After breakfast, we will visit the Bishnoi village by jeep. The Bishnois are a fascinating community which follows the 29 (bish-noi) tenets laid down by the 15th century Guru Jambeshwar. They fervently believe in the sanctity of animal and plant life so all animals live near their villages without fear. When a Bishnoi dies, he is sometimes buried in the sitting position and often placed at the threshold of the house or adjoining cattleshed. A Bishnoi believes he will later be reincarnated as a deer, hence the herds of blackbuck often seen near their villages.

The nature excursion was interesting, catching a glimpse of two Blackbucks fighting and some of the local birds. More interesting was the people and the simplicity of their lifestyle. The women were busy making bread and cooking on the cow dung fueled stove. That takes a little getting use to but when you are here it is important to respect and admire how they live and enjoy their simple life as farmers. Water and electricity are still unavailable to most of the rural areas but the government is working hard at making this happen. The water is capture and put into a cistern plus of course they use wells. They enjoyed our visit, especially the kids when Norm was showing off his grandchildren. Having said all of that we looked for and found their little solar charging station for their cell phones.

From here we went to another village a watch a potter making different pots etc. but I think the main event was the visit to a local making opium. Did we try some you might ask? Well you decide, do you think we did? After that he have us a demonstration on tying a turban, which is very interesting…get this 27 meters of cloth! Of course he picked one of us to model the finished product, yes indeed it was me, but of course of us fine men got our own for pictures, LOL.

Finally a mountain resort to finish off our day,  we had a ” little” sing song around a fire plus some dancing! Great way to finish a fabulous day!