On Thursday we ventured out from Bikaner for a short train ride to the local town of Deshnoke. About an hour away from Bikaner, Desnoke is famous for rats. A whole temple full to be exact. Apparently in the 14th century the son of Karni mata drowned. She ordered Yama the God of death to bring him back to life. Yama said he couldn't, but Karni mata as an incarnation of Durga had the power to restore her sons life. I couldn't figure why she wouldn't have known that, but who am I to question. For some strange reason she then apparently decreed that all her descendants would be reincarnated after death as kabas (rats), including her son. Hence about 600 families in Desnoke claim to be descendants of karni mata and their relatives are rats in the temple.

Taking a left out of the station we discovered Desnoke to be a dry dusty place with a few whitewashed buildings , lots of nomadic donkeys, cows and the odd camel. It was great to explore the lanes and see some real desert dwellers going about their daily routines. As we got further down the road we came across a small market and a wooden cart selling samosas. Ready to have a snack we asked for a couple of samosas, handed over the ten rupees (10p),and moved away from the stall. I still haven't figured out why, as the samosa wasn't hard, but I soon discovered I'd lost part of another tooth. Fortunately this time not right in the middle - but close enough to need another dentist visit at some point in the next few weeks. Think I'll have to stick to a liquid diet from here on in !! So much for my pre trip NHS checkup.

Eventually we made it to the temple. In the end it turned out to be difficult to miss. In true Indian style the area surrounding the temple in this quiet town had been filled with stalls selling colourful knickknacks, snacks, drinks. Being a temple we were expected to remove our shoes, which we duly did, and we carefully picked our way along the path to the temple- paying the 30 rupees to use our camera. I've never been great with rodents particularly those running free, but I was hoping that this could be a turning point. Maybe being amongst so many of them in one go would cure me.....a bit like a psychological flooding technique. All was going well as I kept a careful eye on the movements of the little blighters round the entrance. Then a bl****y great pigeon flew through the archway and frightened the beegeebies out of me. After that I was definitely on high alert. I'm not quite sure what I was expecting but I did think that temple rats would all have big smiles and look really healthy from all the free food and attention. These were just scabby looking things. There were loads of flies and it was difficult to walk anywhere without stepping in rat or pigeon droppings. I bravely headed towards the inner temple area, but faced with a couple of rats who seemed adamant they had been given responsibility for checking intruders I admitted defeat and gave in. I did try and think of them as Granny Patel, or great uncle Praven but it didn't help. They still looked like scabby rats.

On the way back we resolutely squashed ourselves in alongside the locals on the train, and soon became an attraction for a bunch of local youths who wanted to try out their basic English via a small notebook. John soon found his feet and proved to be a natural interacting with the local teenagers. When we arrived back at Bikaner they all shook his hand before heading off in their various directions.

The following day we headed off early for our pre booked camel safari. John getting extra bumps on his head from the top of the rickshaw as we bounced along the rough road, around speed bumps and through potholes to get to the camels. Neither of us have ridden camels before so we decided a two hour jaunt into the desert around Bikaner would be ample. We soon discovered there was only going to be us, two camels and the two camel men, so we were able to set off straight away once we were aboard. It was very strange as the camel straightened his legs to assume his full height, after letting me climb on. It seemed such a long way down, but after a few minutes walking along the track it seemed the most natural thing in the world. The saddle was extremely comfortable and the ride slow and smooth. We stopped after about twenty minutes to climb a large sand dune on foot (easier said than done) and then remounted for the rest of the journey. John had been given the female camel, who definitely had an aversion to the many flies that buzzed around her head. Periodically she would swing one of her legs up to touch her chest, swatting flies as she went and thumping the pad on her chest with a loud thud. Poor John looked quite unsettled to start with- presumably thinking she was about to set off at full gallop, but once he got used to her all was well. We were able to observe a surprising amount of wildlife for our high vantage point, including antelope, wild camel, cattle, goats, salamanders, and an abundance of birds. There were also a lot of villagers huts along the route.

We moved on from Bikaner to Jaisalmer on Saturday on another night bus. Thankfully this time only a seven hour trip so didn't need to invest in any super sized tena pads. Although climbing up the ladder to get in the top bunk was a bit challenging as you ladies of a certain age will appreciate. I'll save our Jaisalmer tales for the next blog.....so it's bye for now ....