than most of the major churches, mosques, synagogues and temples we’ve been to, where the focus is usually on glitz and glamor and donation boxes.

Beyond Mother Teresa, Kolkata has a nice Indian History Museum and showcases some beautiful ancient Hindu relics and archeological finds. In addition, the Victoria Memorial Hall was definitely worth a visit and yet another place that locals swarmed us hoping for conversations and selfies and just to gawk at my pale skin. They all seem mesmerized with my white hair and all of Lyd, in particular. It’s funny how many people simply stared at us and then blurted out “Where are you from???” This always led to funny conversations, lots of selfies and more questions, which we always love. That's one of the things about travel we truly love - connecting.

It’s safe to say that India is a land of extremes. Extreme assault on the senses. Extreme population. Extreme traffic. Extreme poverty and extreme wealth. Extreme smog in some places and beauty in others. An ADD nightmare here and a deep breathing exercise there. But the two extremes I like the most are the people and the food. The people are beautiful and polite (except when in a queue) and gracious and friendly and curious about us and helpful to the extreme. And the other extreme, the food, has been for me the best food of the entire trip, especially the vegetarian food. I still think Indian food deserves more notoriety on the world stage.

I have been completely surprised with the country. I heard a bunch of negative reports about the usual items - the smog, the population density, the traffic and worse, the severe poverty. We’ve witnessed and experienced (from an interlopers’ view) each of these but we’ve also seen lots of signs of a country that might some day take over as the most powerful economic force in the world. Through the chaos I saw signs of advancements…new roads, new buildings, a pride in the national university system that seems to imply that education is a major focus of the population. I saw a LOT of wealth and worldly people here…people that aren’t afraid to travel and experience the outside world and also a lot that want to leave for better opportunities. At the base, I think there is a bit of the US mentality of a hundred years ago - it’s a hard world and you have to fight and scrap and work hard as hell to get ahead and that’s what I felt from the conversations I had with people. People weren’t afraid to move to Dubai or Russia or Canada if it meant getting a better job to support their family. Side note, NOBODY I’ve talked to in the past few months wants to come to the US, anymore. It seems like it’s a distant dream but people are looking elsewhere for their opportunities now…what that means as the US’ “Shining Beacon of World Leadership” role I can’t say but it seems that other places are much more attractive to modern Indians. That’s especially sad when I think back to Raju’s story and the legacy that this one amazing Indian immigrant has been able to bring to our country, especially with his daughters and who we love. Those investments in people take a long time to nurture and realize but last generations, as they have with Raju and Theckla’s kids and grandkids - our friends. Those people are going elsewhere now and don’t see the value as much in America anymore. I hope that changes in the future but it worries me now.