A weekend adventure

Hey everyone!

India is going quite well. We have both had a cold however we are feeling better today and went on a nice adventure. We started our morning eating breakfast at peace café. It’s a cute place not far from where we are staying. While at breakfast we had the pleasure of sharing our table with a lovely Canadian girl. She runs her own wedding floral business in Vancouver and tries to do everything organic and/or local. After breakfast she joined us as we walked about 1km to the local church. This church was the only building in upper Dharamsala that survived the earthquake 1905 and is quite stunning. However it is also in great need of repair. We all donated a small amount; however it seems that the church really is in need of a sister church to help them raise money. While visiting the church we walked around the cemetery where we saw a horse, several monkeys and the burial place of the second viceroy of India who died in 1863. The three of us walked back to town and said good bye to our new friend. Ian and I than headed on a wandering. This led us to the next neighborhood over, even closer to the Himalayas. We got to see the areas swimming pool, did some shopping, and then walked another 2km up into the foot hills to look at a waterfall and go to a café that is tucked in the awesome foothills. The waterfall was not much to speak of however it was interesting to see the hundreds of monks washing and drying their clothes along the river at the bottom of the fall. We were able to walk past on of the largest shale piles I have ever seen, for those of you who were ever at EWA it makes the shale pits there seem like a baby kitten. The café we visited was perhaps 1/3 of the way up this mountain that gives climbers their first access to the snowline if heading into the Himalayas from this direction. We had lunch at a restaurant that had gray rock for a floor, this makes loads of sense here because most places with western floors end up being slanted, and saw the cutest puppy ever. I really wanted to bring him home however Ian said no =( Our last stop for the day was at a little shop on the edge of town. It was sketchy as could be, we got out as fast as we could and decided that we had enough adventure for the day.

I hope all of you are doing wonderful!

Laura & Ian