THE ENIGMA OF DEVPRAYAG

For hours together, I sat there...thoughtless...it was miraculous...to see the Bhagirathi meet the Alaknanda...Bhagirathi with full force and intensity getting absorbed into the calmness of Alaknanda...giving birth to the Ganga.

Its rightly said, you are never the same after the dip in the Ganga...how it happens...will always remain an enigma to me...

Take a ride on NH7 from Rishikesh and keep following the track of the Ganga up into the Himalayas, before she is known as the Ganga...and that might turn out to be the most powerful journey of your life...Know her as Mandakini...as Alaknanda...as Nandakini...as Pindar...as Bhagirathi...as Dhauliganga.

One post is not enough when I talk about the Ganga. Many more to come on this.

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ANTWERP CENTRAL STATION

As deep as I can peep into my past, I always sense very fond and nostalgic memories of railway stations. So many moments of childhood began and ended in railway stations. My love for railway stations continues and whenever I get a chance I don't miss a visit into a station to experience the magical energy of the mixed sound of thousands of fast moving footsteps and eager voices. European settings provide infinite moments to any traveler. Antwerp is no exception too. Like any other European city with a strong medieval connect, Antwerp owns its history and legends. While it may take pages to write about Antwerp, let me restrict this post to the first landmark of Antwerp, its getaway - its very own train station, the Antwerp Central, located in Koningin Astreidplein, in the heart of the city. The brainchild of King Leopold II and designed by Louis Delacenserie, Antwerp Central, with its stone clad structure and huge dome, has seen its days of glory and destructi

THE VOICE OF LAKE BLED

Nature communicates...through different channels, shapes and forms. Sometimes, in the form of the gentle ripples of water...and sometimes through the rustling of the leaves of the trees. The sound of the wind brushing with everyone around can just not be missed. The image of the beautiful birds swimming and looking at you and coming close, as if they know you since ages, is a beautiful experience. For the full duration, I was there, this is exactly how I had felt. Some sort of communication...with everything around. A beautiful lake, an island inside the lake with a story and church on it, snow capped peaks around this lake, reflections of a fairy tale castle, swans wishing by as they swim and beautiful boats ferrying the lake without disturbing the swans... About half an hour's road drive from Ljubljana, the capital city of Slovenia, wrapped all around by the Julian Alps sits a beautiful lake, by the name Lake Bled (Blejsko jezero in Slovene)....in the tow

THE CLASSIC RIVALRY OF OLD ZAGREB

We stood there absorbing the beautiful sunset that Old Zagreb, locally known as Gornji Grad, offered. The February evening was delightfully clear and presented a view to remember. In front of us, mingling with the red tiled roofs, dominated majestically the two famous monuments - the Zagreb Cathedral of Kaptol and the St. Mark's Church of Gradec...along with the bits and the pieces of the historic panorama of a thousand years. Few centuries back, during the medieval period, when the region was not known as Zagreb, existed two hill top settlements - the Kaptol and the Gradec, separated by the then existing rivulet Medvescak. The Kaptol housed the Cathedral and was the religious center while the Gradec was home to the merchants and the craftsmen. It took the two settlements centuries of bitter rivalry before prudence took over and they decided to unify during the nineteenth century, thus together becoming Zagreb. The reasons for this bitterness were many ranging from simple

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