A tour of Brussels - Swiss - Paris

Adding to series of my travel posts, here is post that covers my recent Best of Europe trip. As a nature lover, first thing I should say, Europe is scenic beauty. It is also famous for its historic monuments and places. It is a vast continent to cover. My trip was a 6 day tour arranged by Star Tours. This specific trip is named by them as "Best of Europe in 6 days including Disney Land Paris". All the tour itinerary is available here, so I am not going to re-write the same. Few people have already asked me why this particular tour operator was chosen for the trip. It is a matter of choice and comfort for 4 (My wife, daughter, son & self) people, especially being Indian vegans travelling to places where egg and fish are considered to be vegeterain. At the time of writing this post, we are living in London which is also one of the primary reasons for selecting this tour operator. We went to this trip in the month of August. This would be a lengthy post compared to others as I planned to cover all the 6 days in a single post. For saving some text space, I have hyperlinked certain places to their respective Wiki articles to give more information about that location.

Inside a train in Euro tunnel

Day 1 was when we started early in the morning, picked up by the coach and reached Dover near London to cross the English Channel. This was the first interesting part of the journey. So, to reach the main land of Europe towards France from the UK, Dover is a point of exit. Two ways of crossing the English channel are through Ferry (that carries all the road transport to cross the channel) and a train which goes in a "Euro" tunnel, constructed on the sea bed. All the carrier road vehicles would go into the train, and the train crosses the channel in the tunnel. The immigration checks were done before crossing the English channel. So as the train reached Calais, France, the coach came out of the train and continued our journey towards Brussels. It was a long drive. On reaching Brussels, we went to The Grand Place, which has a history. It is at the city center of Brussels. Once a market place and a king's palace, it is a collection of buildings which include the Town Hall and various museums like Beer Museum which has around 800 varieties of beer, The Brussels City Museum etc. We went on to visit the 24' tall Mannekin Pis statue which had several funny and serious legends associated with it. The one currently seen is a replica, while the original is kept in the museum of Brussels at The Grand Place. Leaving this place, we proceeded to see the Atomium,which is a stainless steel made structure representing an atom of Iron. A single unit atom of Iron metal magnified 165 billion times is seen as the Atomium. Currently, it is a museum with  escalators that can take you from one sphere to another. The trams are interesting part of the city and is also famous for Waffles, beer and Diamonds. This concluded our Brussels city tour. We entered into French territory again, checked into a hotel in the night after a very good dinner. 

Black Forest drive and Cuckoo clock

Day 2, we started moving towards the Black Forest Germany via Strasbourg. Starting that day, till the end of trip, both sides of the coach were full of beautiful landscapes. Windmills, country houses, farms, sunflowers, hills, mountains, valleys, lakes..wow. As we entered Germany, our guide gave a quick intro of Germany, their HISTORY and how marveled in automotive industry.It is also famous for Cuckoo clocks and Glass. Black Forest is a mountain region and is the birth place of the Black Forest Cake. It is also the birth place of the Cuckoo clock. The original Cuckoo clocks were to see and costly to buy (Sigh!). The tour operators arranged Lunch there with yummy Black Forest cake(eggless) and we started our travel to Switzerland. On entering Switzerland, the first place we visited was the Rhine falls of the Rhine river. These are the Europe's largest plain waterfalls. The Rhine river splits into 2 falls with a land mass in the middle open for tourists. A boat takes us to the center of the falls which is the plain rock structure between the two sister falls. The tourists can climb to the top of the small cliff to see both the falls from the center.

Rhine Falls

By the way, the scenic and landscape beauty doubled as we entered Switzerland. It was a feast for eyes and the canvas. Swiss is famous for watches, knives, chocolate, cows & milk. After getting back to the coach, we proceeded to Lucerne where we saw Lake Lucerne, the Chapal bridge which the oldest wooden bridge in the world and the Lion monument which is a rock carving to symbolize the Swiss martyrs of the French revolution. For the first time, I had seen electric buses which draw power from over head electric wires just like a regular electric train engine. It was then I understood Swiss had taken strong measures to curb pollution that can destroy its scenic places.

Lion Monument and Chapal Bridge	Lake Lucerne

 We went to Engelberg for the night halt and trust me, every nature lover should be here at least once in their life time. Engelberg - Town of Angels.

Day 3, it was rainy and cold. We started little late to ascend Mt. Titlis, one of the highest mountain points in the Alps. It stands above 10000 ft and the easiest way to reach the top is a cable car. The travel from Engelberg to summit of Mt. Titlis by cable car takes around 30min. Majority of the distance is covered  by a normal cable car. The remaining distance is covered by a rotating cable car which is world's first of its kind. If the weather is pleasant, the rotating cable car will let us see some breathtaking views of the mountain ranges. Although it was not sunny on the day we went, we could see the valleys when the clouds gave an opportunity for few seconds. Since it was raining in Engelberg, there was a heavy snowfall on the mountain along with thunderstorms. We played in the snow, did the cliff walk on the highest suspension bridge in Europe. The Ice flyer on the summit was another attraction on top of Titlis which was not operational due to bad weather. There is a Glacier cave which is totally an Ice cave in which we went from one end to other walking carefully on the slippery icy floor. We descended down from Mt.Titlis after spending couple of hours there.

Mt Titlis - Snow, cable car and Glacier cave

We started our journey towards Interlaken after having lunch in Engelberg. It is approximately a 2.5 hour journey to Interlaken amidst of mountains, valleys, small rivers, waterfalls,tunnels and lakes. It was such a picturesque travel that I could not close my eyes even for a minute although I was totally tired. Cameras were not enough to capture the sceneries. The naked eye was not enough. A life time will probably not be enough. Probably for the people staying there, its normal. For a visitor, it is heavenly. The time given for roaming around in Interlaken was around 1.5 hours. It was not raining but cloudy. We could see Mt. Jungfrau from a distance. Travel to Mt. Jungfrau was not part of itinerary but I heard it is also something that should not be missed as a visitor. We spent around the Victoria Hotel taking pictures of the beautiful mountains all round us. Switzerland made Yash Chopra as an ambassador for their country and installed a bronze statue for him in the Interlaken. We started our travel to Geneva from Interlaken on the same day and went on a city tour seeing various United Nations buildings like UNICEF, UNESCO etc. We had a stop over at the Broken Chair monument and the United Nations building in Geneva, post which we went to Lake Geneva for some clicks. From here, we started towards France and had a night stay in a hotel after entering the French territory.

Interlaken - Scenaries and Mt. Jungfrau (bottom right)	Geneva - United Nations Building, Lake Geneva and the Broken chair

Day 4, is mostly travel till the evening to Paris. We reached Paris in the evening and went on a boat cruise on River Sienne. The good thing about France is that they retained their rich monuments and heritage as well as the beautiful architectures of various monuments. On the cruise, we were able to see the Eiffel tower, Notre Dame cathedral, Musee d'Orsay etc.

River Sienne Cruise Trip - Oldest bridge on River Sienne
Statue of Liberty, National Assembly, Eiffel Tower,
Notre Dame Cathedral

After the cruise, we went on a night tour of Paris city in the bus with 4 stops at important places for clicks. Special mention to the night time illumination of the Eiffel tower with its hourly glitters. We had stop overs at the Eiffel tower, Arc de triumph, Place De La Concorde, Musee De'Armee, Les Invalides (where Napoleon was buried) and the Opera buildings while we had seen few other buildings like the Louvre museum, the other Statue of Liberty, Princess Diana's death tunnel etc from the bus. Interesting things that we learnt were that the National assembly building, which had 54 pillars around it in Greek style indicating the number of weeks of a calendar year, is an exact mirror image of the Royal Palace in the Place De La Concorde on the other side of River Sienne. Also the number of classical street lights in Place De La Concorde are 365 indicating the 365 days of the year. Adding to that the Les Invaldes monument, the Place De La Concorde and the Arch De Triumph are all in a single line of sight. It seems the earlier emperors wanted to have a clear line of sight in front of their palace, hence the architecture. We had our dinner before the night tour and we went to our hotel for a good sleep after the night tour.

Paris Night Tour - Arch De Triumph, Les Ivalides, Eiffel Tower, Concorde, Opera

Disney Land Paris

Day 5, the entire day was dedicated to Disney Land Paris. We had visited Disney Land Orlando in USA earlier. But my daughter was small at that time, although she was aware of the characters. This time, my daughter needed no introduction to any of the Disney Characters. Thanks to her, my son was also aware of lot of characters. So it was worth of the journey as they enjoyed in the park whole day. It is important to be pre-planned about the places you want to visit inside Disney Land.
This saves a lot of time and energy. The parade in the evening was what all the people would be waiting for and it was pretty creative and energetic. The tour managers did not plan for the illuminations and fire works show in the night in the itinerary but it would also be worth watching.

Day 6, Eiffel Tower. It is important to start early in the morning to Eiffel tower. Heavy rush to visit the monument can take your total day. Joining early in the queue will give time to spend on the top deck of Eiffel tower. It reminded us of our top deck visit to the Empire State building in New York as written in my earlier blog post.  We could see the various places that we visited the other day from the top view. The city of Paris, both old and modern, were visible from the top deck. We, then went on to middle deck and then came back to the ground floor. Interested people will take the steps to the top deck but many would prefer the elevators. Interesting to see the architecture of such a huge monument.

Eiffel Tower - Top view of Paris City from Eiffel Tower, Paris Sky line, Mr. Eiffel's statue

We started our journey back to London after having lunch. We reached the Calais port by evening. This port was from which the coach we roamed all these days enters a ferry. We disembarked the coach and reached the top deck of the ferry, took some rest. It was a 90 minute journey on the ferry to cross the English Channel and we reached Dover Port on the UK side. The immigration was done on the French side. We reached home by 9 PM in London and a wonderful tour came to end.


Lots of memories and experiences!!

Unheard Stories from The Great Mahabharata - 1

On the 16th day of the great war of Mahabharata, something unusual happened. The Pandavas had to fulfill their vows while winning the war with the Kouravas. Arjuna, was whose chauffer was Sri Krishna, was in the center of attack strategy set by Drona and trying to break it. Meanwhile, the elder brother Yudhistara was badly injured and his chariot was pulled off the war scene. He went into his tent for first aid and medication.

On the other side, Arjuna had successfully solved the attack strategy set to him and heard the news of his brother's injuries. Krishna has immediately routed the chariot to Yudhistir's tent. Both Krishna and Arjuna went inside where Yudhistir is applying medication to his injuries. On seeing them coming in, Yudhistir has started abusing Arjuna in his pain and anger. "Where were you when they were attacking me? Are we going to win this war? If you cant even save me, how can you save others? Why do you need the so great bow and arrows, and Krishna as your chariot operator?" said Yudhistir.

Arjuna has immediately took the bow and pointed it to Yudhistir. Krishna stopped Arjuna immediately and asked "what are you trying to do?". Arjuna replied "I took a vow to myself that if someone abuses or criticizes my bow and arrow, I will kill them." Krishna asked "It is your brother. You cannot kill him. Its not right (dharma)." Arjuna said "I cannot keep myself away from actioning the vow I have taken. That is not right(dharma) as well." Krishna said, " Alright then, abusing a noble man on his face is as good as killing him. Abuse your brother and it as equivalent as killing him."

Arjuna told Yudhustir, " YOU (in a singular/disrespectful sense) have no rights to blame me. It is just because of YOU we are into war. If YOU have not gambled with Kouravad, we will not be in this situation. If YOU have agreed to go back to kingdom and wage war after first13 days of exile, we would not ahve faced this situation. It is all because of YOU."
Meanwhile Yudhistir was sobbing. On seeing his elder brother crying like a child, Arjuna could not control himself and started crying.

Few minutes later, Arjuna took his sword and put it on his own neck. Krishna stopped him again and asked him "What are you doing?". "I am going to kill myself. I made a vow to myself that I would not disrespect any elders and noble men or else, I will kill myself. And here I am, dishonoured my elder brother by calling him with no respect and abused him. I will kill myself." Krishna said ," You are Arjuna and you have a war ahead of you. You have other vows to be fulfilled. You should not get yourself killed now. I will propose an alternative which is as equivalent as killing yourself. Just praise yourself. It is as equivalent as killing yourself." Although Arjuna was not ready, Krishna convinced him to do so. Arjuna praised himself a lot telling all his glory.

Source: wikicommons

Krishna went to Yudhistir to touch his feet and said "Brother-in-Law Yudhister, on behalf  of Arjuna, I am sorry for all that has happened. Do not take it to heart and let's go back  in the war." Yudhister immediately lifted him up and said ," Oh Krishna, this is not needed. You are our well wisher, a Guru and a guide. It was my mistake to show my agony in first place. We express our sadamd anger with our near and dear, that does not mean we part away from each other. I thank you for teaching us all a lesson."

Arjuna hugged Yudhistir and apologised him. They went back to the battle field to fight a great war which finished on the 18th day.

One story, many things to learn!

A Spiritual Tour to Trincomali, Srilanka

[Guest post by my Father, Shri S.B.V.Lakshmi Narayana]

It was our first travel abroad and with a tense moments, started our journey to Sri Lanka six day tour organized by Shri Kuchibhotla Ramasastry and his grandson Shri Kuchibhotla Satyanarayana Sarma, Hyderabad. The team consists of 82 members.

CHINMAYANANDA MISSION GUEST HOUSE AT RAMBOD, SRILANKA

On arrival at Colombo Airport from Chennai by Indian Airlines Flight. On completion of immigration checks and visa formalities, we came out from the Airport and went to parking place where two A/C 42 seated

buses, as arranged by our organizers, are ready for us. Organizers have already distributed slips with bus number, seat number, and Room numbers of our accommodations at respective places to all the members.  All the 82 members assembled, took the bus and settled in our seats allotted.

ANOTHER VIEW FROM CHINMAYA MISSION GUEST HOUSE, RAMBOD

First we were taken to Shri Mayurapathi Bhadrakali Amman Temple Kalyana Mandapam (Hindu Cultural Centre) outside Colombo, where we had completed our daily routine and had the goddess “darshan”. It took about two hours time. Since it was already 11.00 AM, organizers prepared Lunch. Post Lunch, we had started at 1.00 PM to our night stay at Rambod. Rambod is a very beautiful place with lot of trees and mountains, Hanuman Temple, Sita-elia (Nuwara Elia, which is Ashoka-grove where Sita Amman stayed for ten months. On the way, we were supposed to see one Buddha Temple and Ranganadhaswamy temple. The temples were closed as we were late and both the temples were skipped from the journey. Finally at 9.00 PM, reached Rambod and since buses could not go on the steep mountain to reach our accommodation at Chinmaya Mission Guest House, Autos were provided to occupy our rooms. Hot snacks were prepared immediately and served to us.

MACWOOD TEA ESTATE, SRILANKA

On the second day early morning, we saw the environment around us and thrilled with the beauty of the surrounding nature and then went to Hanuman Temple, which is hardly 100 mts from our accommodation. The statue is about 30 ft tall and in the temple they played Hanuman Chalisa, which really vibrated us in that environment. Had breakfast and went to Macwood Tea Estate and they have provided their employee to show various processes of tea manufacturing. In the estate tour, they had shown us white-tea leaves, which we never saw before. When enquired, they informed that it is highly nutritive and available in their stores at Rs.10000/- per 50 grams only. As a courtesy, they provided, a cup of black tea, free of cost to all the members.

From there, we visited Gayatri Peetham at Nuwara Elia.  This idol was established by Meghanadha.  The temple authorities are constructing one more temple to install 108 Bana Lingams. We have seen 108 lingams, which were brought from Gomati River.  The speciality of these lingams is that they are continuously sweating. There we have completed our lunch and visited ‘Ashoka vaatika’, where Sita Amman stayed for ten months.  We had seen Lord Hanuman’s two foot prints and then came back to Rambod for night stay.

BUDDHA TEMPLE AT KANDY (TEETH OF BUDDHA IS UNDER CROWN)

On the third day morning, after visiting Lord Hanuman, we completed our breakfast. From there, we had started to Trinkomali. On our way, we had seen a big Buddha Temple, where the teeth of Buddha was kept under a gem studded golden crown.  Since it was already post noon, Mathal temple at Dhambulla was closed. We then proceeded to a medicinal plant Garden-cum-Restaurant, where we had Lunch. There the staff of Royal Pharmacy have explained about the plants and shown various medicines prepared with the plant extracts. It appears they are effective for so many diseases but very much costly.  Started our journey to reach Buddha Golden Temple and then to Trinkomali. There we were provided accommodation at Sarvodaya Hostel.

 

SEVEN HOT WATER KANNIYA BHAVULU AT TRINCOMALI

On the fourth day, “Chandi homam” was performed. We had Bath at Kanniya Hot water wells (7) which were said to have been dug by Ravanasura to perform his mother’s rituals.  The local peoples believe that only after bath at these wells, one should visit Saankari Amman/Saankari Devi. After bath, we went to the goddess’ temple, had a peaceful darshan and returned to Sarvodaya Hsotel, where the Chandi Homam was at the ending stage.

ROOF & WALL ARCHITECTURE AT KALI AMMAN TEMPLE, TRINCOMALI

One the fifth day, we went to Kali Temple, where Kumbha Mela was being performed.  The temple is very much rich is architecture on the walls and roof.  Then we went to Lakshmi Narayana Temple and had darshan of ‘Dasaavataras’ and Lakshmi Narayana Murthy.  Returned to Sarvodaya, where our organizers completed ‘Ekadasa Rudhabhishekam’ with 365 ‘mruthika’ lingams. In the evening, we were taken to a nearby beach, spent some time and returned to accommodation.

SRICHAKRA ARCHANA AT SRI MUNISWARASWAMY TEMPLE, CHILAW

On the sixth day, i.e. “Radha Saptami” day, we had our bath with Swallow Wort (Jilledu) leaves at Sea, seen the Sun Rise and came back to

Sarvodaya, where Aruna Paarayanam and Surya Namaskarams were performed. Shri Ramasarma with traditional fervor prepared Payasam, an Indian sweet made of rice, milk, jaggery and after offering it to the Sun god first (Nyvedyam), it was served to us. We then completed our breakfast and started to reach Colombo. On the way at Anuradhapuram, we were taken to a shopping centre and then to a Buddhan temple. We had lunch there and then visited Buddha Golden temple.  After that at Chilaw, we had a darshan of shri Muneeswaraswamy, the idol was said to be installed by Sri Rama after killing Ravana.

 Reached Colombo Airport at 9.00 pm. After Check in, we had dinner (pulihora) and took our flight 12.40 midnight.

The meals/coffee/tiffin were prepared by Organizers with own chefs brought from Hyderabad. The food arrangements are extremely good.  The package of the entire tour except at Trinkomali local trips is Rs.36000/-. We have to pay the Visa fee of Rs.2200/- at Srilanka, which is valid for 30days. Indian Rupees are mostly (80%) acceptable at an exchange price of 2 Srilankan rupees for one INR.

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