Reached Pondicherry and walked through the beautiful and neat morning streets of Pondicherry to the hotel (A la villa creole- zero stars to the hotel though). The hotel is like 550 mts from the railway station. But dammit rains! From 7 AM to 11 AM, it rained 4 times. Spent some nice time at the Rock beach and experienced the overhyped Le Cafe near the Mahatma Gandhi statue. Except for the location, nothing is good about the cafe. Overpriced, sub-average food. Heading out to Auroville now. Will keep updating....
Continuing...
Our plans for Auroville got cancelled due to the continuous showers... You shouldn't visit Pondicherry when it rains here...
Well!!! Google helped me find a good seaside restaurant- "Escape In". It was indeed real good. By the time we finished our lunch, the drizzle subsided. We then headed to the Promenade beach and after spending some good 30 minutes, started walking towards the Basilica of the Sacred heart of Jesus. It started raining heavily. But somehow, we reached the Basilica. It's an amazing oriental specimen of Gothic architecture. Spent some time enjoying the architecture and paying my respect to the Son of God, who died for our sins.
Headed back to the Rock Beach, had some ice cream, spring potatoes and waffles. As we headed back to the hotel, the rain stopped us again and this time, for more than an hour. Pheww!! What a mixed day it was!
Let's see if we can visit the Auroville, the temple with the elephant and the Paradise beach !!! Stay tuned! (Adding more photos)
Today, we waged a war against the rain. We challenged the rain to see it could stop us from exploring. We made up our minds that we would travel whether it rains or thunderstorms.
We started off for the Vinayagar temple (famous for the elephant who blesses the blessing-seekers). I wanted to see her but sadly, was informed that she visits the temple from 4 PM - 7 PM. However, we did the darshan. By then, it started raining cats and dogs. Drenched, we started towards the Aurovindo Ashram (Aurovindo Ashram and Auroville aren't the same). Amidst heavy rains, we saw the silence zone and the library. There wasn't much to do there and then we headed towards the Auroville.
Very few of the areas are open to the public and most of the shops are closed on Sunday. However, the path we treaded on seemed like the KBR Park in Hyderabad. After walking for like 250 mts, we reached the Visitor Center from where we collected the passes for Mateimandir (the globe that comes up whenever your Google Pondicherry). Well...walking isn't fun in the red mud specially when the rain accepts your challenge and turns up the volume). However, we didn't back down from the challenge too. We continued our walk and finally..fully drenched, after 1.2 Kms, reached the viewing point of Mateimandir...a golden globe...
We then clicked a few pictures and started walking back. Then we found one van, who took us to the entrance...
Wanted to have breakfast at Tanto...but they open up at 12:30... So couldn't eat at Tanto...
We then, came back to the White Town and suddenly, it was all sunny. (Guess, we won the challenge against the rain). After having some breakfast and Googling the best pizza around, went to Cafe Xtasi (the MG Road area one!). Had some good pizza and we wanted to head to the Paradise Beach. However, it started raining again and so wasn't sure if we could get the jetty to the Paradise beach. Plan dropped!
Went to the Promenade Mall and watched a movie! (Hotel Mumbai)... After the movie, headed back to the Rock Beach.. The rain gave up the fight against us and it was a pleasant evening with the waves crashing against the rocks wildly.
After a sumptuous dinner, headed back for Bangalore.
Check the pics out...
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