Back in 2007, I spent a weekend in Pondicherry and a couple hours in Auroville, where I'd had some spectacular tomatoes. From Pondicherry, I remember buying a brilliant turquoise kurta, seeing a statue of Gandhi along a nice seaside prominade, and signs for keeping the city clean. It is quite clean too as there are many women with short brooms brushing away.
Pondicherry, now named Puducherry, was a French colony until 1954, so architecture and language influences are seen in the town.
This time around my plan was to catch up on the journal writing as I was about 1 month behind while C saw the sights.
We arrived late on a Saturday night and it seemed the cheaper spots were booked. We headed towards one that we never found, enquired at another that was full and then found Ram guest house. It was nice enough, but seemed overpriced at Rs. 2000 (negiotated down from Rs. 2500) as wifi was only in 2 public areas that had mosquitoes. There was filtered water available and we got cookies as a consolation.
We headed out to find dinner as it was late and ended up at Madame Shante's - just okay. Being in Pondy, I thought it safe to get cauliflower gratin (poor choice). The pasta arabiata was decent enough tough.
After dinner, we walked along the water and saw the statue of Gandhi where kids were playing and lots of other people enjoying the breeze.
On the way home, we popped into The ROAD motopub and lounge due to the loud music, but weren't inspired.
In the am, we had a watery juice and then eggs (Rs. 10) at a couple of the many spots near the hotel and then headed to Artika for some tasty coffee. I then spent the day there writing about the 3 weeks spent in Sri Lanka. For lunch, I wanted the beet salad, but it was sold out, so had the potato and egg instead. Then we shared the ginger cake with ice cream - yummy!
For dinner we went to the rooftop of DeBussy and had chili cauliflower (great), paneer sticks (bad), and beer snacks for Rs. 980, while I tried unsuccessfully to book train tickets on the IRCTC site and app. Then we got some rice and chicken 65 at the same spot we had breakfast. The chicken didn't have much meat.
In the am, we had the same breakfast and then headed to Auroville by auto for Rs. 200. When I'd been before it was a Sunday afternoon, so the Matrimandir (concentration dome) was closed. This time it was open. We watched a 10 minute video on the making, which was good background and walked the km to the viewing spot.
Pondicherry, now named Puducherry, was a French colony until 1954, so architecture and language influences are seen in the town.
This time around my plan was to catch up on the journal writing as I was about 1 month behind while C saw the sights.
We arrived late on a Saturday night and it seemed the cheaper spots were booked. We headed towards one that we never found, enquired at another that was full and then found Ram guest house. It was nice enough, but seemed overpriced at Rs. 2000 (negiotated down from Rs. 2500) as wifi was only in 2 public areas that had mosquitoes. There was filtered water available and we got cookies as a consolation.
We headed out to find dinner as it was late and ended up at Madame Shante's - just okay. Being in Pondy, I thought it safe to get cauliflower gratin (poor choice). The pasta arabiata was decent enough tough.
After dinner, we walked along the water and saw the statue of Gandhi where kids were playing and lots of other people enjoying the breeze.
On the way home, we popped into The ROAD motopub and lounge due to the loud music, but weren't inspired.
In the am, we had a watery juice and then eggs (Rs. 10) at a couple of the many spots near the hotel and then headed to Artika for some tasty coffee. I then spent the day there writing about the 3 weeks spent in Sri Lanka. For lunch, I wanted the beet salad, but it was sold out, so had the potato and egg instead. Then we shared the ginger cake with ice cream - yummy!
For dinner we went to the rooftop of DeBussy and had chili cauliflower (great), paneer sticks (bad), and beer snacks for Rs. 980, while I tried unsuccessfully to book train tickets on the IRCTC site and app. Then we got some rice and chicken 65 at the same spot we had breakfast. The chicken didn't have much meat.
In the am, we had the same breakfast and then headed to Auroville by auto for Rs. 200. When I'd been before it was a Sunday afternoon, so the Matrimandir (concentration dome) was closed. This time it was open. We watched a 10 minute video on the making, which was good background and walked the km to the viewing spot.
Along the way is a Banyan tree, which is quite special and the center of the city. By coincidence, this tree was found in the area where the Mother suggested the town be by pointing to an open area on a map.
Silence is requested, but that was lost on everyone there as people were laughing and loudly organizing photos.
Getting back to Pondicherry, proved more costly and all sorts of false logic was employed. There is a sign at Auroville stating the price of Rs. 270, but parking is Rs. 20, so we tried for Rs. 250, without success. Being in a bit of a hurry to try to get a train, we weren't going to spend so much time negotiating. Regardless, we didn't make the train, but discovered sleeper buses, where it appeared you got a matress to sleep on, so we decided to go with that.
Back in Pondicherry, we went for beet salad at Artika and then headed to get bus tickets as the online site wasn't working. To get to the bus station, the auto driver pulled a stunt of driving the wrong way on the side of the road to avoid making a U-turn.
We booked bus tickets at Lucky travel near the bus station. It was Rs. 500/sleeper to go to Madurai with the bus leaving at 10:30am and arriving at 5:30am or 6am.
Having a few hours to spare at happy hour time, we went to a hotel near the bus station where Zipper bar is. It was super dark and didn't have wifi, so we didn't stay. Instead we headed to Hotel Atitha, but also no wifi. While enroute to another spot, we saw a sign for an Ayurvedic hospital, so popped in to see about a massage. I also did a consultation with the doctor to ask about metatarsal pain and learned that it's caused by a vata imbalance.
After a couple of abhyanga treatments for Rs. 1200, we were nice and oily. I was interested to hear a first timers report and was told that it was good, but why does the (wooden) table need to be so uncomfortable?
We had dinner at Lailas county. The food was a bit slower than we'd hoped as there was a large party ahead of us. It was good and cost Rs. 1022.
We raced out and struggled a bit to find an auto for a decent price. All wanted Rs. 120 to go 3.5km, but were told that is how it is in Pondicherry and we didn't want to miss the bus. We made it in time and after waiting a bit, got on the bus in front of us. After getting all settled, we found out it wasn't going to Madurai. Oops! Found our bus, which smelled like moth balls and settled in again. This was an a/c bus, so we got a blanket. With earplugs, it was possible to get a decent night's sleep especially because we weren't woken up until 6:30am.
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