The Long Journey Home

Yesterday afternoon, I arrived home from my 22 day trek through India. The trip was great! But I must admit it's good to be home. The trip home took exactly 47 hours! The start: The journey began when my alarm clock rang at 5 AM on Thursday 23 March in Jaisalmer, India. That was 3:30 PM, Wednesday afternoon, in California. Jaisalmer is a fascinating town - it's in the Thar desert and has an enormous sandstone fort founded in 1156 which is perched high on a desert butte. The fort is still inhabited (a rare thing) and is a living history museum, with winding cobbled lanes chock full of people, cows, wild boar, goats, flies, and buildings and temples with intricate sandstone carvings. First leg of the journey: Jaisalmer is as far west in India as I was allowed to travel, as sanctioned by the good old US Department of Energy. It is located on Indian National Highway 15, 120 km east of the Pakastani border. DOE explicitly forbade travel west of Highway 15. (Guess I won't mention the camel safari in the Sam sand dunes, 40 km west of Jaisalmer, in my trip report!) The town is 300 km from the nearest airport in Jodhpur, and we set off by car (with driver) at 6 AM. It took 5 hours to reach Jodhpur - traffic (meaning the number of cows, camels, flocks of sheep, auto rickshaws, and people walking to villages for their daily water supply) was light and we reached Jodhpur 3 hours before our flight. To make good use of the time, we toured the Mehrangarh fort in Jodhpur while waiting for the plane. Leg 2: My flight departed Jodhpur at 2:15 PM, only 15 minutes late, and arrived in Mumbai at 4:30. Leg 3: 8.5 hour layover in Mumbai until the scheduled departure of my international flight. The facilities at the Mumbai airport are rather spartan, so I transfered to an airport hotel to eat dinner, take a shower, and catch a couple of winks. Leg 4: Not long before I was back at the Mumbai airport, checking in for the flight which was scheduled to depart at 1:10 AM on Friday 24 March. (It's Thursday by now in California.) I was pleased that British Midlands did not take notice that my bag was overweight and that they had no problem with the Tibetian ritual dagger (a sharp, pointed, metal object) in my bag. The flight finally took off for Heathrow at 2:15 AM, delayed by an hour. I can say that I spent more time in the Mumbai airport lounge than I needed to. The flight took 9.5 hours and we landed at Heathrow roughly on schedule. I didn't eat the food (it was full of fruit and salads and dairy products, loaded in Mumbai) but I drank most of the plane's allotment of Tropicana orange juice. It was a wise decision not to eat - one of the passengers was sick while waiting in line for the lavatory.... Leg 5: 4 hour layover in Heathrow. First thing I did was eat FOOD! I ordered a large creamy latte. It disappeared in about 30 seconds, so I had to order a second one while my breakfast was being prepared. Toasted Brioche with ham and poached eggs and a cheddar cheese sauce. It disappeared in about 45 seconds and I thought I had died and gone to heaven. Next, I toured the shops and bought a chocolate Easter bunny at Harrods, and 4 boxes of my favorite brand of English biscuits. Not that food was on my mind or anything. Leg 6: My United flight to San Francisco left Heathrow on time at 10:05 AM (it's Friday by now in California) and we were in the air for 10.5 hours. I was blissfully upgraded to business class and consumed every single morsel of anything and everything they put in front of me. The flight landed on time and having cleared customs with the above mentioned ritual dagger I was home at 2:30 PM - exactly 47 hours from when I awoke in Jaisalmer. India is an amazing place, the conference was good, and you all can expect plenty of blogging about the trip in the near future. Once I take a couple of days to rest and recover from the experience! I won't even mention that I have to travel to DC tomorrow for a 2 day committee meeting...