Beyond the Hills & Valleys

It had been 24 hours of nightmarish travel and I was really exhausted. Twelve bumpy busride hours later, I reached panji bus depot. Even though i was really looking forward to a shower and a toilet, my adrenaline kicked in and i asked people around how to get to gokarna. It was disappointing to know that the next bus for gokarna was 6 hours away. But a bus to nearby town was just leaving. So without having a clue about what direction i was headed in or how far this town was from my destination i jumped aboard, bought a ticket bursting with excitement to get to there. Three hours later, My two hour bus journey is only half way and i am baking in the sun. Not cool. The bus reached karwar 5 hours later and i was baked to a crisp. After some shade and some water, I was wondering what to do. i was joined at the store by two curious looking English boys wearing toy autorickshaws around their necks. After a chat and getting some directions from them i asked them if i could ride along, but they had a lot of carryon luggage and So they left in an autorickshaw. I however just could not get the idea of the autorickshaw ride out of my head and Finally decided to take one myself. A good decision as it was one fun ride. The views along the way were spectacular and after 16 hours in two horrible buses, the rickshaw was comparatively seriously comfortable. Three hours later i was at gokarna beach. After curiously looking at few temples i went into a local restaurant and asked fellow travellers directions to paradise beach. After some basic munching i headed to the beach and got on a boat, did some basic bargaining about the fare as advised by fellow travellers and headed to paradise beach. Tired from my trip after looking around the beach i find my friend sitting with a bunch of other people under numerous coconut trees singing songs and playing the guitar. A big smile appears on my face as i wave to my friend.