McLeod Ganj

The town sprawls sporadically around a forested hill.

It looks great from a distance but is missing a little from the local council when it comes to town planning and rubbish collection.

After the Jason incident, we are not so keen on monkeys now.  These Rhesus monkeys beg for food daily and hang around the outskirts of town. We walked to the very useful (not) mountaineering institute to see if anyone had a half decent map of the area... but they didn't!

The Dalai Lama (exiled spiritual leader of Tibet) resides at Tsuglagkhang Complex.  Here you can find many monks and Tibetan people who have escaped from Tibet. Many have walked for several weeks across the Himalaya mountains to reach India. Having seen some excellent documentaries on China's influence on Tibet, it is not surprising the distances some of them have come.

Here Claire spins the prayer wheels.

The monks come out of their teachings to sit in the sun and look cool.

Digital watch and sunnies are nicely off-set by a bit of chin plucking.

We got to witness a round of "Monk Chat". After a busy day of meditation and scriptures the monks retire outside to debate interpretation of the Sutras.

One monks stands and tries to convince the seated monk of his point of view. Any good arguments are delivered with a loud and cocky slap of the hands.

Hippies who wander the streets with dirty clothes, sandals and filthy hair come here to find themselves.... some of them seem to mop the floor with their shirts.... It looks like they use their hair to mop the floor the last time they were here.

This is about as exciting a it gets when wandering town trying to find more about Tibet.

The Tibetan parliment-in-exile is an underlining two storey building.... Not quite the Patella Palace.

Jason went looking for the Dali Lama's house hoping to pop-in for a cuppa and discuss world peace. He got pretty lost and just found barbed-wire fences and the usual assortment of inorganic rubbish... however you can find cow pats drying in the sun.  Someone has actually spent the time picking these up, moulding them into shape and splatting them out to dry, and we are certain its not the cows.

Just in case you are wondering what they do with them...they take the cowpats and burn them for fuel.

Dip Tse Chok Ling Gompa didn't have a sand Mandala on display but it did have these man made flowers. We think they are made of butter... if not it's soap.

The Tibetan museum did have a Yak-butter sculpture of the Potala Palace with the Dalai Lama floating above it.

Despite dreadful weather on our trek to the Indrahar Pass, we did get chance to see the mountains on the day that we left. This is the view from the bus.

We really don't like the buses here, nor do we feel safe on them.

Tyres don't seem to be replaced until after they explode... but most worrying is the Indian attitude of ,"Don't worry, Shiva is driving the bus"... Judging from the number of crashes and wrecks around the place it would appear that Shiva don't drive too good.