Jaisalmer to Mount Abu

Part II

...As we were driving back from the sand dunes, I saw the meter of the fuel tank, it was almost at 'E', there was no petrol pump for the next 15 kilometers. Jasbir Uncle drove at the most economical speed, 60, there were cars passing us at 110-120, we felt like we were going in a road roller. But being a road roller helped as we reached Suryagarh before the tank was empty. We had dinner with my fathers' friend. After dinner I played billiards with another 15 year old boy. We kept playing till 1:30 AM! And as I expected, I woke up later than what we had planned. Finally we left Jaisalmer at about 10:15. We made our first stop 70 kilometers off the highway near Barmer. A village called Dhanau, Chohtan, District Barmer. Barefoot College has a center there also. I had gone to the Barefoot College in Tilonia many times before so this was not something great for me. What interested me was the fact that 33% of Dhanau's population were Pakistanis who migrated in the 1971 war of India and Pakistan. I even met one of them. He said his family is still in Pakistan, they are in touch through mobile phones. A relative of his had gone to Pakistan recently and given his mobile number to his family.

             We had lunch with them and set off again towards Mount Abu. Soon the sun set and we had to go up the mountains at night. We finally reached Mount Abu at 9 at night. We found a hotel and quickly went to our rooms. The weather was cold compared to Jaisalmer and Bikaner but it wasn't colder than Delhi. We had done more than 500 kilometers today. I needed something from the car at midnight and when I went to ask for the keys from Jasbir Uncle, he was like tere padosee ke paas hogi, (it must be with your neighbour), he was so tired he was talking to me in his dream!
              In the morning we both had surprising news for each other, I told him about the midnight episode and he told me that there was frost on the car at 7 in the morning! So maybe Mount Abu was colder than Delhi. We walked till the famous lake of Mount Abu but didn't feel like boating so we started walking towards a huge balloon we saw in the air. On the way, we saw horses with riders on them. They were asking everyone if they wanted to sit on it. They walked the horses when someone sat on the horses. When we reached the balloon place we realised that people go in that balloon and enjoy the view of Mount Abu. We did the same. The view was good but not as much fun as we had while going up and down. It was fun seeing everyone so scared! When we came back down, we drove till a widely known Jain Mandir which was a normal temple. So basically Mount Abu is just a tourist spot and has just tourist attractions. It does not live up to its name, but I figured that the people of Rajasthan might go there because of the colder weather than the hot Rajasthan.
            Udaipur, Bhim and Tilonia still to come.....