Days 15-25

I arrived in Mumbai or rather I didn’t – I arrived in Thane, which is actually a couple of hours north of Mumbai. I am staying with my friend of 20 years, Kedar and his family – wife Priya, 4 year old Kimaya and mum Mrs Gaekwad. Kedar and I used to be penpals in our teens, back in the day when schools were happy to share your address with randoms! We have kept in touch and after we met for the first time in London last year, I have come to visit.

Kedar is in the Bollywood film industry! He just won an award for Director of Photography and I’ve had the chance to watch the filming of new Netflix movie Chopsticks on location around Mumbai. I even joined in some background action scenes carrying a shopping bag across the mall 😂

First impressions of India – traffic, honking horns and pollution. Every day my weather app warns of ‘Smoke : Very Unhealthy’ and the vehicles have a thick layer of dust. But consider that more people live in Mumbai than Australia… I’ve taken public transport in many developing countries but this is the first time I feared crossing the ten lanes of traffic that never stops! I asked Kedar how do you cross the road and he replied ‘this is India, the biggest economy in the world’ – ‘But how do cross the road??’ – ‘Oh we don’t think about that’ 😂

And please come back, Sri Lanka trains, all is forgiven!! Taking the train home out of South Mumbai, my only aim was to stay inside the women’s only carriage of the moving vehicle, holding my bag above my head to stop it being ripped off. Who knew tiny women could push with so much force?!

I finally saw a few tourists in the Colaba area in South Mumbai. But only a few. Here you’ll find the Gateway to India which is an impressive arch built to welcome King George V and Queen Mary to India when they arrived by boat.

It’s chaotic – although there are oasis of calm to be found in high end cafes serving raw vegan food and great coffee which I sought out of course. There are a lot of millionaires in Mumbai!

My favourite experience in Mumbai by far was crouching in the back of a van with wide open doors and back, whilst filming scenes of a moped racing through the traffic…

Also nice is a walk along the beach although no swimming as the water is toxic.

I hadn’t quite realised how far my base was from Mumbai so after a couple of days with 5 hours of travel time, I stayed local and indulged in a hair spa which included a head massage and pedicure… And most unexpected, a ‘vibrator’, which I wanted to take a photo of but couldn’t really move at the time. The woman attaches the vibrator to her hand then runs her hand over your head (and face!) to revitalise. I certainly felt wide awake after but that may have been the shock. After we went to a great (all veg) Thali restaurant where they just keep refilling hundreds of little bowls of food:

I also liked the ‘Experiments with Chai’ cafe where you pick what additions you want – having no idea what most of them were I ended up with black tea, masala spice, ginger, basil and some others that I can’t spell. It was surprisingly good!

After a few days off I ventured out to the Kanheri Caves. These are caves with ancient rock carvings high up in the Sanjay Gandhi national park. After another 2 hours in an uber (still only costs a few pounds) I paid my entrance fee and looked for the shuttle bus up to the top of the hill. A man approached and explained that as it was a week day and late morning, the bus wouldn’t be running and I’d have to wait maybe 3 hours. Unless of course I took the private ‘official’ car for £20. £20??! I knew this was a scam so said no thanks, I’ll walk the 7km uphill. Two minutes later the bus (which was indeed running up and down all day) picked me up for the grand sum of 20p. It’s this kind of annoyance that makes travelling here more of a hassle.

At the top of the hill were dozens of caves, containing huge Buddhist carvings and inscription, some dating back to the 1st century. I met some girls from Mumbai who very politely asked for a selfie with me (which turned into about ten photos with each member of the group) and visitors from Thailand who insisted on taking photos for me as I was travelling alone 😎

It’s fascinating to think of people living up here once. Interestingly I didn’t notice any signs about not turning your back to the Buddha here like in Sri Lanka!

Heading off to Nasik now for the weekend and some more temples, before flying to Delhi on Monday and starting my tour of Rajasthan…