Mysore - The Trip to Mysore

Cheryl suggested a trip to Mysore to get out of Bangalore and see some more of the country. The Taj Majal was out because it required a flight and overnight stay. Too much time required for a two week visit. Mysore is not close, 3 hours each way, but doable in one day. Fellow expats, Monica and Emma decided to join us. At 6:45 am with pillows, bread basket and bottled water packed we headed out. The good new about leaving so early was that traffic was pretty light. The bad news was that our driver was one of those people that drive right up to lights, traffic back-ups, road blocks and speed bumps (Right don't get me started!) at full speed, then slams on the breaks at the last minute. So we are on the Bangalore-Mysore road cruising at 100 kph (about 62 mph) when we come up to the first roadblock. The police set up these barriers so that all the traffic has to wind around the barriers going from full speed, two lanes to no speed one lane. It's crazy! The we are at full speed again and come up to a speed bump. I assume that these are in place because we were approaching populated areas, but who knows. I couldn't count how many roadblocks and speed bumps we hit on out trip. But for each one it was the same, wait to the last minute and slam on the brakes. The scenery was interesting. There were sugarcane fields being harvested and rice paddies being planted. That was surprising to me, I think of that mainly in Asia. Who knew?