Wai in Maharashtra

Tuesday, March 17, 2015

After exploring Sydney Point in Panchgani we headed over to Wai. We travelled by the Wai-Panchgani-Mahableshwar Road. Wai is located at a distance of around 14 KM from Panchgani so roughly around 30 minutes away. 

By the time we landed in Wai,  it had already started drizzling and in a matter of few minutes it had started raining too.  Chilled breeze complimented the rains. 

Now we had to search for a place to stay for the night.  

Manohar had asked me, if he should book the rooms online, to which I had declined, stating that we might get rooms and now we are searching for one. How stupid of me. Grrrr

We spent the next one hour searching for accomodation.  There are plenty of hotels in Wai, but they didn't meet our needs. Finally we found Hotel Ganesha,  located very near to the Dholya Ganpati Mandir.  It provided us hot water (hot rod), good rooms at a price of Rs. 800 for a day.  Checkout time being 10 AM. 

The time was around 5 PM on my watch,  but it was already dark outside so we couldn't visit the Dholya Ganpati Mandir,  which was next door. 

We called it a night.  Now due to heavy rains the power had conked off. Thanks to generators in the room, we still had light and fan in the rooms but the charging ports were non functional.  Now I realise the importance of powerbanks on trips.  Though I never felt the need to carry one in the past. 

Dom,  his bag was like a magician's hat,  such a lot of stuff filled in it,  ranging from food,  to 3 litres of cola,  to mosquito repellent.  Anything that you can think of is in his bag. 

We also found Ganpati statues on each and every internal road in Wai.  The same way we have Crosses on the side of the roads in Goa. Never seen anything like this before.  Wai is famous for its Ganpati Temples and hence has devotees throughout the year.   

Dinning was a task for us,  as there was no electricity,  we had a tough time searching for a place to eat.  Most to the eateries were shut down.  So we travelled along the tiny roads of Wai hoping to get some dinner.  As it was raining and to compliment it there was no electricity,  most eating joints had shut shop.  Finally we reached a small food court comprising of roadside chinese food.  

We had some awesome Indian chinese food,  Triple Shezwan Rice,  Chicken Manchurian in Gravy and Chicken Hakka Noodles. After having out stomach full, we called it a day and headed off to the room for rest. 

We were to visit the Dholya Ganpati Mandir,  Krishna Ghat the next day