Travelling

This is the final part of the day wise series of the Gujarat Trip planned in the month of December.  The days will then be merged for the final blog. Day 13 Saputara - Pune We left from Uday Hill Resort in Saputara by 6:40am and started our journey towards home (Pune). It was a 280km journey. It was dense fog till around 8:45am. The condition of the roads wasn't great either. After driving around 150km , we took a break at Crown Curry restaurant near Sangamner and had breakfast. The journey started again and we finally were back home by 1:30pm with sweet memories from the trip!! 😊😊🙏

This will be a day wise series of the Gujarat Trip planned in the month of December.  The days will then be merged for the final blog. Day 12 Saputara Sight seeing - 2 Lazy day started only by waking up at 8am followed by some fun with the kids. We got ready followed by an impromptu visit to a strawberry farm. We picked strawberries and ate them fresh from the farm. We got back to our room and relaxed some more. We then left the room by 12noon. Today's destinations were all within 2km radius. We first reached honeybee center. The honeybees were kept in wooden closures where they live and produce honey as well. It also housed some beautiful flowers. Next we walked to the adventure park nearby. We had fun with the bumping cars and the kids also experienced the zipline. Next was the saputara lake where we had some maggi and lemon soda. Also got some pictures clicked. This was followed by a visit to the Saputara museum and a fish aquarium with different types of fishes. Fro...

This will be a day wise series of the Gujarat Trip planned in the month of December.  The days will then be merged for the final blog. Day 11 Saputara Sight seeing  We started by 10:30am from our accommodation for sight seeing in Saputara. First stop was the Gira waterfall. It is said to have close to 200 waterfalls during the monsoons. As this was December end, there was only one waterfall but had good flow of water. It was very hot and sunny even at this time of the year. There were some shops with stuff made out of bamboo. Next on, the Waghai botanical garden was a 15-min drive. Not a great destination, but it housed a variety of trees, plants , flowers and a namesake butterfly park. At the exit was an Amul parlour. Took a short refreshing break there and then started towards Shabari Dham. On the way was a fruti vendor selling pineapples and oranges. We stopped for a natural refreshment and savoured on some sweet pineapples and oranges and started our onward jou...

This will be a day wise series of the Gujarat Trip planned in the month of December.  The days will then be merged for the final blog. Day 10 Ahmedabad - Saputara  We started at 8:15am from the accommodation at Ahmedabad for our journey towards Saputara. The roads were good. We stopped on the way on NE4 for breakfast. The Jagdish outlet serves good breakfast, a bit spicy though for my liking. Replica of the mall is on the other side of the Expressway where we stopped while going towards Ahmedabad on Day1. The drive started again and after 3 hours , stopped for lunch at Hotel Furat. We got good Punjabi food followed by very thick sweet lassi. We started our journey again. Saputara is a hill station. We wanted to see the sunset , but the sunset point was under maintenance. We then re-routed towards table land. That was a happening place with loads of activities like horse riding, camel riding, balloon shooting, ring game, scooter, bike, remote controlled car, decorat...

This will be a day wise series of the Gujarat Trip planned in the month of December.  The days will then be merged for the final blog. Day 9 Kutch - Ahmedabad A relaxed day started by waking up at 6am. We got ready and had delicious poori bhaji for breakfast. Our journey started by 9am where we headed towards Aaina Mahal. It displayed the kings and queens from history, the currencies used, their old pictures, vehicles and other household items used , etc. It was a very narrow street, a bit of an effort to navigate the xuv there. Next destination was the Vande Mataram memorial housing a museum (was unavailable for general public as there was some session going on for students) , pictures and statues from Mahatma Gandhi's life, the brave soldiers of our country and an artisan block. The drive to Ahmedabad was now 7 hours. Most of the roads were good but a lot of maintenance work was taking place at various highways causing the highways to be blocked for normal flow of tra...

This will be a day wise series of the Gujarat Trip planned in the month of December.  The days will then be merged for the final blog. Day 8 Dholavira - Kutch The day started by 6:15am in the tryst to view the sunrise. It was a cold December morning and getting out of the bed was difficult. However the thought of the sun rise was motivational. We got ready to reach the sunrise point which was 35kms away from our resort. Almost there, we could not spot the sun and hence thought of completing the few kilometres left of the "Road to heaven". We again stopped at the sunrise point while getting back from the end point of road to heaven, but still no signs of the sun. The kids refused to get down due to the chilly wind. Husband & I got down, went down on the sand and patiently waited for the sun to show up for around 30 minutes but the clouds won't give way. We clicked some pictures and for back to the hotel with no sight of the sun. We had breakfast at the hote...

This will be a day wise series of the Gujarat Trip planned in the month of December.  The days will then be merged for the final blog. Day 7 Bhuj - Dholavira We started from our accomodation (The Desert Inn) in Bhuj by 7am. Dholavira was 1.5 hours drive. The roads were all good this time. We drove through a beautiful road called the "Road to Heaven". A beautiful road with sea and white sand on both the sides. We stopped to click some pictures by the road side and also to enjoy the beauty of the nature. We then drove towards the "UNESCO world heritage site - Harappan civilization". What a planned city it was. How much of understanding had gone into the construction that was done thousands of years back with whatever limited material was available and no technology, only their inherent techniques. Hats off to the people of that era!! It was an exciting experience.  Post this, we checked in to our accommodation at Dholavira tourism resort. The lunch was kat...

This will be a day wise series of the Gujarat Trip planned in the month of December.  The days will then be merged for the final blog. Day 6 Gir National Park This day again started a bit early. We got ready and started by 5:20 am to reach Gir's Sinh Sadan by 6:20am. Car parking is available inside. It was quite cold, and the cold wind added to it. It was essential to cover up in warm clothes including head and ears. We had procured the permit in advance, a guide was assigned to us who got the jeep and we all got into it. It was a 12km drive before the actual safari started. We were lucky to have a brilliant sight seeing of lions, leopards, neelgai and deer. Also spotted some peahens and wood peckers on the way. Gir forest is said to be spread across 1412 sq. km. area housing 674 lions, 60k+ neelgai and 1L+ deer. It was an hour long safari which was worth every moment. We returned back happy and had breakfast at a shop nearby serving hot fafda jalebi!! We then started o...

This will be a day wise series of the Gujarat Trip planned in the month of December.  The days will then be merged for the final blog. Day 5 Dwarka - Somnath The day started much earlier at 2am. We got ready and checked out of our accomodation by 3:25am. The first destination was Girnar which was a 4 hours' smooth drive. The mountain is at an altitude of 3672ft comprising of 10k steps from the base. The ropeway covers the initial 5k steps reaching mata Ambaji temple. Further up is the Gorakhnath temple and then the next peak is gurudev Datt mandir. It is all stairs to navigate through. Took us around 2.5 hours to cover the 3 peaks. Neminath temple is 1200 steps below the ropeway point but I chose to skip it. The ropeway charges 700INR both ways for adults and half the price for kids below 110cm. The ropeway is very well managed and even during peak hours, the waiting time wasn't high. The ropeway takes 7-8 mins each side. Darshan at dattatreya temple was just amazin...

This will be a day wise series of the Gujarat Trip planned in the month of December.  The days will then be merged for the final blog. Day 4 Dwarka A comparatively lighter day with not too much planned on the agenda. The day started by 7:30am. We got ready and left for Dwarkadhish temple at 9am. The temple was a 5mins walk from our accommodation. The queue again was quite long and not well managed. Took almost 1.5-2 hours for the darshan. We then came out in the market , had lunch at a restaurant called Indian Rasoi. Post lunch, was a visit to Gomti ghat located behind the Dwarkadhish temple. It is said to have holy water, hence the visit. We then got back to our accomodation to rest for a while. Evening was dedicated to the sunset. We started by 4:30pm to walk the 850m to the sunset point. Sunset point is located near Bhadkeshwar Mahadev Temple. It was a beautiful point located on the shore of Arabian sea. The water is very clean, the shore was dirty though. Th...

This will be a day wise series of the Gujarat Trip planned in the month of December.  The days will then be merged for the final blog. Day 3 Ahmedabad - Dwarka We started from our accomodation in Ahmedabad around 5:45am towards Dwarka. After driving for around 3.5 hours, we halted for breakfast at the Highway food mall. As it was earlier in the day bigger outlets like McDonalds, Dominos were not operational. However one of the food vendor was serving gujrati breakfast. We ordered fafda, dhokla, bread pakoda, methi pakoda and poha. The tea post outlet served hot and delicious tea, much needed on a cool breezy morning.  We then headed over to Gopi Talab and on the way covered Rukmini ji ka mandir and Gopi Nath ji ka mandir. This was then followed by Beyt Dwarka.  Beyt Dwarka is a small island near the mouth of Gujarat which was accessible only via boats until a few years back. As an alternate , a beautiful bridge has been constructed now called the "Sudarshan br...

This will be a day wise series of the Gujarat Trip planned in the month of December.  The days will then be merged for the final blog. Day 2 Ahmedabad  We started in the morning by 8:30am from our accomodation towards our first destination - Adalaj step well. Brilliant architecture with intricate carvings on the walls and pillars. This well's construction was started by a king, but completed because of his queen. From here, we headed over to Kankaria lake. This wasn't a part of the original itinerary but while talking to some locals the previous day, this was an addition to the list. Kankaria lake and the surrounding area is beautifully developed. There's a nominal entry fee into the campus, followed by upfront payment for the individual activities you may want to do. We bought tickets for the toy train. Though it is called toy train but accommodates all ages. It is a 15-min ride around the lake. While we waited for the train, we got some snacks from the food co...

This will be a day wise series of the Gujarat Trip planned in the month of December.  The days will then be merged for the final blog. Day 1 Pune - Ahmedabad  We started from our home in Pune at 4:15am for Ahmedabad. The expected drive time was around 13 hours by the map ( excluding breaks). We took the Ravet route to Mumbai which was good. The saying "Mumbai never sleeps" could be sensed when people seemed rushing to their workplaces even before 7am. The roads between Mumbai and Vapi were terrible and took much longer. The roads were under construction and had heavy vehicles all the way. It needed patience and skills to navigate that route. After crossing Vapi , we finally stopped for a break and had lunch. After a filling lunch, we resumed our journey. At Bharuch, we got onto NE4 (National Expressway 4) which is one part of the golden quadrilateral project connecting Mumbai to Delhi. Now this was an enjoyable drive. NE4 joins NE1 later ahead. There was a police ...