20th Jan 08 - Empty City & Missing Birds
Trip Start
Jan 11, 2008
1
6
32
Trip End
Apr 20, 2008
Bharatpur, India
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
Next was a visit to another National Park at Bharatpur, this time it is famous for birds. It is supposed to be a marsh land, but years of drought has left most of it bone dry and as a result lacking in birds. We hired a Cycle rickshaw to take us through the park, the "driver" was also very knowledgeable about the park and acted as guide. He charged by the hour so he cycled at the slowest pace possible - comically so, but it was so cheap we did not care. Despite the lack of water, some areas had been maintained by pumping water from underground and we did get to see a few things, mostly due to our unofficial guide who new where to look. We would not have seen a thing if it was not for our guide so even through he had stretched out the tour to a massive 4 hours I gave him a good tip on top ........ wait for it......... "more, more" came the reply. Now, by this time I was quite use to this through many encounters I have not bothered to mention here, so I was blunt (but polite) and I received the usual "I you are happy, I am happy". I suppose you can't blame people for trying their luck, especially when there is so much poverty about - but it does get wearing.
Harish (our driver) drop us off at the guest house we had booked late in the afternoon. On arrival, the owner told us the prices had increased from the ones he quoted just a couple of weeks before, apparently to cover increases in electric. Electric must be expensive because the room rate has increased by 33%. Having used my polite quota for the day I was very blunt, eventually we agreed a price near the original. The price difference in UK terms was only a pound but it felt like he was taking the piss (the whole room rate was 9 pound). Despite paying extra for the optimistically named "Super deluxe" room and paying further for the extra electric, the owner refused to give us and electric heater - so a cold night was had as it dropped to 2 deg C, we could have collected all the dust together to form a really thick blanket, but Lisa overruled this idea - out with the sleeping bag liners again! On the plus side, the food was good and cheap.
