Saturday = A GREAT Day!

WELL...Saturday was WONDERFUL! I'm only going to blog about our hike and the leprosy colony, because otherwise this blog would get ridiculously long. But, we did have a great time shopping in Dehradun, and got some GREAT things for the house! Tomorrow the painters are coming to start painting, so I thought I'd post pictures once they're done and the new things are settled. But, here's the rest of the day!

So, 5:20 AM. I'm UP! Ready to go...get breakfast packed, water packed, dressed, sunscreen on...at the school by 5:55 AM...and by 6:25, still no hiking buddies. I thought, "Did they decide to not go? Did they change the meeting place? Do they hate me?!"" ( I never actually thought that, but I definitely didn't know what was going on!). I hike home, check my e-mail, and discover that last night they decided to change the departure time to 7:00 instead. (to Steve's credit, he did try to call...so I guess I'm not mad. :) ) SO, I had an unnecessarily early morning and had to "re-gear myself up", but eventually we were off for a great hike!

We had a WONDERFUL view as we started the morning!

Don't be deceived...it's not the real white house. :)

We passed a local school where kids were studying, and they got really excited when they saw us! These pictures are through holes in a wall...they were ADORABLE! We had to leave when the teacher came out, though...oops!

It was a GREAT hike down...not too difficult, and lots of beautiful sites. It was pretty foggy most of the time, but we still saw a lot of neat things!

Random burial site...kind of creepy!

There had been a rock slide here...it was a little interesting crossing, but nothing too bad. :)

Smilin' Steve.

Towards the end of the hike, we saw these two guys just sitting on a hill.
Thought it was a cool pic. :)

Notice where the hands are pointed? Kind of hard to see...but in two different directions!
Which way to go?

The trail we took used to be the only road up to Mussoorie, and during British occupation it was a toll road. This is the sign that read the different rates for merchandise going up the hill.

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THE LEPROSY COLONY!
The leprosy colony was really amazing. We got to see them turning the cotton/wool into the string to weave, and then got to spend a lot of time shopping. I think the pictures speak for themselves.

These kids lived at the colony...and were SO cute!

The fabrics were really amazing...we ended up getting 4 rugs, a purse, and 4 placemats

Wrapping up our package...

YAY!



After the leprosy colony we went into Dehradun to eat lunch and go shopping. Where did we eat? McDonalds! Our first McDonalds in India. They don't serve any beef, and the chicken nuggets were "sold out"...so Chris and I got a chicken sandwich. The other guys got "Maharaja Macs"...and were less than impressed. :)

And then, the shopping began! More to come about that later. In all, it was quite the day!