Bandelier National Monument

Our first day in Santa Fe started with a photo session after breakfast. The first post in this series about the house we stayed in is here.

We started driving to Bandelier National Monument around 8AM and reached there a little after 9 AM. It was a scenic drive with fall colors everywhere!

There are a lot of places in New Mexico to visit. This was a birthday celebration. So the ladies had shortlisted a few places to see considering the crowd and capabilities (my knee, MIL’s ability to walk etc.). Banadiler was supposed to be all level ground for the walking (occasional slope but with ramps and no stairs).

There was a guided tour and we joined that tour for the first 20 minutes. Then we decided to go as a group and see the rest of the stuff with the map.

My knee was put to the test even though it was walking through level ground and the occasional ladder climbing.

This place is our local Cappadocia !!! Similar soft stone where peope made a residence. The fall colors were beautiful as was the weather. It was supposed to rain, but we got lucky throughout the day.

Here are the pictures..

At the end of the canyon there was an alcove house which needed 140 steps to be climbed. We decided to see it from the base of the canyon and turn back. There was no way I was going up those stairs. Was happy to have gotten this far with the knee brace.

A shout out to Uniqlo.. those Gemini Ganesan style pants I bought in the Japan trip in April really came through. You cannot see the knee brace as I am wearing the pants on top of the brace!

We had packed lunch from the bay area and we had that in the picnic benches near the visitor center and drove back.

A video highlight reel…

Came back to the house and had a tea/coffee break. Then did a small photo shoot and we were off to see the Plaza.

That in the next post..

The mother of all crossings at Shibuya- Japan Day 6

The previous post in this series is here..

After visiting the electronic city, we were going to Shibuya crossing to experience the worlds most not so pedestrian pedestrian event..

There was a request from the ladies to stop two train stations earlier and walk through a market which had beauty supply stores in Harajuku area. There was yet another uniqlo store there and me and my friend both got more pants (dont ask!). There was more eye rolling from the ladies and we made a mental note that sometime an extra suitcase purchase was required before the return trip.

we did stop by a few stores to get an idea of suitcase prices and made the long walk from Harajuku to Shibuya. We spent a good 30 minutes at the crossing, going from every point to every other point with the crowd and taking pictures and time lapse videos. Was very proud of the group for holding as still as possible for the time lapse videos.

Then we tried to get food there but we were not lucky. I was also reminding that group that while they could always get something to eat in the hotel (there was a Sizzlers and Starbucks at the Tokyo dome which some group members were eyeing since we checked in), I had to deal with wet clothes that needed laundry. So off we went to the hotel. While everyone else went for dinner, I ate a packet of Parle G biscuits, grabbed change and went to the laundry in the 7th floor. Waited there for 2 hours and by the time the clothes dried and got back to the room at 11 everyone was asleep.

While we were in electronic city earlier, our driver for the next days event called us and asked us if we could be ready by 4:30 AM the following morning. We told him “no way” and said 5:30AM was the best we could do.

the video highlights of Shibuya crossing..

We were to get up at 5 and be outside the hotel at 5:30. So I came back with the laundry and crashed.. Day 7 was going to be interesting..

A thousand lingas

The previous post in this series is here..

After getting down from the reclining Buddha temple, we had a very short drive to another parking area to see the 1000 linga river.

The kings had carved a 1000 lingas and other reliefs on the rock face after blocking the river and once done, had released the river across these carvings. The idea was that the water was blessed by the gods as it flowed over their reliefs and came down as a waterfall. They also planted herbs alongside so the falling water was medicinal.

The water source is a spring and you can see it gush water out in the video at the end of the post. It was cold fresh spring water at its source!

We walked a good mile along the river till we had crossed most of the lingas and turned back. The crowd was starting to arrive.

The next two photos are Sarak taking our making a selfie and the actual selfie..

We prayed at the little Buddha shrine near the river source (which used to be a Linga at some point back in time) and walked back. The buddhist take over some 700 years ago was apparently violent in some places and peaceful in some places where kings reconciled and built temples for Vishnu and Buddha side by side to appease people. Guess we now know where the “buddha is the 10th avatar of vishnu” logic came from. In Hindu mythology the 10th avatar is yet to arrive (Kalki.. who shows up to cleanse the world and close out things).

The video does a better job for this leg of the trip than the photos..

There was a lot of water flowing in the river which meant our next stop was going to be amazing!