Our last day of PCT was kind of underwhelming, but a much needed relaxation.
We got up nice and early to check out of our hotel and leave by 8:30, but didn't actually end up leaving until 9:15ish. Today was Indian Independence Day, so literally almost everything was closed, which drastically limited what we could do. We went to Qutub Minar, which is a complex with the tallest stone tower in the world, built by a king to show how great he is, he then started an identical one that was twice as wide and twice as high, but he died before even finishing the first story. There are tombs of a few kings there, and remains of the buildings surrounding the tower. We then drove by the lotus temple, which is a beautiful temple literally shaped like a lotus, stopped on the road to take a picture, but we couldn't go inside or anywhere near it. Not sure if it's because it's super sacred or because it was closed for the holiday.
This was basically all we could do for the day because of the closures, so they drove us to a parking lot to park the buses for us to have lunch. After seeing all of us so happy with our dominos last night, RC decided to treat everyone with dominos for lunch today. I was not opposed. We had to wait for a while for it, but we were in the air conditioned bus and we were in the parking lot of a shopping center (surprise!) so people could do yet more shopping before we left. We had lunch, shopped around to kill time, then headed to the train station to catch our 27 hour (with no delays) train back to Hyderabad to then fly home. A few people absolutely did not want to take that long train again, so they booked flights. I could have with them, but it was like $90 for the flight plus 2 nights extra of hotels plus all my food and I just wasn't about that life, the train and all my meals are already paid for plus the majority are on the train still, and I want every last minute with everyone possible! So I opted to stay on the train. It will be an adventure for sure, since we checked out at 8:30 and haven't showered all day (train leaves at 5:25PM) and we aren't arriving until 8PM tomorrow. We will really stink, so I opted to stay in a hotel room even though I could just go straight to the airport like everyone else with flights at my time, but I have like 8 hours and need to repack all my junk and need NEED need to shower. So that's my plan. I'm ready to be back home soon, but not looking forward to the long flights. I am however looking forward to seeing my cousin Alex during my long layover in NYC for his birthday though! So that excitement will get me through the train and the planes. Hopefully everything runs smoothly!