3am comes early, let us tell you! But once we are up and about, it doesn’t seem all that early. We finalize the packing, shower and meet in the rest of the crew in lobby well ahead of schedule. Because it is so early, we will obviously miss breakfast, but the hotel has provided breakfast boxes for us to take away with us – along with coffee to wake us up now, thank you!
The boxes are immense, containing an assortment of treats and boiled eggs. We end up consolidating a lot of the food and giving the rest of it to Sanjay on the bus. He takes it home to his family, and I think Suneel shares it too. Today is a sad day though, because we will be saying goodbye to Sanjay and Suneel. They are off to another tour group as we wing our way south to Mumbai. They have been such an amazing pair, keeping us safe and comfortable for 10 days now – we don’t know what we will do without them! So, with a little heavy heart, we board the bus for our final ride, arriving at the airport still at 0 dark 30 and bid a heartfelt goodbye to our two pals. Bhanu takes over from here, organizing, collecting passports lining up the luggage. He checks us all in together and gives us our boarding passes then lets us loose in the airport, admonishing us to be at the gate on time.
I can’t recall exactly what we did for the 2 hours we had to wait, but we did reunite with the rest of the group at the gate in time to board and we are off to Mumbai! The flight is quick and easy, a little over an hour and we are transported from our village explorations to the big cosmopolitan city of Mumbai. Collecting our luggage, we follow Bhanu to meet our new guide for the day, Sangeeta, who squires us over to our bus and our new driver and assistant. And, off we go into the crazy, busy, traffic ridden city of Mumbai.
Sangeeta gives us some information, which quite honestly I’ve forgotten, as we slowly make our way into the city. We get stuck in traffic as we make our way south down the peninsula that contains the city. Crossing a long bridge over Mahim Bay, we eventually make it through a traffic light that holds us up for at least 20 minutes, to get to our first stop – the Dhobi Ghat. This is one of the many open air laundry slums – where virtually hundreds of thousands of items come from all across the city for washing. We only have time to get off the bus quickly and take some photos – which is a disappointment, because we all thought we were going to actually tour the ghat, but that is obviously not on the schedule. And while we knew how lucky we were to have Bhanu as our guide, it is here, at Dhobi Ghat where we see exactly how good he really is in comparison to Sangeeta. Don’t get me wrong, she is a good guide. Just not the caliber of Bhanu. She tells us information about where we are, but she doesn’t give us detailed info about what we are doing, how long we will be off the bus, whether to take our whisperers, what to expect – or really any of the details that make for a much better, more organized – and far less disappointing - tour, as we are so used to having with Bhanu.
So, after only a few moments off the bus, we load back up and head to the Gandhi museum – housed in the mansion of a friend, where he resided during his political activities in Mumbai. It is full of relics and dioramas of important periods of his life, as well as the room where he stayed, still with his bed and books and the terrace where he was arrested in 1932. We’ve visited previously, but figure it will be nice to have a look around again – plus we can use the bathroom, which is a necessity at about this time.
Sangeeta loosely organizes us as we troop off the bus, crossing the streets to get to the museum. When we arrive, the gates are locked. Huh? A big sign informs us that the museum is closed today for pest control. Ah, bummer! They are obviously fumigating the whole house, we can even smell it from the street. Bhanu strikes up a conversation with the guys inside the gates, and we are convinced he will talk them into letting us in – but no, not happening. So, we skip Gandhi and head directly to the ISKCON Chowpatty Hare Krishna temple. It’s a little bit of a hike, but we all make it safely and rush to the bathrooms before we begin to tour. Shoes off, we wander through the ashram with Sangeeta giving us history, explaining the different areas of the temple and the Hare Krishna consciousness mission. She even does a little Hare Krishna dance and song in front of the main altar area. The whole thing is interesting, but we have such a strange relationship (and memory) of the Hare Krishna organization in the states, that for me at least, it is a little off-putting. There is lots of beautiful carved wood, many walls and doors are gold embossed, and lots of what may be marble pillars and flooring, but the statuary is a bit cartoonish, which is completely at odds with the rest of the building. Just weird.
Finally done with the temple tour, we head back to the bus for our final stop – The Gate of India. We take the scenic route and tour on our way to the gate, driving along Marine Drive, informally known as the Queen’s Necklace, to get a view of the water and the development along the coast, then we head back inland and pass Victoria Station train terminal, making our way fairly easily through the hustle and bustle of Mumbai traffic. As we are meandering about through the city streets, we get a catch a glimpse of a Dabbawala, carrying his delivery lunch boxes on his bike. Yay! I really wanted to be able to go to the Dabbawala delivery point, but the timing apparently wasn’t right on this tour, so it is cool that we at least go to see one delivery guy. The interesting thing with this Dabbawala is that he is carrying individual lunch bags and boxes – not the big uniform silver cannisters that we had seen before. Sangeeta explains that some people have their lunches cooked by their family and delivered in this fashion, which we didn’t know. The Dabbawalas we saw before were part of a service you paid for on a monthly basis, you picked the menu and they delivered the food.
Because of the traffic and congestion, we can’t stop the bus for long at the Gate area, so once we pass the Taj Mahal hotel we all have to quickly jump out to walk over to the gate. Passing through security (girls on one side, guys on the other) we reconvene on the huge square that holds the gate to listen to Sangeeta explain its significance. It’s funny though, this time, maybe because we have an “official” guide, no one bothers us – no one asks for selfies with us, the vendors stay a respectful distance away – it’s a totally different experience, but still a quintessential Mumbai must see.
And with that, our half day tour is over and we are whisked away to our hotel, the Trident Nariman Point at the end of the Queen’s Necklace overlooking the bay.
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