(2) Southern end towards North of India...

I had packed my bag, after about 1 year of working in a project, and towards its completion, began to remove possessions which i won't require, and thus filled one big backpack (rucksack), with all my belongings, which i can carry on my own (so, it had to be less than 10kg in weight, as i weight some 60 plus kgs. initially, due to attachments,

i could not throw away some un-necessary things, and carried them on, till realization hit me, few days / weeks / months later.  then i was able to lighten up my baggage / burden..  (to become more of an email, without attachments ;)

Kanyakumari, as a place is more of a tourist trap.. or the people there are more commercial, and used to people coming there for short stay, of a day, or 1-2 days... mostly to be at one end of India.. of course, Vivekananda rock, which is the real end (about 2 km away from land, a big rock, like an island in middle of the sea).. which you can access, only through a boat ride, is worth visiting.

Trivandrum (Thiruvanandapuram), capital of Kerala comes up next... where i had dome some work, but, soon traveled up, to Tamilnadu, and to Kodaikanal, which is more of a city.. the surrounding hilly areas around Kodaikanal would have more appeal to natural lovers, as its colder, greener and more exotic and peaceful.

from Kodai, to Coimbatore, where some of my friends had invited me to stay with them (they were staying in rented houses on the town's outskirts... most of them, 20-25 year age group, enthusiastically exploring their new found adult life, as the generation of 21st century's second decade... so many differences from my own youth period and culture...  these youngsters, dont prefer solo traveling (yet), and more into traveling in groups... more into peace, and not much interested in concepts which divide people, such as regionalism, religion, caste, etc. etc.  i was amazed to see this, and kept becoming more hopeful about a better future (in comparison to my own youth experiences).  though, not all these youngsters agreed with my positive and hope about future ;)

from there, to banglore, to goa.  in goa, stayed in an organic farm setting as a volunteer and met and interacted with most youth (20-30 age group mostly)..  tho in goa, many more from all over the world, and i was excited to learn rapidly about amazing cultural differences and personalities.

but, these days were like an incubation stage, and by the beginning of this year, the bakpakng aspect hatched.. a very short trip to mumbai, and train to Orissa, Puri..  something like 40 hour plus train ride, gave me lots of time to introspect and realize what kind of bakpakng i want to do.

in Puri, stayed in CT road (Chakra Tirtha), which is close to beach, but enough away from the touristy / commercial / crowded part of the beach..  nothing much doing, but living alone with own time frame..  fortunately, there were many such solo bakpakers there, who were totally onto themselves..  while occasionally for couple of hours a day, might join others at a tea shop corner for some chit chat.  that was it.  amazing time, but maybe not everyone's cup of tea ;)

more about Puri, orissa in next blog..