Sunday October 16th we woke up at 5:30am for no particular reason. We had planned to meet with Jhoola(Baiju’s sister) her friend Geetha and our niece Sowmya at 8:00 for breakfast.Jhoola and Geetha came along till Omkareshwar to take darshan and see us off on the Parikrama. We got ready including washing our clothes from yesterday ( we are carrying three sets of clothes only). We went down at 8:00 had tea at a road side tea and breakfast stall right in front of the hotel. We ordered ginger tea with less sugar. Since “less” is a very subjective term the tea was too sweet for my taste but perhaps I need the extra energy. Already it is very hot for me. Need to get used to it. We walked around the corner to Shree Gajanana Maharaj Ashram for breakfast. Simple good food. Poha , Upma with coffee and tea. We planned out our day. After breakfast we walked around the ashram. The place was very clean with lovely gardens and many buildings where people can rent rooms and stay. There is also a lovely temple of Gajanana Maharaj. He was from Shegao in Maharashtra. He is one of the saints in Sanatana Dharma. As we were walking around we met three old ladies who had come from Shegao. Two were related and the third was helping the older lady get around. One of the ladies’ grandfather knew Gajanana Maharaj. And they were very proud of this fact. We spoke to them
For few minutes. They spoke only Marathi, so I was the translator. We went and met the priest who is going to help us get started on our Parikrama. His name is Pundit Sandeep. He is a young priest in Omkareshwar who has a small temple and he also helps people like us. When we met him he told us some details as to how we can get ready for the Tuesday morning departure. Then he took us into the Omkareshwar main temple. There was a big line since it was Sunday. We went for a special darshan. Pundit Sandeep handed us over to one of the priests on duty, who took us in through a maze of corridors and staircases directly to the Garbhgudi(the inner sanctum where the deity is). There we joined the regular line and did a quick Namaskara. In most temples one can only stay in the main room for few seconds. We finished darshan and Planned to meet Pundit Sandeep tomorrow for finishing registration for the Parikrama (This not government enforced. But the local priests and ashram gurus would like to have names and details about everyone who is doing the Parikrama). By the time we finished talking to the Punditji it was lunch time. There are many Dhabas around. We picked one and had lunch followed by two hour nap. Evening we had tea and went to Mamleshwar temple. Both Omkareshwar and Mamleshwar together make one of twelve Jyothirlingams. Walking around the town we saw most shops carried items related to prayers and souvenirs. After darshan we went on a boat ride around Mandhata Island where the Omkareshwar temple is located. River Narmada meets with River Kaveri at one end of the island. The boat is canoe shaped and motorized. We were the only ones on the boat. The river flow was very fast. We went easily till we came to the meeting point of the two rivers. As we turned the corner we were going against the tide and suddenly it seemed like we were standing still though the motor was roaring very loudly and one boat man was guiding the boat using a long pole. At one point he jumped out of the boat in waste deep water and pulled the boat out of the heavy current. We all held our breaths for few minutes and suddenly we were in calm water. The boatman who jumped in the river was out of breath for quite some time. Then I saw him take an old half cut plastic bottle and dip it into the river and drink the water. (Hmmm can I try that !!!!). We made it back safely. We had ordered Daal Baati at the Dhaba near our hotel. Dinner was good. A bit heavy and late. We need to plan dinner earlier.
