Shimla

Ok so after another crummy overnight bus ride where neither of us got any sleep at all, we arrive in Shimla.(later to be named Shitla by us) Now this town was described as a nice typical hill station and the capital of honeymoons. Now again we are puzzled by India and Indians. Why anyone would want to come here for there honeymoon is beyound me. Really. We arrive in this town that is polluted due to the crappy buses and encircling mountains with the sewage drains running down most of the sides of the stairs you climb and the streets you walk down. I think that our mood didn't help but it's the same starting view that all the Indians get as well. So here is where the touts come in. No we don't need help, don't follow us, stop right there and don't move until i say so and then walk away. But no, no is never no to an Indian. He will follow until the end as we saw. So we walk up to the top of the hill and over to the YMCA because that must be a good option(and they don't give commisions). but as we have seen in India, YMCA doesn't mean cheap but still good, it actually means expensive and not as good. It's really weird really. How there you can get a crummy room with no bathroom for 400Rps but somewhere else get a slightly better room with a bathroom for 300Rps. So we continued walking and checked another hotel that was full. So we set the bags down and i was going to go to another hotel up the hill but the old man tout beat me there and so i wasn't prepared to pay extra because i had a walking companion. So i said i was going back down the hill. I return to where Justina is and thinking that he maybe is gone, i start back up the stairs in this cat and mouse game. Now there were 2 ways up the hill, i had the stairs between the houses way and the tout was on the trail going around way. The tout came back down and was asking the other touts if they had seen me which they said they hadn't. So as I was turning around the coner of the first stairs, i see the man start into a run. The kind of old man run where he has to kinda rev the engine before starting. Well i wasn't going to loose this race. I sprint up the stairs to where it meets the trail, seeing him just turn the corner. I get into the hotel a good 10 seconds and secure an acceptable room for the right price. My first race in India and i won, although he was an old man, but still probably even more determined than me. So Shimla maybe once was nice but now is no more. The room we stayed at really wasn't that good, and you were that into even taking a shower in the bathroom. We slept most of the first day and then went out to walk around. There are a few streets around the "hill" that were nice with the colonial country england style housing and the shops and many people doing exactly the same as us, just walking around. So this is the only picture that i really have of the place of the main square and so the only one you will get. We bought some books, walked up to the temple dedicated to the monkey god at the top of the hill and just strolled around. There just really wasn't much to the place that's all. So after 2 nights there we new that it was time to leave and so we got on another bus, yes, i know. But this one was all day, and we arrived in Rishikesh at around 6:30pm, saying that it will be our very last bus ride in this journey. Well it turns out that me might have to catch one to Delhi but at least it won't be a local bus.