So we left the airport in a jeep style car after seeing a bit of paper with our names in green pen being held by Mr Pinto.....the man we were expecting to pick us up to take us the two hour drive into the tribal village of Jhadpoli and to the place we were to stay for two nights.....The Hideout.
I managed to get some sleep in the back of the car and woke up when the car had been stopped at a so called toll to pay some money to a load of tribal men. As it turns out this group of men were getting everyone who passed and used the road to pay some money to them so that they could have a festival celebration, apparently some big shot diplomat was going to use the road that day and so the money goes towards a festival and this is common practice!! Odd.
We arrived at the Hideout at about midday after driving through acres of countryside, through hamlets of tribes etc. We were greeted by Hemant, a well traveled philanthropist and yogi with a real sense of spirituality with the belief that raw food can cure all ailments. He is a genuinely lovely guy with a welcoming heart, kind face and nature. He has spent the last 25 years building the Hideout up in a really eco friendly way, he recycles everything, re uses, no food goes to waste, his mum lives here too, he eats healthy wholesome raw foods from the land and has a large fruit and herb farm. The place is amazing!! Truly fantastic. We loved six senses in Vietnam but here we have loved it because we have just stopped. Literally. We have been snoozing on the hammocks, blogging, reading, eating, doing yoga and thats about it today apart from we did venture out for a walk into the village to have a wander and get stared at. We did some yoga with Hemant, his mum, aunt and two lady helpers/workers which was lovely in the early evening.
This place is not for people wanting luxury, it is not for people who expect electricity all day, or hot water, white towels, toilet roll etc. The place is back to basics in those things. There is only electricity for some of the day, bring your own toilet paper and towels ( we hadn't realised this so borrowed towels and used wet wipes) and expect there to be no hot water. However, this place has alot going for it.It is simply stunning and without wanting to sound too much like a hippy it has a really good energy. You can spend your time just chilling and lounging around, sitting in a hammock, doing what you please. You can go and help out in the kitchen preparing the fruit and veg that has literally just been harvested from the farm, and learn how they make interesting raw food salads and make lentil dahl and gluten free breads. We ate so well today and I don't mean because there was loads of it or it was posh food or anything. We arrived and were greeted with a glass of freshly pressed hibiscus juice which was very welcome after two hours in a hot car / post flight / post very long and crazy night out ( the upside is that the copious amounts of salsa dancing we did may have burnt off a few calories, I'm missing my daily exercise!) . The juice was lovely. We got to our room ....
There are a few different choices at the Hideout as far as accommodation. You can stay in a brick house, eco cottage or camp out in the forest. We chose the brick house. We had chosen the eco cottage but after a summer of being munched by midges in my own country and what with the nurse saying we did not need to take anti malaria tablets I changed my mind at the last minute and opted for the brick house as the eco cottage just had a cow dung roof with a tree log frame just like the main building so it didnt have any windows or doors, just open space with a bed in the middle. The brick house was mostly made out of brick and cow dung/clay but it still had open windows but it had a door. The ceiling was open tiles on top of bamboo struts. The bathroom was a very simple bamboo towel rail, western style toilet ( or pot as its known here), a simple slow flow shower and sink. There was a frog near the toilet when i went to go to the loo so i ended up putting it back out of the window, a few years ago I may have had a screaming fit!! Don't get me wrong I am terrified of spiders, cockroaches, lizards...most things that crawl or buzz for that matter and i must have sweet blood as they all love me and bite me. And camping, nature and the outdoors is certainly not my fave thing but I like to experience new things, get out of my comfort zone once in a while so thats what we did. The mosquito net supported by four bamboo canes around the bed had a few holes in so i had a bear grills idea of putting plasters over the holes
and we also slept individually in the bed under a mosquito net each wrapped around us, i got munched regardless!! They seem to like my bum and thighs! I thought they were just after blood and not fat. If someone really likes privacy and security while away then this place is not for them. There is no safe and no key for the door, you operate on a trust basis. The windows are open frames and have thin material used as drapes so they can be seen through but again, you appreciate and understand that other people know it is a window to a room and wont look through.
After we had chucked the frog out of the window we sat down for lunch with Hemant, his mum and aunt. Lunch was delicious, i was so impressed. We had fresh salads, chutneys, rice flower chapatti, lentils, rice and other things that were yummy that i don't remember the names of, along with herbal tea with added lemon juice and jhagaree ( don't know how to spell it but it is a natural molasses) followed by a couple of energy balls made out of natural sugars and nuts, Phill loved them! (Yep they are like mini snickers)
The way that things are prepared by the two young ladies ( staff members, one 19 and the other 22, tribal women from local communities) is brilliant. They sit on the floor to roll the breads, they grate and grind and even make spaghetti out of cucumbers and beetroots. There are plenty of nuts, seeds, lentils, beans and salad sprouts used and it is all done in such a calm and precise manner.
After lunch we sat with Hemant and chatted about the place, how he travelled the world, how he sold belts in Europe and purchased the land of the hideout and started to plant trees 25 years ago and it took something like 19 years to hear the birds come. His story is amazing, he is inspiring. Ok, i find a few things he touches on a bit far fetched. Where as i believe that everything happens for a reason, you choose to take certain paths and meet certain people he goes deeper and beyond that and thinks we are all connected and we can all be more intuitive. I dont think many people are intuitive, i am a bit but not like those communities in the tribal hamlets, they have to be and they know no different. We then went on to talk about children, home births, hypnobirths etc and his take on all of that was interesting and we agreed on it.
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