Another early morning steping over the sleeping bodies of the reception and other staff of the hotel as we head out the door to catch another early morning bus to Dehra Dun and then ANOTHER one to Mussoorie. Oh well.....if you are heading off the beaten track, you have to do as the locals do. After a quick cup of masala chai and the bags tied to the roof again, we were off.

By this time, we are so nonchalant about travelling in the buses that near misses and sheer drops really don't bother us anymore. By now, even the vomit streaked side panels(on the outside of the bus!) are not even a conversation starter (yes, there was a time when they were. It is amazing what colours these buses had acquired by the weak stomachs of travelling Indians - reds, greens, oranges and yellows. You knew a badly maintained bus when the vomit had actually turned black! Avoid them if you can!)

It is always a relief to head up into the mountains again and away from the heat, haze, pollution and dust and toward a bath that the guidebook promised was in the place we were aiming for (a lady needs her bath. A shower will only take you so far; especially when the hot water needs to be split between two!)!

Mussoorie is supposedly the favourite place that the newly married from Delhi come on honeymoon and it is at the Honeymoon Inn that they stay.....with its rooms with baths! We joked and laughed that we should tell all our friends that we were doing it backwards......having the honeymoon first because we would be staying at the Honeymoon Inn! Ha-bloody-ha..... Whoever wrote that guidebook needs to actually go and SEE the bathroom because there is no such thing as a bath in Mussoorie, because we checked practically every hotel in that town! b******s.....

But since we were here we thought we might make the best of it. Especially since there was a fantastic Tibetan restaurant that we frequented three times! Try Tibetan deserts, they are fantastic! So much so, that Ing had to almost lick the chocolate sauce off hers, and my plates! Seriously, it was that good!

We were surprised to see that the town had a cable car to a vantage point for sundowners! Fantastic! But surprisingly, at the top it was like a market. Apparently one of the favourite things for honeymooners to do is to head up here and have their photos taken in fancy dress costumes of by-gone Indian era. "You want photo? Make you look like Maharaja! Come this way!" Hmmm...clearly we must look like honeymooners then and they see right through our white skin! Finally we are being harassed because we blend in and not because we are white......amazing!

But the disappointing aspect is that the view and the viewpoints are secondary to selling whatever they have up there. It is a fantastic sight and it could really be made into something unique and specially, but alas, it's that old syndrome again, raising its ugly head. But where there are views to be had, they are fantastic. On one side is Dehra Dun on the plains; either side of us you side the lower foothills of the Himalayas extend their ridges and spurs towards the Ganges and far to the north, the clouds part very briefly for our very first glimpse of a snow covered peak! Seriously awesome!

And after all the excitement of Tibetan chocolate desserts, cable cars, declining the chance for a fashion shoot and our first snow covered peak it is time for a beer and we know just the place; just-a-short-up-the-next-hill-and-down-the-other-side away.

Tucked away in the trees just above the main town of Mussoorie is the Kasmanda Palace. Here is a place where plenty of history has been made too. India's Maharajas knew that India would soon be independent and that they had an uncertain future. Those affected by the proposed Partition were given a choice - stay in the India or align with Pakistan. All but one made their choices in line with India or Pakistan. One Hindu Maharaja with a mostly Muslim population dithered and dathered and ultimately wanted an independent kingdom, but this was never an option. Where it became clear that he would not choose, both India and Pakistan dispatched armies to the region to claim it as their own. Pakistan was too late and the Indians got there first. The result of one man's dithering and arrogance led directly to the Kashmir conflict of today. It is a situation of great complexity because Pakistan claims it as their own, as does India, as do the separatist Kashmiris and in a globally connected world, it affects a lot more than just these countries and groups.

China is not best pleased about the situation, especially with its own agitated western Muslim population being influenced by the situation here nor India's seeming inability to deal with the situation at all. Now that India, China and Pakistan all have nuclear weapons (and perhaps the political will or insanity to use them) and that the Indians have signed a very significant nuclear deal with the Americans there is much to play for in a larger, and broader geo-political and international sense.

The Indians have been pressured by the Chinese to do nothing for the Tibetans; so much so that the towns that the Tibetans live in have very little or no funding at all in fear of upsetting the Indian population, but also because they do not wish to upset the dragon of the north. The Chinese recently demanded that the Indians place a very important politico-religious figure under house arrest in India - which they duly did.

The two neighbours have even gone to war in the early 70's over disputed territory in the Himalayas and comprehensively out-thought the Indians politically and militarily. So the Chinese seem to consider the Indians are irrelevant in a political sense and exert pressure and use whatever leverage they have over the Indians to their own advantage.

But it here at this then-hunting lodge that the Partition effects -discussions were held and the lodge retains it old fashioned elegance of those important days. With its stuffed rhino and other animals heads mounted on the wall over the grand main staircase and the skins of tigers and leopards on the walls on either side and photos and relics from those imperial days all over the place, it is like a living museum and, just like the Cecil in Shimla, there are plenty of ghosts that walk the corridors in the imperial costumes or British uniforms discussing the future and their place in it. No doubt, many a deal was made here. Just imagine if these walls could talk, what would they say?

With the sun heading behind the hills and the purple hue seeping up from the horizon far away, the cold beer in our hands made us feel like kings of the world and all we observed was ours to enjoy. No wonder the Aussies are the way they are then......if you drink Fosters beer, you end up thinking Australian!