We have had to relinquish Tuktanic, and now rely on public transport. The freedom to go where we want is sorely missed!

The guy from our hotel has arranged a transfer for us all the way to Jodhpur, split between the two of us it is not too expensive. Definitely quick and easy travel air-conditioned travel through the Rajasthan desert, than Tuktanic provided but a whole lot less fun and adventure. We did not break down once!

A few hours outside Jaiselmer, on a long dusty empty road we suddenly come across a mass of people all heading down the road and to a bigger gathering of people in in the middle of nowhere that it more than a dusty depression of a  dried out mud pool. There must be about two hundred people, who have appeared out of the flat horizon of nothingness. No signs of any habitation.

Naturally this is an immediate stop for me to find out what is going on, take photos and behave like a total tourist. I beg for the driver to stop and dive out the car.

This is a first sign, after the group hubbub of the Rickshaw Run that Laura and I are not natural travel companions, she prefers to stay in the car, headphones/music on snoozing.  I could easily have stayed chatting with the women, learning their stories, what the ceremony was about, could I join in…

I gather from a brief grabbed explanation off the only person i could fnd speaking English that it is rainy season tributes… an offering to tempt the skies to open.

Laura waited patiently for me to get my fix, and then its back in the car for another few hours of empty roads