Hitch-Hiking To Kama Sutra

Temple at Khajuraho

From Jodhpur we visited Bundi and from Bundi we wanted to get to Khajuraho, famous for its many temples decorated with some of India’s best examples of Kama Sutra art.  However, that meant state run buses since it was low season and there were no longer enough tourists around taking this route across Rajasthan eastward.

It’s about the journey not the destination, right? 

Our first bus we caught at 8:30am from Bundi.  We were told it would be about 7 hours to get to Shivpuri, the city on the border of the next state.  From Shivpuri we planned on catching a 3 hours bus to Jhansi where we’d spend the night before getting an early morning bus to Khajuraho. 

Estimated total trip time to Khajuraho: 1 day and 1 morning.

Inside a temple at Khajuraho

Unfortunately, we forgot to convert this value into INDIA TIME.  It’s amazing how much time we spend wasting time. 

Like all buses, there are many stops along a journey in order to do the usual things: toilet break, lunch break, snack break, chai break, smoke break, break break, etc. etc. 

However, these are all done at separate times here in India.  Sort of like it’s all on the bus driver’s whim.  Sometimes he’ll stop to pick up more passengers from the side of the road.  Sometimes he won’t.  Sometimes he’ll stop the bus to go buy a pack of smokes 5 minutes after leaving a bus station full of vendors.  It once took us 30 minutes to drive 100m because we stopped 3 times!

Instead of 7 hours to Shivpuri, it took us 11 hours to get there.

Temple at Khajuraho

About 10 minutes into our ride the BUS BROKE DOWN.  We were told by the only guy there who spoke some English that no replacement bus was coming. 

We were just far enough out of town so that there were no lights, no taxis, no rickshaw drivers, nothing.

So we had to hitch a ride in the back of a flat bed truck with our English speaking friend and some other locals.  In retrospect, it was pretty cool as it meant lots of leg room, cool breezes and an awesome view of the stars.  But as a young foreign woman, I was blessed to have a male foreigner companion I could trust. 

We made it to Jhansi well past midnight and circled the town a few times before finding a suitable place to stay.  It took us 16 hours just to get to Jhansi so we decided that waking up in about 4 more hours to catch the morning bus just wasn’t going to happen.

In the end, total trip time to Khajuraho: 3 DAYS. 

But the temples were awesome and totally worth it.