Dhaba food in Amritsar

Previous post in series is here..

We were about to have a late lunch after a lot of walking all through the morning. Walked through Golden temple, Jallianwalah Bhag memorial, Durgiana temple, then Gobindgarh fort and finally lunch at 1:45 in the afternoon.

Have already mentioned our first taste of Dhaba food (La Roma Dhaba which serves Maggi noodles that is apt for its name and the Shudh Dhaba right outside Golden temple the previous evening).

There is something to be said about the butter Naan in these Dhaba's. Just like the Sikh's go bathe in the water around the golden temple and come out pure at heart to worship god, the naan's in these dhabas take a dip in pure butter (I am sure there is a butter lake somewhere in that kitchen) and come out ready to make the hungry taster see god. One minute you see a bunch of naan in a basket and the next minute it disappears.. have never seen the kids eat so fast in my life! 

For the afternoon lunch we went to Bharwan dhaba. This one just one upped the Shudh dhaba when it came to the butteriness of the butter naan! it was spicy, fatty and just plain yummy. If you want to die happy, make sure your last meal is at this dhaba! 

After being stuffed to the throat with food, the waiter came and asked us about dessert. We asked him what was special and he knew how to hit my weak spots.. He said "we have mutka kulfi" and "phirini, which is a local delicacy".. we said "okay bring it" and there was a fight for the items across the table. It was that good.

We did however restrict ourselves to some limited sweets so we could move on. The plan was to do some shopping for clothes for the ladies and then go for a break at the hotel and if weather permitted, go see Sadda Pind. We were up for an interesting last evening at Amritsar. 

Durgiana temple and Gobindgarh fort

The previous post on this series is here..

There was a reason Amritsar fit our "trip within a trip" concept perfectly. You could cover all the attractions in the city within 2 days, provided you had a good driver / guide. 

We had one more site that got added. Gobindgarh Fort, which used to house the Kohinoor diamond, was open to the public after 157 years! We just were fortunate to be there after it opened.

We did a quick stop at the Durgiana temple, which was rebuilt to mimic the golden temple. Only the "willing to walk in the hot sun" subgroup went for this. The "rest" stayed in the Van under the shade. This temple also has a gold roof, silver doors and reminds you of how rich things were "once upon a time"!

Given Jr. had spent almost a month in India by the time we visited Amritsar, she had been trained by grandma to walk around temples. She was willing to walk in the sun and that to me was an interesting change! 

We spent a litle under an hour at the Durgiana temple and were off to the Fort. At first we were disappointed to learn that the actual fort was a good mile or more from the parking lot.

That meant half our party would refuse to go citing leg weakness and heat! Fortunately, one of the guards said that for a fee they can get us inside on a vehicle, provided we can wait for 10-15 minutes. So we gladly paid and took the ride. 

There were not that many visitors, it being a week day and we pretty much went through all the history of the place, watched a show in the theater within the fort, have San and the little one go on a "camel ride" and come out in time for lunch.

there were a few horses in the fort that were used to give rides. One of the horses was an albino (I think). It was beautiful to see..

and did I mention the "camel ride"? The little one for some reason, wants to go on Camel rides every chance she gets.. maybe because she missed out in Jaipur a few years ago... this time she was not disappointed!

The camel ride, short and sweet.. smile on their faces, priceless! 

Then there was a late lunch. That lunch deserves a special post in itself ! 

Jallianwala Bhag Memorial and a walk around the Golden temple

The previous post on this series from the India trip in Summer of 2017 is here..

The Jallianwala Bhag memorial is right outside the Golden temple. Have read about in history books and have seen it appear in many movies like Gandhi or the recent Phillauri. 

It is a place that is sombre in mood because of the lives lost in the massacare. You get chills when you look down the well where hundreds jumped to escape the bullets but died in the well. 

What happened in this place is something the mind cannot comprehend! The place in pictures..

They have a statue at the entrance that is very poignant. Took shots of it in the night and during the day.

Guess the crowd was an easy target when you have narrow entrances like this to an open park!

We walked around the lawns, saw the bullet holes in the walls, then walked out in silence.

On our way out, I looked up at Jr. and she smiled back at me. Then she broke the mood and we took a selfie under a tree with beautiful flowers.

Then we took pictures around the beautiful statues and buildings in the access road to the temple. The place was absolutely clean and it was nice to walk around.

The entrance to the Golden temple and the Jallianwala Bhag Memorial is all tiled. There is a serious and lively atmosphere here that is hard to explain. Most of the temple visitors have a very serious look on their face. The kids though are running around like crazy and all this co-exists in a nice way.

Walking around there and taking pictures definitely changed our mood to a lighter one..

We had to move on to our next stop...