T minus 2: Romantic Srinagar

After a drenching evening in flooded Delhi streets with nightmarish traffic and pre-tour indulgence at a fine-dine Asian restaurant Yauatcha at DLP Promenade / Ambience mall, we finally arrived at the romantic “heaven on earth” Srinagar

Just prior to boarding the flights from Delhi, clips of protests in Srinagar were showing on the TVs at the hotel and airport.  Apparently during Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to the US to meet US President Donald Trump this week, the US State Department declared Syed Salahuddin, the chief of “separatist” group Hizbul Mujahideen, as a global terrorist just as a goodwill gesture!  So the seperatists have started rallying for protests.  What an impeccable timing!!%#%.  I have to say that it was quite nerve-racking to get on board!

This aerial view though started relieving our anxiety quite a bit.  When the car service picked us up and drove about 45 minutes to our House Boat in Dal Lake, the ride completely eased us.  Gopi’s worries started to vanish when she saw small kids getting on the school auto-rickshaws and ladies and girls roaming quite freely on the streets.

And to top it of, we had a romantic evening on the “Shikara” boats, with waterside shopping, restaurants and other Shikara vendors coming to sell us street-side shopping items.  Such an amazing way to alleviate all the fear.  The beauty of Jammu and Kashmir gives us no doubt on why both India and Pakistan claims the ownership.  There certainly are unrests in the area, but those are in the pockets where there are Police Stations and Army Camps.  Mostly the insurgents or separatists do not bother the tourists – their fight is against the government and it’s forces.  Media has exaggerated the severity of the situation and we’ve only been playing attention due to our trip, but in reality, this is the normal way of life here for years!

Following are some of the serene pictures we captured on the iPhone. All the DSLR pictures will be uploaded after the end of the ride.

Waterside shops and Shikara vendors

This is our house boat – weather is beautiful and it looks so scenic at night.

Keep following the blog to see Gulmarg or local site-seeing tomorrow before the rest of the crew, bikes and the fellow riders join us.

Again, so relieved that Srinagar situation is not as bad as the media portrays it to be, especially all the tourist spots.