The Carnelian week at Gujarat - a summary post

 Feb 21st-26th 2025

Click on the link to jump to that date. 

Carnelian Day One - Ahmedabad and Sarkhej Roza

Carnelian Day 2 - On to Lothal 

Carnelian Day 2 evening - Sun Temple at Modhera

 

Carnelian Day 3 - Rani ki Wow it was

 

 Carnelian Day 4 - Back to the Future feeling at Dholavira

 

Carnelian Day 5 - A Slice of Kutchi history and culture

 

Carnelian Day 6 - Ending with a flourish - flamingoes and wild asses with a bonus Owl

 

And the Ebird trip report is here:  https://ebird.org/tripreport/353535

 

Carnelian Day 6 - Ending with a flourish - flamingoes and wild asses with a bonus Owl

 Continued from here

 26th February 2025

 

Our Carnelian road trip explorations were slowly coming to an end.  Everyday I saw something completely astonishing and revealing.  And this last day was no different.

 We got a morning look at The Fern, Sattva - and I was relieved to see more mud and less concreted spaces.  When we returned home, I was curious as to who was behind this group - we stayed in I think 3 of their properties.  The promoter Param Kannampilly started The Orchid Ecotel in Mumbai, and has tried to make a mark in sustainable hoteliering, I read.  At the moment they have more than 120 hotels under their umbrella! None in Tamil Nadu and that explains why I had not heard of them.  

The jeeps picked us up fro the hotel and in less than 10 minutes we were at the sanctuary gate.

This was not my first time at LRK, but it was Sekar's first.  The sanctuary has been around since the seveties, when the Wild Ass populations plummeted.  Their populations are steady now and I think it is fairly easy to see them.   

The Bajana Creek however has water and waterbirds as well.  As you enter, the creek is to the right and parallels the jeep track.  The Jeeps like to stay on the tracks - it is kind of difficult to assess which is hard mud and which is soft, just-dried beds.  Typically, the area is a salty desert, with these little patches of water but in the monsoons the water is more widespread as also the birds.

The much anticipated flamingoes were there in plenty!  Both Lesser and Greater.

Devaroon got some lovely shows like this one - showing the vastness of the landscape too.

The Northern Shoveler moved in an orderly fashion through the Lesser Flamingoes that were focussed on filter feeding. Photo by Devaroon

SaiSudha got this lovely video of a flamingo doing the stomp-stomp feed feeed dance.  And you can see the Pied Avocets in the background as well. 

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DGm20U5SZP2/?igsh=eDFyNmNoZHVtZDE=

 

Flamingo Ikebana

Photo by Devaroon - a bunch of Spoonbills were busy too in the clear waters.

I daydreamed as I stared through the reeds at the clear waters that rippled in the breeze.  

A collective gasp as a flock put on an aerial show.  There's something so joyful about birds in flight.

A trail of pink and honking vocalisations by the flamingoes didnt seem to bother the other birds who ignored them and continued with their morning.

A flamingo was here.

Some birds and ducks were far away - Common Pchards with their ferrous heads, a couple of Greylag geese with their distincive pink bills, and 3 Dalmation pelicans in the water!  They did not look too different from our Spot-billed Pelicans, but these were much larger.  And one white Stork!

The jeep drivers gently moved us along to catch the wild asses.

And then I noticed that Sheila was missing!  She had dropped her iphone near the flamingoes, some of the guards seem to have found it, and she raced back to go and get it.  She came back with phone looking vastly relieved even if they doubled the reward rate to a 1000 Rs!

The asses moved as a large group in the desert.  The Indian Wild Ass (Equus hemionus khur).  They have never been domesticated - I found that interesting

The asses feed on prosopsis and grass, and graze through the day.  Prsopsis seems to be a dry season alternative, as they prefer the grasses more.

The wild ass has family herds, with stallions living on their own, and then when the mare is in heat, there is the usual male rivals battle and an alpha male emerges.

 Grasses like this Alkaliweed form an important part of their diet.  It has some slat and also holds water.  Some of us tasted it on the suggestion of the guides. 

 

 

They can run really fast the guides told us, and there's no point trying to get too close - they will trot away.  Chasing them in the jeeps is strictly forbidden.  We saw a couple of them "necking" and hrsing around. 

 It was time to leave but not before we saw an Owl!!

Do you see the Short-eared Owl Asio flammeus Photo by Devaroon

Human perception is so amazing - once you "see" it, it stays seen, but until then, you keep asking, where, where?  All I see is leaf and brown bark.  you whine and fret, and everyone says look here look there, follow the line of that branch, see the rust colour...and then suddenly you realise you have been staring at it all along, just not seeing it.  it has happened so many times but always astonishing.  And then when you see it, then you become the cool one, needing to help the needy few who haven't!

Complete bird list here:  https://ebird.org/checklist/S215471912

And then it was time to leave, and a dusty ride back to the gate and to the resort and check out time.  We were in the bus and on our way back to Ahmedabad by 1.  By 4 in the evening it was goodbye time

And so ended our remarkable and memorable trip.  A trip through time, with wonderful fellow travellers and facilitated so seamlessly by the Carnelian Team.  

For us, it was on to Mumbai, catching a virus, possibly from my fellow traveller on the flight and then back to Chennai.  The chatter continues on our whatsapp group, and the sharing is interesting enough that no one has left the group!

Carnelian Day 3 - Rani ki Wow it was

 23rd Feb 2025 - Patan

Continued from here.

 

Once again, we needed to check out by 8am and head for breakfast.  We were ready early and decided to explore the neighbourhood.  Sandhya was down and briskly walking up and down.  Hotel Raveta seems to be away from town, off the NH10 - and the area is called Tirupati township!

Nothing much to write about the environs - an open sewer ran the length of the road - or was it a stormwater drain?  There were these bird stands - the one with the peacock on it - where pigeons cooed and fed, as also the Jungle Babblers.  One Grey Wagtail hurried and bobbed along the banks, very busy with his/her morning feeding.

The white-breasted waterhens rooted around in the canal.  We strolled in the streets behind the hotel - dusty and dry, and once again many pigeon feeding stands, and we saw Sparrows go in and out of one of these.  

There were Laughing Doves calling, from the wires, cows wandering and of course the street dogs looking at us with hope for a biscuit or morsel.

We got back to the hotel, to see the Buddha fountain also filled with pigeons!  Ebird list here.  

Breakfast was in the ground floor cafe - and there were very nice dhoklas and also khandvi - I quite enjoyed those, though I think my Selvi's poha is better.😆

Our bus arrived - the driver was amazing - never late, kept the bus shiny and clean, and drove steadily.  

We settled into our seats - already habits were forming - Sekar and me sat on the right hand side - all through the trip I think!  We had to pick up the splinter group who were at the other hotel just down the road.

Suddenly we were in the greener and cleaner part of down town Patan it seemed.  I remembered from my Sarkhej ki Roza Ahmedabad story about Patan being the capital of the Gujarat Sultanate before his time.  There were some old fort walls, a couple of large fancy schools, lots of tree lined roads, and then we were there.

Our first glimpse of the ASI complex - standard with lawns and trees.  As with all ASI monuments we were greeted by large lawns and neem trees. I wonder why they do this though - it’s so not part of our old gardens and it’s so water intensive. 

We strolled across the lawns, there was a flash of brilliant blue - an Indian Roller darted across the lawn and settled on this Neem tree.  Do you see it?  Photo by Devaroon

And then just like that - we were at the well!  I just stood there stunned.  Stunned at the sheer size of it, the stark beauty and the wonder, and even more stunned as to how something like this could have been buried and forgotten.

Bhimadeva I - of the Modhera sun temple - had a wife, Udaymati, who is the Rani who is believed to have built this Vav or well in the 11th century, after his demise.  We know nothing about her, it seems?  So she did not rule upon her husband's death, but she was important enough (and wealthy enough) to commission this monument to water.

While one version says that the step well caved in during a flood, it could be that it just silted over.  The well part has always been visible - only no one seemed to remember the step well bit.  The whole ASI restoration makes for fascinating reading.  The fact that it was silted over is seen by many as a blessing in disguise - it saved the step well from vandalism and possibly erosion by wind and the elements.

Supposedly in the 19th century, those pillars that were seen poking out, were vandalised and carted off to build another step well Trikam Barot-ni-Vav  in Patan.  Talk about repurposing.

The whole step well is 64m long, 20m wide and 27m deep with tier upon tier of carvings.  Were these pillars - seen in the foreground in this picture -  the base of an entry arch? 

Clearing The Debris

It was in 1958 that ASI undertook the clearance and restoration work for the Vav, which was filled with silt and water. As the process of desilting and debris clearance started, the water also started receding. The silt had to be cleared bit by bit by hand and carefully checked before disposal for antiquities that could be mixed with the mud.

“It was the most risky project of my career,” says Bhopal-based retired ASI archaeologist Narayan Vyas, who did the documentation work at the site for seven years between 1981 and 1988 and also holds a PhD degree on the stepwell. “For days, I would sit on the narrow ledges that run along the walls on a chair working. If I looked down I felt dizzy, it was so deep,” he remembers.

Work was slow – the process took more than three decades to complete. Bisht recalls that when he had taken charge of the Indore circle (which includes Patan) in 1989, only three levels had been exposed. The rest was completed under him. The top two levels of the stepwell had been destroyed – ASI rebuilt them, but without any of the sculptural adornments that must have been there originally. After the desilting, the sculptures had to be cleaned with distilled water. “Chemical cleaning and treatment was done to protect the structure and sculptures,” says Vilas Jadhav, another retired ASI archaeologist who had also worked at the Vav.

(Source:  https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/pride-of-patan-the-journey-of-rani-ki-vav-from-a-being-buried-art-treasure-to-the-reverse-of-the-new-rs-100-note/story-2vFSa1l6JZtGLhUx6pC7NI.html)

We climbed down the steps, and I for one did not know where to look - row upon rows of beautiful sculptures, intricate designs, amazing "engineering" must have gone in to get this sandstone step well in place.  Who were the builders, the architects?  who were the sculptors?

Kalki - the one we await.  Riding Devadutta the horse, and with maidens pouring water?  Enemies are underfoot and crushed.

Mahishasuramardhii was one of my favourites - so beautifully sculpted, though I felt she did not have a "fierce" look.

Do you see the 3 owls?  Meera had set Sheila and me the task of finding them, we failed miserably, so distracted were we, and she had to point them out, eventually! 

The most wondrous feat of engineering cum ingenuity for me was the reclining Vishnu - seen at the far end, through the various layers of pillars - carved so when the well was full of water he would appear reclining in the ocean!  How cool  is that I thought. 

There was Balarama, Buddha, Rama, Parvathi and so many more - dancing women everywhere.  ASI estimates that there must have been at least 800 sculptures in al!

Varaha once again with a maiden pouring water?

Some one remarked very wryly, isn't this all a bit much, what is one supposed to see?  Then we discussed and imagined how Patan residents would have visited the well ever so often, and then each day they could sit in a different spot, admire a different sculpture, or maybe have a favourite spot, have rendezvous with secret lovers under specific figures, the possibilities were endless!

What was interesting was along with the innumerable gorgeous apsaras, there were female sculptures like this - with khatvanga  in hand.  Rani Udaymati - I wish we could know more about her, and the brief she gave the "design team". 

You had to admire the scale of it...

and the intricate details of each panel.

A vertical panoramic shot from where we stood to the top.

Here's a video of the well, and also zooming in on the Vishnu at the rear.

A couple of hours later, we reluctantly  moved out of the step well, came around to the actual well at the rear.  There are guards ensuring that people do not try any stunts like trying to look into the well. But there should be a way for us tourists to see the well face as well = I have since seen pictures, and even the well wall has beautiful work on it.

From the well, looking back at the step well , where we had just come from.

Even these walls were sculpted!

A pair of rose ringed parakeets seem to have made a nest in the wall - and were busy feeding their young ones - I think.

I could have quite happily lingered longer. We then went to the Patola museum and I learnt about the Patola style of double ikat weaving. No photos allowed but it was a pretty cool place. The family said they were involved in the this for 28 generations and claimed to trace their lineage back to the Solankis. 

And then we drove and drove (some 5 hours) and drove all the way to the island of Khadir where Dholavira is located. Along the way I saw 2 flamingos, a roller and one wild ass as well besides the longest every cattle procession ever!

We entered the Rann salt areas halfway through - and then travelled on the old Road to heaven - to reach Khadir Bet island.

Lunch was so so. And we reached the rather nice Evoke hotel in the evening. Checked in and then went off to see the sunset at the rann - what a lovely experience it was.   Sekar's
 photos below