Deepavali .. with a twist

This weekend was Deepavali .. the second one I was missing in a row; Not that I am the types who's been missing it and mooning over it .. anyways ..
Nandita and her roomies invited us over for festival lunch. Akshata's granny is here and we all were looking forward to some good home cooked food.
There was also a parallel plan to hire a car and keep the tradition of all-weekends-of-october-out-of-house alive .. so decided to spend the saturday in Boston and Sunday driving around.
Woke up late and headed out for lunch. The Food was awesome as expected with a number of dishes and all home made.. we literally Binged!!
After that .. we had half a mind to just curl up and sleep .. but it was also the Pumpkin Festival Day in Boston Commons and we didnt want to miss the same.



The Place was swarming with people and I was pleasantly surprised to see how popular it was. There was a Guinness Book attempt and successfully accomplished to have the most number of Carved Pumpkins in one place.
Once the sun went down and the pumpkins were lit.. Was a magical sight .. Felt myself in transported to an enchanted place.
It was also fitting that we each lit a few Pumpkins .. it was our way of celebrating Deepavali .. the festival of Lights :)
Couple of my ex roomies wanted to visit the Temple as there was a Firecracker show scheduled. We hurried home .. took the rental car and reached the Temple where our fears of not finding parking proved true. We were directed to some other make-shift parking area from where we were to take a shuttle to the temple. While we were waiting .. we could hear the distant thud of the crackers and knew that we wont make it in time.
At least we were able to go to the temple for Darshan .. had some prasadam and decided to head to Dakshin for Dinner.
They had a special festival spread and for the first time had Dosa Idly Vada in a Buffet place. It indeed was a celebration for us as far as food was concerned.

Sunday morning we decided to head out to Mount Washington .. but on calling up found out that saturday snow had closed the Auto Road so had to make last minute changes.
Decided to head out to the Berkeshires and what a good decision that was.
After going to the state of New Hampshire for 3 wknds in a row .. headed out towards the border of Mass and NY and found rolling hills .. beautiful fall colors (just past peak) and some lovely quaint country sides. It was refreshingly different and could really see some great Barns, farm animals and pristine white church steeples against the hills painted yellows and browns with Fall colors.
I am really regretting not having visited this part before ..
the Town of Shellburne was as quaint as they come. We loved the place.
In case time ever permits.. am sure to go back there and spend more time than just an casual drive by.
Stopped at the Forge Pond .. one of the ponds along scenic drive we took in the Berkeshires area. Mirror still lake and some cool colors again made good backdrop for some pics.


We drove along the Mohawk trail and the Holyoke State forests to reach the summit of Mt Greylock .. the highest peak in MA.
Was a lovely view from up there but was also cold.
There is a particular Hairpin bend along the way which provides breathtaking views of the villages and towns thats worth a stop by.

Some more pics