Seven Earthquakes Later

When we had arrived in Dharamshala, we met a nice German woman, RIa, who has lived in the area for 25 years. Somewhere during the conversation, she mentioned that all the recent building was against the earthquake building code. She went on to mention that Dharamshala is sitting on a major fault and is expecting some sort of a huge quake in the future. Um okay. Glad we are on the 3rd floor of a 4th floor building over the side of a mountain. Ria also warned us that our hotel was NOT looking so safe to her. Great. 

Waterfall fun

In the Hills

Waterfall Fun

We had a magical three weeks in Dharamkot. We loved our guest house, our neighborhood friends, familiar faces, great restaurants and we LOVED going to the teachings of His Holiness the Dalai Lama (who by the way stopped to say hi to Amit!). We also loved the waterfall, the monks washing their robes and blankets in the small pools of the falls, the momo's (Tibetan dumplings) we bought on the road, the long walks up and down the mountains, the amazing eagles that graced us with their constant presence, the baby donkeys, cows and puppies, and all the goats and even the greedy monkeys. We loved the Chai Shop at the top of the hill that sells yummy cashew cookies and good chai and on and on. Life was really enjoyable in Dharamkot.  

Amit LOVES cows. Babies especially

Waterfall

Momos on the Road

One afternoon while Itay and the girls were napping- I was actually trying to write a blog post - I felt the room shake. At first I though it was construction from a nearby guesthouse but I then realized it was an earthquake. I woke Itay and the girls and rushed everyone outside. Turns out it was a 4.8 on the Richter Scale. It freaked me out. We later found out that there had been another one that day. 5 more followed over the next 2 days. Small ones. Other friends with kids made plans to leave and another family that we connected with contacted us and asked if we wanted to go with them to Manali area. We decided the time had come. Best to err on the side of caution. The girls and I took a walk down and then up the mountains for last minute errands- bid our amazing place goodbye and had a ceremony to thank and say good bye to all the people and animals we had met.

Walk to the Waterfall

Henna Tattoos

We took an 8 hour private taxi with our friends to  Vashist, near Manali- a beautiful and picturesque  village tucked into Kullu Valley in Himachal Pradesh. The driver seemed very intent to get us to Vashist as dangerously as he could.  He drove like a maniac around hair-raising turns on super steep mountains, overtaking everything in sight and veering sharply around blind corners at really high speeds. Playing chicken with massive trucks was did not seem to bother him the least. At some point I just stopped looking. Needless to say, we needed to stop multiple times to allow our friends' son to vomit. And no, we do not have car seats and backseat buckles do not exist here. We have become quite relaxed about the whole car thing though. 

LEECHES!

Vashist is lovely. The views are spectacular, exaggerated and peaceful. Snow-capped mountains loom all around us, the air is cold and crisp morning and night and warm sun blesses us during the day. There are wonderful hot springs right down the road from us and Amit and I already had our evening bath there with the Indian, Tibetan and local tribal women. It was really a lovely experience and we look forward to bath time at the springs tomorrow night. 

We will stay here 4 more nights and then begin our journey south, stopping at the Taj Mahal- bien sur. 

Waterfall

Bucket Bath