Today, we took the Shitabdi Express train to Haridwar. When we got there, we hired a guy to take us around in his auto-rickshaw. He was actually pretty good. He didn't try to get us to go to any special stores or anything.
Our first stop was the Gurdwara near to where my grandfather's ashes were scattered. While we were there, a guru did a prayer for us.
One thing about Haridwar is that there are people who keep records of names. So, we looked around to find the guy who kept the information of my dad's family. Deepak uncle wanted to update the records with some newer information and I wanted to get the records for my genealogy tree. Well, we ran around from place to place to find the pundit who kept the records. Unfortunately, we ran into a dead end. We needed to know the name of the village from which our family comes, and we did not. I am disappointed.
The next stop was the dip in the Gunga River. Harikapori was the area where we went to take the dip. I stripped down to my underwear and went down the steps into the water. I had to hold on to the chains because the stairs were slippery and the water was rushing fast. I went all the way down into the water. That water was cold. I guess that's because the water is coming from the Himalayans.
We got dressed and made our way back. As we were doing this, we got harrassed by some guy who wanted a handout. Of course, we weren't gonna give it to him. So this guy followed us. And we walked a little faster, and he kept up. He was giving us a look to guilt us to giving him some money. Somewhat amusing and somewhat psychotic. We got into our auto-rickshaw and the guy was not there. We had to do a loop around to get to the main road. Amazingly, we passed by the guy right there. He knew exactly where he needed go to find us. We just drove by, and I gave a little wave.
We ate at a little dhaba near by. The food was really good. And not bad for $2.75.
The driver took us to Temple Row where there are a bunch of mandirs. Alot of them are replicas of famous mandirs in India. Some had animatronics. Some had mazes (just like the original mandirs) to walk through. One mandir was a replica of the one at Vasudevi. We were walking around in water, crawling through cave like structures. Strange.
Then we went to two temples which are on top of these two hills overlooking the river. It used to be that pilgrims would have to walk up the hills. But now, there are cable cars that will take you up.