Today, for a change, I didn't miss a turn and get off route - somebody else did, so I did a nice vigorous 4 km time trial to fetch them back - in 100+ temps.

Once we got back on route, we took a passenger ferry to Bombay - an hour ride across an open mouth to a large bay - with enough smog and haze that Bombay's skyscrapers weren't visible until 45 minutes into the crossing.

It was a 2 deck passenger boat with no life preservers - only 4 flat pieces of orange foam, about 4x8 feet each to hang onto in case of emergency.  Crossing a very busy shipping channel.  The entire navigation system consisted of a compass. Full stop (unless the guy was using Google maps on his cell phone).  And the entire control system consisted of a old style wheel (with the spokes sticking out, and apparently requiring about 4 full revolutions of the wheel to turn the boat 5 degrees), and a throttle.  But, I'm pleased to say, I am now on dry land again for 2 days until we go back the other way.

We went to a strange bar in Bombay tonight where the prices of drinks vary, like the stock market, based on demand - so if a couple people order Margaritas, the price of Margaritas goes up a couple rupees (with a stock exchange type electronic "ticker tape" reporting prices.  It's cute, but plays havoc when you try to figure out (and split) the bill at the end of the evening.  It was a noisy, rowdy place, where we were the only white faces.  It should not allow people over 60 inside - between the noise, and my age and crappy hearing, I understood near nothing of any conversations.  So, I just smiled and nodded.

Bombay is a more recognizable city than any we've seen so fat - at least the tourist area where we are:  British style - with a bit of an Indian flare - stone buildings, trash cans - thus no trash lining the streets, no cows wandering the roads.  Big grassed central park area with several large cricket pitches.  (BTW, India got crushed by Australia last week by 333 runs - what sports do you know where you can lose a match by 333 points?)  Less continuous horn honking, not quite as much of a life threat to walk across the street.  Even some function traffic lights.  Ate lunch at a very nice Italian restaurant and dinner at a "continental cuisine" bistro.  Nice for a break from Indian food.  Though, for dessert we had a cheesecake that had Indian style spices in it and was quite delightfully unlike any cheesecake that I'd ever had before.  Even found an ATM where you could get out more than $15 at a time.

Walked through Bombay's fanciest hotel - not a place that I would ever be in danger of being allowed to stay at.  Quite elegant.

Today's business news was very upbeat over Trump's proposal to initiate a "points" system for immigration and work permits for the US:  a great advantage to highly educated Indians - engineers, doctors, etc. - who would like to come to the US.  

Traffic notes - brakes? Rear view mirrors? Horns!

There are plenty of things that I'll need to "unlearn", and relearn the old ways of doing things when I get back to North America.  I need to look left when I step off the curb into the street (in India, most of the traffic comes from the right - in the left lane - but perhaps a quarter of it is coming from the left).  Yes, I will be able to drink tap water without it being a life threat.  Mosquito bites might be annoying, but aren't generally life threatening with dengue, malaria, etc.  Jean will be able to take a pee out of doors without checking first for cobras (Vikas, our drip doctor, tells me that a majority of cobra bites in India are on the butt).

And, very dramatically, I'll have to unlearn the Indian techniques of crossing though an intersection (even the small minority of them with "stop" signs - which appear to be meaningless):  It didn't take long to learn that for safety and efficiency, you need to keep up a reasonable speed and need a very flexible neck.  Speed allows you to pass through smaller gaps in the cross traffic, to intimidate some of the cross traffic, and to make a sudden turn to go with the traffic when you realize that you won't actually make it through the gap (perhaps staying upright, and if not, decreasing the closing velocity at impact).  The flexible neck is necessary because you'll be getting cross traffic from both directions on both sides of the road.  If you slow, or stop, you need a bigger gap in traffic to give time to accelerate and it may be a long time before you get that gap.  Plus, you'll generate an increasing cacophony of honking behind you and risk getting plowed down from behind.  I'll have to relearn the whole concept of slowing and stopping.