Raiders of the Lost Park

IT WASN'T RAINING THIS MORNING! After recovering from the shock, I met up with Kristen and we embarked on a little day trip to the northernmost part of Bombay. In the middle of Sanjay Gupta National Park are the Kanheri Caves: 109 1st-century Buddhist rock-cut cave temples. Many of the carvings in the caves were destroyed by encroachers (I think the Portuguese) and others over the years, but now it's a government-protected site and a tourist attraction. As recommended by our guidebook, Kristen and I hopped a cab down to Churchgate Station for the train ride (yes, I took the train...yes, I know about the bombings...yes, I'll kill anyone who tells my mother) up to Borivali Station. From there, the guidebook told us that we would have to take an "all-areas" taxi (as opposed to the regular taxis) to the park and into the caves.

Buying the ticket and finding the right train was easy. We opted for the First Class car on the way up. The ticket cost 104 roops (as Sarada and her friend term rupees...remember this number). The ride up was nice except that the express train we were on started making local stops suddenly and threw us off our count of stations so we got off at the wrong one. No bigs, we were able to hop back on. At the correct station, we found the single-color, all-areas taxis and Kristen pitted a few cab drivers against each other to get a fare closer to the one in the guidebook. Little did we know (aforementioned guidebook was silent) we would have to pay entrance fees to the park for us, the driver, and another entrance fee for the car. If we had known, we probably wouldn't have let the driver bring along his friend. Yeah, we ended up having to pay for him, too. Whatever.

It took quite a while to get to the heart of the park and the entrance to the caves. We left A-1 (we asked him his name a few times and it always sounded like the steak sauce) and his buddy at the car and proceeded up the steps to...another ticket booth. Again Lonely Planet let us down and we were forced to pay the cave entrance fee (100 roops for foreigners, 10 for Indians...sweet). Already significantly more expensive than we expected, we made our way towards the caves hoping that they'd be worth it.

And they were.

This was exactly what I was hoping my trip would be like. Kristen and I hiked all over a mountainside littered with waterfalls, caves, and Buddhist carvings. Whenever it would start really pouring, we simply took shelter in a cave and waited it out. I quickly changed out of my hiking boots and into flipflops (the first big rainfall after we got there turned most of the paths into little creeks). Bopping over wet rocks was actually easier in my Havaianas (I only bit it one time and only have a small bruise on my right wrist to show for it). I was able to impress Kristen with just how chickenshit I can be when I discovered that quite a few bats inhabit the darker caves. Sadly, we hadn't thought ahead (again, Bad Lonely Planet!) and were without a flashlight so we had to make do with some flash photography (hopefully I'll figure out how to post Kristen's pictures soon). What the guidebook did do well was point out which caves to look for (they're numbered). Cave 3 was a huge hall of columns with amazing, 2-story Buddhas carved into the entryway (pictures to follow).

Most shocking was that all this (and the seemingly ginormous national park) were within the city limits of Bombay. I almost didn't believe that the honking and people and buildings would really give way to jungle. And the caves! I felt a bit like Indiana Jones. Notably, the reality of the city has permeated even this natural wonderland. During our drive up, we passed a series of shantytowns which, while small, had found their way INTO the national park. I suppose there just isn't enough room in Bombay proper for the poor and they have found a better place in which they can attempt to survive. We certainly saw a lot of makeshift towns on the train ride out of the city.

After a few hours of exploring, we made our way back to our cab and started the trek home. This time, since we were taking the train all the way to the end (no worries of missing the station), Kristen and I decided to be adventurous and save some money. We bought 2nd Class tickets. For Kristen, this meant a pleasant ride in the Ladies Car (no men allowed). For me, it meant shoving my way onto the regular 2nd class car (the train actually began pulling away without me because I hesitated...luckily a fellow passenger took pity on me and helped me pull myself into the car). I gather from the looks that white people don't ride in that car very often, much less alone. Still, it was a neat experience and, at one point, I even got to stand in the open door of the train, like many of the young men of Bombay seem to enjoy doing. It was pretty effing cool. Just call me India Jones.