This trip was shorter than our Rajasthan trip - just about 12 days. This time Manoj's father also joined us for the trip. So the group was Pranav, his parents and his paternal grandparents.
There is no convenient direct train to Saurashtra from Pune. So we took the 9am train from Pune to CSTM (Mumbai). We had to spend 4 hrs on the side berths. Pranav really co-operated well. We reached CSTM on time. We then took a short taxi ride to BCT (Mumbai Central) and checked into the retiring room. The room was just about ok. Manoj's parent joined us in the evening. At around 8pm we boarded the train.
Reached Dwaraka at 3:00 pm. We took an auto-rickshaw to our hotel. We cleaned up and rested while Manoj's parent went around the town to sight see.
Leaving Pranav with Manoj's parents, we went on a four hour trip to Bet Dwaraka and Nageshwar. In the evening, all of us went to check out the Dwaraka temples with Pranav. Pranav enjoyed the place. We did not take him to the main Dwarakadeesh temple. That is the only crowded temple in town.
We started at 8:45 am towards Junagadh. Reached the outskirts of Porbandar by 10:30 am. We took an auto to the Kirti Mandir. Pranav ate his morning snack there and we continued onto Junagadh with a stop over for lunch. Reached Junagadh by 2:30 pm.
We did the city sight seeing with Pranav. We were out between 8:30 am and noon. Pranav really enjoyed the day outing. He walked with us up and down the fort and ran around in the Maqbara. We all rested in the afternoon.
Pranav stayed all day with his grand parents while we did the Girnar-grind.
An hour and a half easy drive brought us to Somnath. Pranav spent the rest of the day at the hotel while the rest tool turns to visit the temple.
An easy hour drive brought us to Gir. Aparna and Manoj went on the evening Safari.
Pranav stayed all day at the Gir birding lodge while the rest took a couple of safaris. Pranav really enjoyed the place. The hotel is situated inside a Mango farm and Pranav had a lot of place to run around.
The car we had requested ended up being an hour and a half late. That upset our plan. We started on our drive to Bhavnagar at 10:30 instead on 9 am. That meant Pranav's tummy was empty on the drive. That seems to trigger his motion sickness and he did throw up. We gave him an extra dose of avomine and slowly made our way to Bhavnagar by 4pm. Pranav recovered well after lunch.
Manoj went on an early morning trip to Palitana. The entire family took an early afternoon drive to Velavadar. It was only one hour and it was a smooth easy drive. Manoj and Aparna went on an evening safari.
Manoj and his parents went on the morning safari. After that it was a four hr drive to Ahmedabad train station. Pranav seemed a bit upset in the last half hour in the city traffic. Other than that the day went ok. We had a long wait at the station and got on the train at 4 pm.
Reached Pune at 4:45 am. The only challenge was to wake Pranav up that early.
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