All day yesterday was spent at the airport - a traveling day. We are now in the state of Maharastra. Same state Bombay is in. City - Aurangabad. There isn't really anything to see or do in this city except for the temple caves of Ellora and Ajanta and the fort along the way. We have no idea why these cave-Ruins are so under the radar. Wow - amazing.
Our hotel was scary - like something out of a horror movie - but we fought through it. It has been decided that India is the dirtiest place on the planet. Ohhh - the stories. We sat at a restaurant and watched the waiter dip our dirty dishes into a bucket on the floor, give them a swirl, then a shake and place them lovingly onto the serving self. And we won't even talk about the towel they used to wipe off our table. Ga-Ross! Needless to say - our immune systems are on high alert!
Were rented a car to drive us to the caves and some sites (all for 2100 rupies = $20 each). Driving out and back we got to see 4 hours of Indian countryside. We thought we'd seen poor in Peru - doesn't hold a candle. Families holding up in literal tents made of bamboo poles with burlap tops. They hover over fires, people so dirty and thin it breaks your heart. Everything is based on a class system here and it is blatant in every aspect.









Along the way to the Fort - we whitnessed the tail end of a public beating. The police car just observing the group of men with large sticks and 1 man on the ground. All from the safety of our wee car, we saw just now different things are here.
The Fort was Monkey-riffic! We Strolled through an entry tunnel to have about 6 large monkeys running at us. I (Marisha) got so freaked out I flung a bag of pineapple at one of them and started running. The monkey impressivly snagged it right out of mid air. "Whatever - they were scary! " In the upper part of the fort, we were brought into the "zigzag" caves by torch light. Very cool except for the hundreds of bats just like the opening scene from Scooby Doo.






At the Ajanta caves - M, in true moorish fashion, dropped the camera on the cave floor and broke the screen. Luckily it still takes pictures, but the old school way. We learned a lot on day two at the caves. We now each have our favorite gods. Marisha's is Ganeesh because he has the head of an Elephant. Brian's is Vishnu, because he is always depicted surrounded by lots of ladies and he has many many hands (for busy hands he says).







