Cobblestone Chronicles

Home to the country’s third largest populace, Da Nang is the temperate town that boasts sumptuous cuisine, and stunning beaches coalesced with verdant mountains, without all the hustle and bustle of Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh! It is quite difficult, and onerous for some travellers too, to envisage a vacation in Vietnam without dealing with the chaotic traffic of Hanoi or the brimming streets of Ho Chi Minh. These two cities and their suburbs, ultimately, have come to showcase to the world what Vietnam is. However, it is what they say after all - sometimes, the obvious choice is not always the best one! Long considered to be the sleepy fishing destination lying about in the centre of Vietnam, and home to the country’s third largest populace, Da Nang is the temperate town that boasts sumptuous cuisine, and stunning beaches coalesced with verdant mountains, without all the hustle and bustle of Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh! It has been several years since I visited this quiet nonchalant...

A place hosting no concrete structures whatsoever, a place that is not as far from civilisation, yet makes you feel quite afar, Kutla is the dream-like reality - one of the many, yet lesser known places, that Himachal is home to! Himachal Pradesh hosts some of the most surreal mountain tops, awe-inspiring boroughs and scintillating secluded towns. However, the most enshrined asset of this state is the beauty that encompasses the lesser known burgs, the hillocks and trails that are, till this date, explored by just a tiny bit of ardent backpackers, and the small villages, that even though many may have heard of, are visited by hardly a handful! Kutla village is one such place - a lesser known hamlet about an hour away from the Tosh village, located at the far end of the Parvati Valley. A place hosting no concrete structures whatsoever, a place that is not as far from civilisation, yet makes you feel quite afar, Kutla is the dream-like reality - one of the many, yet lesser know...

A town with the same name as this wonder of nature, Victoria Falls lies on the Zimbabwean border of the Zambezi river, and has largely been built for tourism purposes. Having said so, it does not take away from the originalities of the Zambezi ecosystem, and we felt so from the very first minute upon our arrival at the airport, a few miles away from the township. As we made our way towards the town, the locals were busy doing their own thing, driving passengers in and out of town, having their early morning runs by the side of the road, and commuting towards their workplaces. And out of nowhere, stood in front of our cab right in the middle of the road, a gigantic male Tusker staring at us right in the eye. But to my surprise, this seemed to affect just us. The locals did not even flinch or decelerate their cars or their feet, and our driver noticing this jokingly said to us, “Welcome to Zimbabwe!”. Such is the oneness of humans and nature in the area, we were taught a lesson ...

Hampi, with all its temples, palaces and fortresses in balletic ruins, exemplifies the rich cultural, architectural, cosmopolitan, and historical legacy of the Vijayanagara Empire, which once thrived on these very banks of the Tungabhadra river. Most of the people do not associate the ancient ruins of Hampi, detritus of the civilisation along the banks of the Tungabhadra river, with the same reverence and grandeur as the ruins along the Indus or other timeworn vestiges. Hampi was the former capital of the Karnataka Empire, established around 1336 A.D, having collapsed some time in the seventeenth century, and has a rich history representing the formulation, glory and finally, the demise of the Vijayanagara Empire. It is a place that, in its own way, has a presence – a personality, a charisma, as one might say, put together in form of rubble, remnants and records! Just ten kilometre from the town of Hospet, which is well connected by rail and road ways, Hampi ...

Cape Town From being a strategic port for the Dutch and then the British in the past, to being the driver of South Africa’s tourism industry and being of great importance to the country’s working economy, nestled between the South Atlantic Ocean and the gigantic Table Mountain lies the versatile city of Cape Town. Cape Town is a kaleidoscope of shifting emotions and cultures. The road along the Atlantic coast slowly but surely transitions from the relatively relaxed beaches to the turbulently busy waterfront area as one gradually enters the city centre. The beauty of Cape Town truly lies within its diversity, from the sprawling beaches of Clifton and Tableview to name a few, to the macabre vibe of Robben Island’s old prison that once held South Africa’s greatest icon in Nelson Mandela, the long-stretching vineyards on the Cape Peninsula and the amalgamation of British, Dutch and South African cultures. Despite the change in scenery associated with different parts of the c...