Every travel magazine, every travel channel, every piece of information, that talked about the topic of Romance, touched a place called 'Paris', almost inadvertatnly. What's with romance and Paris, that has everyone hooked to this city. Infact Europe has 2 places prominently labelled for Romance (Romantic Destinations) .Paris and the other... Venice. Well.... a million people can't be wrong. So I thought, till I personally visited Paris last weekend, after trying to shuffle it off my travel list for 3 years, fending off the visit on numerous occasions.I didn't want to visit these so called 'romantic' destinations with my friends. Why would I want to rob the 'first kiss' experience, going with a group of sambar guys? Well I was partly happy at my procastination and partly disappointed as well.

I'll try to throw the towel first. As with every European city this is a over hyped city. Period. I really can't stop admiring the Caucasians (damn I'm sounding racist) for their relative proximity towards our primate ancestors. When the travel guide book says 'visit a cathedral. Sip wine sitting in the sun in a bar outside. It's romantic'. The bible is followed even if the damn wine costs 3 times more. One more guide says 'Take a boat ride in the Seine and bask in the sun, holding hands with your loved ones'. I see a hundred, if not thousand primate ancestors doing exactly the same. Come one guys, there's a spongy stuff, stuffed inside the cranium. Use that. I thought we Indians are clueless travelers. These guys beat us hands down, only in a more stylish manner.

Ok enough of brainstorming (read bashing). This is my travelogue. Will write about that first. Ok. So on a fine Friday morning I arrive in CDG (Charles de Gaulle International Airport). I had booked by room through a couch surfing/room sharing site http://airbnb.com/ and that place was in a place called La Defance, which is accessible by RER Lines. But the owners were out on work on Friday and by the time I reached Paris, they were away at work. So had to work out a way to store my luggage from Friday morning till the evening and on searching the worldwideweb, found that the Gare De Nord station had locker facilities and so took a RER B line from CDG to Gare De Nord and after meandering throw a maze of escalators and subway levels, reached the place to store the luggage. It could take some time to find this place. The easy way is to go to the platforms from where the Thallys runs. There are sign boards that lead you to the luggage storage area. Interestingly they had body scanners and baggage scanners installed, much like the airport security albeit the queue.The rent was nominal, about 4 EUR for a day and that is from 6.30 a.m till 11.15 p.m. not bad eh. Also the location couldn't be better. North Paris is the place for feasting your taste buds with Indian food, as the places around Gare De Nord abound with Indian restaurants.

So got out of the station with no fixed agenda in mind, meandered around the streets of Gare De Nord, read some menus of the Indian restaurants and realized this part of the world offers relatively cheaper Indian food and then roamed the streets where my legs took me. After an hour, at around 11.00 a.m found a street that went uphill. Any road that leads uphill, has something, at least a nice view to offer. The road ended at the foot of a staircase that was neatly lined with linestone carvings. Interesting I thought. More so if the path is throw lush green vegetation. People have told me paris is not really a green city. But one view at this could prove it wrong. Started claiming the stairs (winding stairs) through a nice park and at the end of it I see a white building. Wait  minute, I've seen this place in pictures. It's called 'Basilique du Sacré-Cœur'. People have told me, the way to reach this place is get down at Metro Station 'Anvers' and walk straight up. But this seems to be a 'off the tourist track'. I have put in the google maps link to reach this place, the way i reached it.
The church was nice and so was the surroundings. After loitering around, decide to explore and went down behind the church to climb down staired apartments. It was a nice walk, quite shady. Then it was time to taste some Indian Food.

When i googled for good Indian restaurants, there was not really many options, but one did mention that Krishna Bhavan (24 rue Cail, Paris 75010, France) is a better place especially their vegetarian thali for 8 EUR. I had a hard time finding this place and the name of the street didn't appear in any of the maps that I had. Every damn street in paris starts with rue and differentiating from rue cail rue cuil from the tiny map I had was like trying to find the gender of a mosquito. After almost getting lost in the city, decided to roam around Gare De Nord and did managed to find the place. Getting down at La Chapelle is a better option. Search for rue cail in gogle maps and you can figure out quite easily. The food was not bad at all for 8 EUR. Infact it was a unlimited meals for 8 EUR. Dosa here costs 4 EUR.

Came out of the restaurant and found Anjappar net door. Checked the dosa price, it was 3 EUR !. Tomorrow's lunch place decided.

Then it was time to check out the Eiffel tower. I had gathered that visiting the Eiffel up and close and personal could intimidate you. And so decided to get down at the Tracadero metro stop, to have a full view of the Eiffel tower and boy i was not let down. The view from here is uninterrupted. Truly majestic.

I have heard folks going up the Eiffel tower in the lift and I also gathered that the queues would be quite long. True to the warnings, the queues were long, but there was absolutely no soul in the counter that sells the 'climbing up' tickets. Umm...lucky me. The ticket was 4 EUR you know. You wouldn't believe, it took me about 30 mins to reach the 2nd level, while I could see folks still waiting down to get in to the lift. I think it makes sense to climb up and that is if you are inclined to physical labor. But I think I was not completely lucky. For some strange reason, may be 'coz Obama was in Paris that day, the lift to the upper floor was suspended. I had to be contend with the view from the second level. Eventually I didn't manage to go up the top level on any other day. Umm....

Wanted to see the sunset from the top of the Eiffel tower. But the sun was very active and decided not to get to bed at least till 11.00 p.m and I had to get back to Gare de nord collect my luggage and check in to the place, which I had booked. I couldn't bother to disturb the hosts after they are asleep and hence had to climb down at 10.00 a.m, collect my luggage and reached the place which was about 20 mins away by train from Gare de nord. The hosts were very nice people and since I was drop dead tired, went to bed immediately.

To be continued

Labels: Travel

• The bigger YOUR seat, the bigger seat you can demand in the government.

• Now that the council of ministers have resigned and the portfolios are yet to be allocated, you can reserve your seat by putting a 'thundu' in the seat. Even better put a saree. (Pakkathula irukavanga saree-ai uruviraadheenga.....kazhaga kanmanigalukku idhu kai vandha kalai ache)

• If you have asked for the Surface Transport & Shipping post and the govt is unwilling to part with it, then scale down your demand...may be... pallavan transport or better ABT transports. Don't give up.
  

• If you have asked for the defence ministry and govt is reluctant, give them your credentials, of you defending your vaeti , sattai during the panchayat council meeting. They will be mighty impressed. if you show the photo credentials (of you holding on to your dear vetti, coz the local saraya lady had uruvified your undrawer earlier in the day and you wanted to protect your ....), published in DinaMakku.

• Don't ask the home ministry to be given to your wife, just because she handles YOUR home.

• Don't imagine something else, when you desire to be external AFFAIRS ministers. It's NOT what you think. So are the following ministries - Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports,Ministry of Tribal Affairs,Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs,Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs,Ministry of Minority Affairs,Ministry of Corporate Affairs

• If you have 10 kids and you have 5 more in the pipeline, you are qualified to be Minister of Labour and Employment.
  

• If you don't get a ministerial berth, don't ask for availability of ministerial RAC or ministerial sitting

Labels: Kusumbu

READ Part 1 Here

Part 2:
What a first day it was. At sunset started walking back to Studor from the lake, this time through paved roads, as it was getting dark and I didn't want to be eaten by a fire breathing dragon lurking behind the trees. The road less traveled offered another view of the valley, this time washed red with the setting sun rays. It was a spectacle in itself. As the apartment where we were staying had a fully equipped kitchen, we thought of buying some groceries and boy what a stock it was. On a normal day it would have lasted for a week. One thing to note thought, I was expecting the eastern European countries to be relatively inexpensive, but not so in Slovenia. The food was as expensive as in holland. It would have bombed my wallet, had I opted to eat out in a restaurant every day, We made some nice pasta and had a good dinner, overlooking the mountains. The house had this view from every room.

Day 2:
By the time we woke up the next day, it was already 9.00 a.m and it was cloudy, threating to rain any moment. But just yesterday the lady downstairs had exclaimed that we had brought the sun to this place. May be not in full, I thought to myself. Packed some bananas, bread and pasta for lunch and headed out to the place called Vogel . It was a ski center in Ukanc. 4 km from the tourist center of Bohinj. There are hourly buses to this place and we were just on time at around 10.30 to catch the bus to Ukanc. It was a short 5 mins ride, along the periphery of the lake. Ukanc is at the western edge of the lake and I presumed it wouldn't take more than a hour's walk from Ukanc back to Studor and I already started fantasizing about this, with the view that I saw from the bus. From 1 D view, wanted a 3 D view.

The ski center Vogel can be reached by cable car from Ukanc and in late Apr, the place had good snow, I mean really good snow, about 4 meters of it ! must have been snowing cats and dogs and dinosaurs in winter.It was again a short 5 mins ride up to the ski center. From this place the highest peak in Slovenia Triglav peak was partly visible hiding behind the clouds. It was quite intimidating and I'm sure so would be the hike up to the peak in summer.
I was told unless I wanted to commit suicide I wouldn't risk hiking the mountain now. (that was the first question I asked when planning to visit Bohinj). But it would be a good challenge to scale the mountain and I like challenges. The sking area was and is beyond any description. I mean how would you feel if you had like the whole skiing area, till the horizon, till the point you eyes could focus all to yourself. Can't get any more romantic eh ?. Check out the pics.

Standing at the edge of the ski center, you couldn't help yourself getting blown away. I mean literally and figuratively. The wind was so strong, it could swipe you off you feet, if you were not gifted with a ponch, like me. The view was so bleddy awesome, you couldn't resist falling for it. Damn it was beautiful.

Spent almost half a day wandering through the snow, in nothing but my jeans and tshirt. I didn't tell you that the weather improved and the sun came out along with us, did I ? :-), may be it was true, what the lady said, we did bring the sun with us. But we come from Amsterdam ,which is eternally climatically cursed. May be we were just lucky.

Came down to Ukanc at around 4 and decided we'll walk the distance back to bohinj, as the lake was showing off her hidden beauty only to the adventurous and the curious and I decided to play ball. The walk back was fantastic to say the least and we reached the lake in a hours time. By the time we reach the tourist center, I was feeling tired and it was time to tame the already timid lake, just yet. Decide to do kayaking on the perfectly romantic looking calm waters, which was to be undone shortly.

Little did I know that the kayak captain sits at the back, unless the titanic captain who sits in the deck. After struggling to get out of rounds, we hardly moved from the shore for about 15 minutes, managed to switch places and this time the captain was at the back, expertly guiding the kayak to the middle of the lake. and that's when the elements thought, 'let's add some rain to this. oh wait, what's a rain with out some wind, i mean gale force winds. Does this look perfect. Not yet, let's rock the boat'. WTF, even though I was shitting my pants, I had to put up a brave face and act as if I was enjoying it. Well to be true, after the initial rocking, it was kinda fun. But the wind and the rain and the rocking stopped after about 15 minutes and the lake assumed her shape back, of that if a timid, calm, lady. It was time to return the Kayak at around 6.00 p.m and we slowly found our way back to the tourist center.

What a day it was. Snow, Rain, Wind. I was missing fire in the action to complete the aimbootham.
As the sun beat a retreat behind the mountains, I t presented a starkingly different view of the lake, this time awe inspiring. I'm a little dumbfounded as to how the same lake could offer totally different views on different days. Unbelievable.

The walk back to the apartment was indeed different. In a day's sunshine, flowers had come to bloom, which hetero were dormant for 6 long months. I mean flowers in all possible colors, that you could imagine. All wild flowers. Man this place had a touch of magic to it. The lurking chef in me took center stage that evening back in the apartment and I cooked this up. If you like verbal indulgence, you may call it a feast. Rice, fish curry, thakali thokku, curd, with only salt and pepper !

After a kumbakarna meals, a equally qualifying sleep, with out putting my camera battery on charge. Little did I realize, that the next day was to have some of the best shots in my trip.

Day 3 .. to be continued

Labels: Adventure, Travel