After a few days in Delhi and a day at the Taj Mahal, I took a six-hour train trip to Rishikesh -- the 'Yoga Capital of the World;' a small town nestled at the start of the Himalayas and on the mouth of the Ganges River. In this area there are at least 25 ashrams for yoga and meditation and also each of the guesthouses holds daily yoga classes.The Ganges River is one of the most sacred elements for Indian Hindus, it is completely revered as “The Mother Ganges.” It is still India though so it is overall loud and dirty, but under that all there is a serene element to be found here.
There are several multi-storied Hindu temples here filled with ceramic gods and bells that you ring as you walk the stairs to each new level. At the top worshippers (and me!) are given water from the Ganges to drink and also given a red bindi dot on their forehead.
There is a nightly Hindu ceremony at the river where musicians play and lead everyone in chants and songs and offerings of flowers and incense are set afloat on the river at sunset. I didn’t have an offering but the man next to me gave me some of his flowers and incense and showed me how to offer it properly to the Ganges. It was really special.
Right now there is a huge pilgrimage going on where boys from the outlying temples come to Rishikesh to gather water from the mouth of the river to take back to their own temples and then wash their statue of god Shiva. They all wear bright orange clothes. They arrive in a town 24 kms from here and have to walk (some of them crawl on their bellies) to here, bathe in the river and then collect the water. Right now there are tens of thousands of pilgrims here -- it is so, so crowded and hard to do yoga b/c the ashrams are filled with the pilgrims. But the ancient tradition itself is really cool to see.
Pilgrims bathing in Ganges and crowded foot bridge.
