However, the real reason we were in Jaislamer was to join a camel trek and head out to explore the Great Thar Desert. After shopping around, we chose a one and a half day trek figuring that would be just enough time to spend with camels. To be honest, Mark didn't want to go at all saying that camels were horrible creatures that were smelly and spit all the time, but he hesitantly agreed once the sales guy said that spitting camels were strictly forbidden in the Thar desert. (Alas that didn't also include spitting Indians who have a horrible habit of loud, public throat clearing sessions which result in spitting at all times of day and night.)

We ended up on a journey with a wonderful group of people. Barbara and Bruno were an Italian couple who spoke only a little English but it was enough to learn that Barbara was terrified of the dung beetles that are everywhere in the Thar desert. I think it's fair to say that unlike the rest of us, her favorite part of the journey was when she was 10 feet off the ground high atop her camel. Katie, a Canadian living in Australia, and Sian, a Brit from Jersey, also joined us. These two top gals were adventuring together in India leaving family, friends and work behind. Not only were they great fun, but everyone could also learn a thing or two about life, the law or prisoners from these two.

After an hour or so of driving into the desert, we met up with our camel drivers. The route we'd chosen was advertised as non-touristic... whatever that means considering that we were tourists. Basically, what we'd hoped to see was some of the desert landscape and to get a glimpse into the lives of the people that live there. Each person was assigned a camel... Heide got to ride the nobly named "Monkey" while Mark ended up on the only camel of the bunch that was dark brown. He never did figure out the real name of his camel, so he dubbed him "lightning" -- an appropriate name as "lightening" was always leading the way and threatening to run off.

Riding a camel isn't all that comfortable. Unlike horseback riding, camels have a long uncomfortable stride that inevitably makes your bum... well, numb. And then sore. After three hours of camel riding through the desert, which was surprisingly green, we arrived at a small village where we were more than happy to get off and rest. Lets just say that the motion of the camel getting up and getting down requires a little getting used to and Mark had a great time laughing at Heide's face every time Monkey executed one of these procedures.

Over the course of the day, we were able to visit several villages. In all of them, the houses were made from some variation of dung, grass and mud and the people were friendly. Most were very low caste villages, which made the people "untouchable" by higher caste Indians. In one interchange, they were fascinated by Katie's high heel shoes and the clompy noise they made on the ground. We also saw the tiniest kid (baby goat) that we've ever seen! He was one day old and for sale -- 40 rupees!

Our nights camp was in the sand dunes. We rolled out blankets and slept under the stars, but not until we'd enjoyed a wonderful meal cooked by our camel drivers over an open fire. Chai, Chapatis, curried vegetables and snacks were all on the menu. So was great singing by the camel drivers. We had no idea what they were singing, but it was great fun to listen. Waking up in the middle of the night to see a canopy of stars was also amazing.

The rest of the gang was taking a 2 day trek so we parted ways after breakfast the next morning. We'd had enough and were ready to go... especially after an hour and a half sprint on a camel back to the jeep. We're happy to report there wasn't one incident of camel spitting on our journey and we really enjoyed getting to know these gentle creatures.

From here, we'll continue onto Jaipur.