Riding day #16, Sept 13, 2019 Shimla to Rohru:  109km, 1,778M up, 1,970M end

This area of India is the apple production centre, and this is harvest time, so an amazing number of big and small trucks carrying apples to market.  Occasionally one goes astray:

In Shimla, there is a two stage (about) 6 storey public elevator - takes one from the mid level of the town towards the top, it costs 20 rupees to ride (about $0.40) - but they gave me the seniors rate (14 rupees) without my even asking - not sure if I should be insulted or complimented?

A minor development later in the day:  turns out the hotel we were supposed to be staying in doesn’t exist, not sure if this was a simple mistake or a scam.  In any case the TDA guys quickly sorted it out, found a new hotel (quite reasonable) and got directions to everyone to the new hotel.  Considering the chaos of this (by India standards) small town, I’m impressed with TDA.

Dunnery at his end of day best

I’ve noticed this a couple of times (e.g. now at the hotel):  the chorus of crickets in the trees is really loud, reaches a high pitch dies off then a loud chorus again.  At least I think they are crickets.

Interesting scam we discovered at Shimla:  A monkey swipes sunglasses off the head of a tourist, a local lures the monkey with some food and gets the sunglasses - the happy tourist gives 200 rupees to the local.  Yes, the local and the monkey are working as a pair.