The view from the 12-seater plane to the island of Tortuguero

A gorgeous, misty morning on the boat ride from the airstrip to Tortuguero

The Arenal volcano

This area of the Nilgiris depends mostly on tea and tourism for its economy.

The car ride down from the hills into the valley afforded this gorgeous view.

This water channel goes all the way to the agricultural lands further downstream. The water is also used for domestic purposes.

This amla candy is made by a women’s group from forest products.

Madanapalle, the nearest town, is about 40 km away from Rishi Valley.

The students were on holiday, so the school was completely quiet.

Only the staff’s children remained on campus.

We took a walk at sunset.

I think this photo was technically taken in Tamil Nadu, while we were driving from Rishi Valley to Madurai.

The sunrise from our hotel room in Kandy

The elephant orphanage in Pinnewala

A baby elephant

The elephants are marched down to a nearby river every morning and afternoon to bathe, and visitors can feed them bananas on the way.

Watching the elephants bathe while eating lunch

The beach view from our hotel room

The setting sun hit these balloons perfectly

Pondicherry was full of strange, French-Indian restaurants with colorful, mismatched decor.

The beach stays active after dark

This family eating ice cream was super adorable and hilarious all at once.

The sunrise over the water the next morning

A cafe at Auroville

To get to Jaisalmer from Bangalore, we had to take a flight to Delhi, then an overnight train to Jaisalmer – lots of time to bond with my coworkers. We reached our hotel around noon on November 1.

Our hotel had a fantastic terrace from which you could see the city. At night, we would sit up there and talk late into the night.

On our first day visiting the rural areas outside Jaisalmer, we went to an farmer’s field, where they were growing bajra (pearl millet).

Here, the harvested bajra is wrapped in an old sari.

In the middle of the field was a beri, a shallow percolation pit, from which people draw clean drinking water.

Though women come to fetch water from the beri, the water is also available to passersby.

Rainwater harvesting is, rather obviously, closely tied to the desert’s flora and fauna, including livestock. For example, goats are able to eat this plant, known in Hindi as phog, and sleep under it.

On our third night in Jaisalmer, we climbed a sand dune and watched the sun set and the stars rise – completely gorgeous.

We could see for miles from the top of the dune.

We were able to visit the Jaisalmer Fort, the only living fort – meaning that people still live in it – in India today. The fort is actually crumbling and sinking because of the sewage mismanagement over the years.

Inside the fort there is a thriving market.

This market mostly caters to tourists.

When we visited, the light was perfect. Apparently, because the walls are made of yellow sandstone, the photographer’s traditional golden hour stretches to two hours.

Laundry can be seen drying on the interior walls of the fort – quite a stark reminder that people still live here.

We also visited Jodhpur’s Mehrangarh Fort, which was used to film scenes for The Dark Knight Rises.

Ridiculously, Naomi Campbell was throwing a party in Jodhpur for her boyfriend’s birthday while we were there, for which the fort was totally decked out.

From the top of the fort, we could see most of the city. Traditionally, Brahmins painted their houses blue, although it’s now no longer an exclusively Brahmin action.

The government-run jungle resort is located on the shores of the Kabini Dam reservoir. Some of the cottages, including mine, were right at the water’s edge.

I don’t think anyone from our group stayed in the Maharajah Cottage – but ours were better!

A fifteen-second walk from the cottages led to the water, where there were stone benches (covered in bird droppings, but still picturesque).

There were also hammocks! I took a short nap in one, and now I wish I could sleep in it all the time.

We were originally supposed to go on a safari to see tigers and elephants, which this area is famous for, but the Supreme Court of India recently banned tourism activity in tiger reserve areas because tiger populations have been steadily declining. The reaction to the ban has been mixed, with tourism suffering and some wildlife experts saying that the visitors’ presence helped defend the tigers against poachers. In any case, we took a “nature walk,” so we saw caterpillars and spiders instead of tigers and elephants.

The last activity of the day was a short coracle ride on the reservoir around sunset. Until next time!