The Return! (India, post pandemic...)

 I had a fairly decent sleep that night in the dumpy Haridwar hotel, and woke up ready for the next adventure. The other three--who had stayed overnight in the swami's guru's ashram-- were presumably to meet me at 8 a.m. that morning, in order for all of us to catch a bus for Uttarkashi, an 8-9 hour journey. I wasn't relishing another long bus trip, but was anxious to see this town deep in the mid-range region of the Himalayas. (e.g., at about 6,000 feet.)  At 9 a.m., still not having heard anything from them, I messaged that I was heading to the bus station. (I was disinclined to spend any more time than I had to at the hotel.) The rickshaw driver who took me there charged double of what it should have cost, of course...  and... I wound up waiting at the dirty, grimy bus station for TWO WHOLE hours!!! The other three were piddling around, taking their sweet time to get to me... and by the time they did, there were no more buses from Haridwar to Uttarkashi.  Since no...

 Yes, I had said, "Never again!" after the last one, didn't I!??! Unfortunately, though, the sleeper bus was the ONLY means by which to travel north, from Pushkar to the next destination of Haridwar. Trains had a waiting list a mile long, and flying was too expensive... and not convenient (would have involved another grueling bus ride back to Jaipur!) So... I grinned and bore it. But barely. It was yet another night from hell. This time, 14 hours worth!!! The driver had these crazy, multi-colored flourescent lights on all night, which the curtains would not block out, so the sleeping mask stayed on my face for the duration. Being toward the back of the bus, the bouncing and jouncing was SO terrible that my body was flung about constantly on the bunk. I counted that I banged my head-- on the side of this coffin-sized compartment (and that is being generous!!!) or the top of it about 9 times! Yes, I actually started counting, it happened SO very frequently!!  He also was a ...

Getting from Jaipur to Pushkar (also in Rajasthan) was a royal fiasco: My host at the guest house was unable to help me with the bus booking as his app wasn't working (and I canNOT do ANY bookings myself online; credit cards, though international, have never worked). So...going by the schedule we saw, I had the rickshaw driver take me to the bus station in order to have plenty of time to find--and purchase-- a ticket on the desired bus for Pushkar. Alas! He tried a short-cut and got lost; he had to stop more than once to ask directions, so that pretty much doubled the time getting there. Then, he stopped on the road NEAR--but not IN--the bus station to inquire about AC buses--none to be had. So...by the time we got inside the station itself, my desired bus had already departed. There then proceeded a major drama--all taking place in Hindi, so I had no clue what was going on-- to get me on a Pushkar bus. What I FINALLY came to understand was that the next one wasn't until severa...