We're now in the desert town of Pushkar in the state of Rajahstan. The temperature is hot again here after several cool days in Delhi and Agra, so liking that :)
We arrived in Pushkar on Saturday at 9am after leaving Jaipur on a 5:55am bus, and we're leaving at 12am tonight on a sleeper bus bound for Udaipur.
Pushkar has been the most amazing place we've visited in India so far. It's a town built around an ancient lake set on the outskirts of the desert (sand everywhere!) surrounded by steep cliffs. The place has an amazing atmosphere to it, very special place indeed. Many Hindu pilgrims come here from all over India, and on the 1st morning we received a Hindu blessing at the holy lake by two Brahman priests, that was pretty darn cool. We climbed to the top of a random hill yesterday at sunrise to visit a temple located on the top, that was well worth the early start, as we could see all around as we were so high, and there were loads of Monkeys about. What wasn't cool was kicking a freshly laid cow poo on the path up, whilst wearing open toe sandals, i really, really could have done without that!!
Yesterday we had quite a relaxing day (for a change) just wondering through the streets having loads of random encounters with priests, shop owners and two american girls (who we've met twice before in Agra and Jaipur!).
I'm really starting to miss garlic bread, it's the first craving i've had for some home food since we started, except for general meat as we've both gone vegetarian for India. Turning veg for India is actually really easy as there's so much veg food here and so many delicious curries. The town we're currently in doesn't serve any eggs let alone meat due to it being a holy place.
We're starting to look forward to Nepal now as we're well into our trip through India. That's going to be awesome, but several travellers have told us that some trekking routes will be closed due to snow. We'll see what people are saying once we get into Kathmandu and work out our trip from there!
Monday, 26 January 2009
Thursday, 22 January 2009
Taj Mahal
We've seen it! In fact i'm typing this only 200 odd meters away from it!
We arrived in Agra yesterday and we visited it first thing this morning getting up at 5am (these early starts hurt!), the Taj Mahal is even more amazing in real life than in the photos, and is a real feat of engineering. However it's set in quite a noisy horrible little city, you can never imagine such beauty could exist here!
We heard a myth that after the King completed the Taj Mahal he was talking about constructing an exact replica on the other side of the river, except it would use black marbel, and he would be buried in it. I really wish that had happened but they locked him away before he could spend any more money! If there had been two, one black and one white it would have represented the duality of good and evil quite nicely!
Tomorrow we leave for the desert state of Rajasthan on a 6am train out of here (another early start!). We're then looking to go to the towns of Jaipur, Bundi, and Pushka.
The north of India is really cold some of the time, it's really strange to see the Taj Mahal in something like 5 degrees this morning!
We arrived in Agra yesterday and we visited it first thing this morning getting up at 5am (these early starts hurt!), the Taj Mahal is even more amazing in real life than in the photos, and is a real feat of engineering. However it's set in quite a noisy horrible little city, you can never imagine such beauty could exist here!
We heard a myth that after the King completed the Taj Mahal he was talking about constructing an exact replica on the other side of the river, except it would use black marbel, and he would be buried in it. I really wish that had happened but they locked him away before he could spend any more money! If there had been two, one black and one white it would have represented the duality of good and evil quite nicely!
Tomorrow we leave for the desert state of Rajasthan on a 6am train out of here (another early start!). We're then looking to go to the towns of Jaipur, Bundi, and Pushka.
The north of India is really cold some of the time, it's really strange to see the Taj Mahal in something like 5 degrees this morning!
Tuesday, 20 January 2009
Delhi ahoy
We finally made it to North India! Over 2000km later and three trains! Our plans kind of fell to crap for a bit but we got there in the end.
Our decision to leave Kollam for Hyderabad was a badly timed one, we arrived at the train station on the day and could only get an unreserved second class ticket, this is the lowest class (no third class at all!), what we didn't know was there was thousands and thousands of Hindu pilgrims returning from a festival the day before, and guess which class of ticket they had! Luckily we got on at a slightly earlier stop, so after a lot of jostling we got a seat (wooden bench). After the next stop they flooded on, screaming and shouting and filled up the whole carriage, we had no room to move our legs, no fresh air, no toilet, and people all around us, we even had a gaggle of children above us sitting on the luggage racks. This was not good as we still had another 25 hours of the journey to go. At the next few stations yet more people desperately tried to bundle on, with police just pulling them back of the overcrowded train, it was quite a scene. The situation got a bit too much after nine hours of this and we eventually got off at some random city. We felt bad for abandoning the train, but the prospect of spending a night unable to move, with no sleep, and the real prospect of the kids above us weeing themselves (remember no toilet on board) and this then leaking onto us (we'd already had miscellaneous food items falling on our heads) was far too much.
As bad as the conditions were this was an important experience, and we were well looked after by our fellow passengers when it looked like riots were about to kick off, they also supplied us with vital food supplies.
We'd then travelled about 300km and we booked an onward ticket to Bangalore for the next morning, and checked into a hotel for a sound nights sleep. The next morning we travelled to Bangalore, which is India's I.T. capital, but for us it was just a very noisy and dirty city, but still interesting to see the new emerging middle classes emerging from I.T.
The next day we boarded our third and last train bound for New Delhi train station, we got on sleeper class which means you have a shelf to sleep on which is reserved but other than that it's similar to second class. This was the monster 45 hour journey which spanned to nights, and a good test of patience, as we a constant procession of people passed through the carriage begging, singing and selling crap. We finally arrived in New Delhi at 11am yesterday confronted by manic traffic, touts, dealers and hustlers. This is a city where we step down from being the polite people we are and ignore offers of this and that and calls of "Hello Friend!".
Delhi is nice though, and today we visited a lovely old red fort and the Old Delhi centre which is steeped in medieval times and completely frenetic!
Tomorrow we catch an early train to Agra, to see the Taj Mahal, which we're looking forward to.
India is a hell of a country, so many different facets, places and people. It has the ability to amaze, frustrate you and re-evaluate everything you know about Europe in one go. Also never have i smelt urine, flowers and cooking samosas at the same time. It is complete sensory overload for the eyes, ears and nose!
Despite all of this it still feels like "home", i can't explain why, but the term "Mother India" makes sense to me now, and i'm sure we will revisit this country again.
Our decision to leave Kollam for Hyderabad was a badly timed one, we arrived at the train station on the day and could only get an unreserved second class ticket, this is the lowest class (no third class at all!), what we didn't know was there was thousands and thousands of Hindu pilgrims returning from a festival the day before, and guess which class of ticket they had! Luckily we got on at a slightly earlier stop, so after a lot of jostling we got a seat (wooden bench). After the next stop they flooded on, screaming and shouting and filled up the whole carriage, we had no room to move our legs, no fresh air, no toilet, and people all around us, we even had a gaggle of children above us sitting on the luggage racks. This was not good as we still had another 25 hours of the journey to go. At the next few stations yet more people desperately tried to bundle on, with police just pulling them back of the overcrowded train, it was quite a scene. The situation got a bit too much after nine hours of this and we eventually got off at some random city. We felt bad for abandoning the train, but the prospect of spending a night unable to move, with no sleep, and the real prospect of the kids above us weeing themselves (remember no toilet on board) and this then leaking onto us (we'd already had miscellaneous food items falling on our heads) was far too much.
As bad as the conditions were this was an important experience, and we were well looked after by our fellow passengers when it looked like riots were about to kick off, they also supplied us with vital food supplies.
We'd then travelled about 300km and we booked an onward ticket to Bangalore for the next morning, and checked into a hotel for a sound nights sleep. The next morning we travelled to Bangalore, which is India's I.T. capital, but for us it was just a very noisy and dirty city, but still interesting to see the new emerging middle classes emerging from I.T.
The next day we boarded our third and last train bound for New Delhi train station, we got on sleeper class which means you have a shelf to sleep on which is reserved but other than that it's similar to second class. This was the monster 45 hour journey which spanned to nights, and a good test of patience, as we a constant procession of people passed through the carriage begging, singing and selling crap. We finally arrived in New Delhi at 11am yesterday confronted by manic traffic, touts, dealers and hustlers. This is a city where we step down from being the polite people we are and ignore offers of this and that and calls of "Hello Friend!".
Delhi is nice though, and today we visited a lovely old red fort and the Old Delhi centre which is steeped in medieval times and completely frenetic!
Tomorrow we catch an early train to Agra, to see the Taj Mahal, which we're looking forward to.
India is a hell of a country, so many different facets, places and people. It has the ability to amaze, frustrate you and re-evaluate everything you know about Europe in one go. Also never have i smelt urine, flowers and cooking samosas at the same time. It is complete sensory overload for the eyes, ears and nose!
Despite all of this it still feels like "home", i can't explain why, but the term "Mother India" makes sense to me now, and i'm sure we will revisit this country again.
Wednesday, 14 January 2009
Heading in one direction
We've now done the state of Kerala, and had a really great time cruising through the lush tropical back waters on numerous boats. It's been really beautiful here, and the people are very friendly and relaxed. We got talking to some lovely villagers the other night who invited us to have dinner with them. They lived on a small island within the backwaters, they were very nice people indeed.
We stopped off at an Ashram on the way to Kollam, dedicated to the femal guru named Amma, probably better known as the "hugging mother". To give it a fair comment it wasn't the place for us and we moved on after one night. It was interesting to see the inner workings of the Ashram, which houses over 3000 people.
We've now seen more palm trees than any person can bear to see, literally millions of them. We're heading to North India on the 16th which will involve mega long train journeys (48 Hours+) and even longer distances (1000km+), we'll be glad once that journey is over as it's been hanging over us for a while now.
We saw red pineapples today while in a canoe in the backwaters, very strange thing, i reckon the locals have just spray painted a normal pineapple. But it seems there's red varieties of everything in Kerala (pineapples, bananas, rice), i guess it's very apt given it's a communist state!
We stopped off at an Ashram on the way to Kollam, dedicated to the femal guru named Amma, probably better known as the "hugging mother". To give it a fair comment it wasn't the place for us and we moved on after one night. It was interesting to see the inner workings of the Ashram, which houses over 3000 people.
We've now seen more palm trees than any person can bear to see, literally millions of them. We're heading to North India on the 16th which will involve mega long train journeys (48 Hours+) and even longer distances (1000km+), we'll be glad once that journey is over as it's been hanging over us for a while now.
We saw red pineapples today while in a canoe in the backwaters, very strange thing, i reckon the locals have just spray painted a normal pineapple. But it seems there's red varieties of everything in Kerala (pineapples, bananas, rice), i guess it's very apt given it's a communist state!
Saturday, 10 January 2009
Kommunist Kerala
We're now in the very south of India in the communist state of Kerala, it's really strange that only one state is communist, but you know when you're here as there's red flags (with the hammer and sickle) everywhere! I should wear my Che Guevara t-shirt but it's far, far too dirty, as are all my clothes. I especially bought a new t-shirt in Goa as i had no clean ones left. I really, really need to do some washing!!
The train journey down from Goa was interesting, the trains departure in Goa was delayed by a few hours, but we got chatting with a number of people and the time flew. We traveled pretty much 3rd class, but it was an experience, cockroaches crawling around, handcuffed criminals and begging lepers! I would call that exciting. We met some over travelers in the same carriage and had a bit of sing along (accompanied by a mandolin and Buddhist hand bells), that got most of the carriage involved, or at least staring.
We're now in Alleppey which is a small town/village that pretty much leads straight into the extensive backwaters. We rode through the quiet backroads today on bicycles, and relaxed as the palm trees and the river side went past. It's absolutely stunning, and is just how i imagined Kerala to be.
Tomorrow we've hired a houseboat that will take us further into the watery landscape for 22 hours, which will mean that we sleep onboard, it's by far the most expensive thing we'll do in India but it's a must do thing, and we are looking forward to a relaxing journey watching the mangroves and small villages go by, especially as we're starting to feel like endurance travellers!
The train journey down from Goa was interesting, the trains departure in Goa was delayed by a few hours, but we got chatting with a number of people and the time flew. We traveled pretty much 3rd class, but it was an experience, cockroaches crawling around, handcuffed criminals and begging lepers! I would call that exciting. We met some over travelers in the same carriage and had a bit of sing along (accompanied by a mandolin and Buddhist hand bells), that got most of the carriage involved, or at least staring.
We're now in Alleppey which is a small town/village that pretty much leads straight into the extensive backwaters. We rode through the quiet backroads today on bicycles, and relaxed as the palm trees and the river side went past. It's absolutely stunning, and is just how i imagined Kerala to be.
Tomorrow we've hired a houseboat that will take us further into the watery landscape for 22 hours, which will mean that we sleep onboard, it's by far the most expensive thing we'll do in India but it's a must do thing, and we are looking forward to a relaxing journey watching the mangroves and small villages go by, especially as we're starting to feel like endurance travellers!
Wednesday, 7 January 2009
Tropical Beach Hippiedom
We left Panjim last Sunday and travelled using the local buses up to Arambol, the northern most tip of Goas coast. It's a strange place, completely geared up for travellers, and not that Indian, the beach shack we stayed in however was right on the beach, and it had resident pigs. The main town itself is littered with every new age piece of paraphanalia you can imagine, but the beach was amazing and it's still a novelty to share the beach with hoardes of cows and dogs.
After two days we moved south down to Anjuna which is a little less busy than Arambol and also has gorgeous beaches. The place has a bit more of an edge to it though, we walked down the main dirt track and everytime we're offered a large range of drugs, never in 10 seconds have i been offered so much variety, many ways to end up in an indian prison here!
Tomorrow we catch a train for 14 hrs down to Indias most southern state Kerela, where we're looking forward to seeing one of the most successful communist states, and of course gorgeous, lush, waterways.
After Kerela we have the task of travelling from South India to North India, which if done by train will take 40+ hours, we need to think this one through a bit, there's only so much train travel one human can take!
After two days we moved south down to Anjuna which is a little less busy than Arambol and also has gorgeous beaches. The place has a bit more of an edge to it though, we walked down the main dirt track and everytime we're offered a large range of drugs, never in 10 seconds have i been offered so much variety, many ways to end up in an indian prison here!
Tomorrow we catch a train for 14 hrs down to Indias most southern state Kerela, where we're looking forward to seeing one of the most successful communist states, and of course gorgeous, lush, waterways.
After Kerela we have the task of travelling from South India to North India, which if done by train will take 40+ hours, we need to think this one through a bit, there's only so much train travel one human can take!
Saturday, 3 January 2009
Go Goa Go
We left Mumbai at 6:55am on the 2nd of January on a train heading to Goa. It's at the times when you have to wake up at 5:45am and carry a heavy backpack around looking for your train, that you debate whether you made the right choice to do this thing for six months!! But we were fine after some food on the train. We first of all got on the wrong carriage, i think the unreserved section, and people were trying to help us, that's the kind of difference in attitude that we've loved about India so far, people genuinely want to help and are friendly. It's a shame that wasn't our carriage as i'm sure we would have had a lot of interaction with the locals, our carriage instead was a sleeper carriage, and not really too interesting. Although i did have a fun time half hanging out of the train door watching the countryside go by. The train journey is about 12 hours from Mumbai to Goa, but the food on board is excellent, and i've never had so many offers of Chai or Coffee.
This will be our second day we stay in Goa, we're currently in the state capital of Panaji, which has a real portugese feel to it, most houses are built using the same architecture, except for the monkey god temple (hindu) we visited that earlier, that it's safe to say was not in a portugese style.
We've just eaten our evening meal in a sweat little side street shack, where we were served a Veg Thali for 20 Rupees (around 30p!), it was just one sweet old little Goan man serving and doing the cooking, i really like shunning the usual tourist restaurants now and again, i don't think i've ever met such a sweet old man!
Tomorrow we're going to attempt to get to the beach village of Arambol which is the Northern most beach in Goa, it's supposed to be quiter and lest touristy than other areas, and has a number of gracefully aging hipppies in residence. The transport will probably be via two buses, which i look forward to, as todays one to Old Goa town was interesting, and i made a friend on board. You really can't help but make friends here, never have i met such warm people.
It's going to be a great six weeks in India, if first impressions are correct.
This will be our second day we stay in Goa, we're currently in the state capital of Panaji, which has a real portugese feel to it, most houses are built using the same architecture, except for the monkey god temple (hindu) we visited that earlier, that it's safe to say was not in a portugese style.
We've just eaten our evening meal in a sweat little side street shack, where we were served a Veg Thali for 20 Rupees (around 30p!), it was just one sweet old little Goan man serving and doing the cooking, i really like shunning the usual tourist restaurants now and again, i don't think i've ever met such a sweet old man!
Tomorrow we're going to attempt to get to the beach village of Arambol which is the Northern most beach in Goa, it's supposed to be quiter and lest touristy than other areas, and has a number of gracefully aging hipppies in residence. The transport will probably be via two buses, which i look forward to, as todays one to Old Goa town was interesting, and i made a friend on board. You really can't help but make friends here, never have i met such warm people.
It's going to be a great six weeks in India, if first impressions are correct.
Mental Mumbai
We arrived safely in Mumbai at 1am on the 31st December, the plane ride was smooth and no problems until we had to land, and we had to circle Mumbi a few times. What really struck us about Mumbai was the shear amount of homeless people throughout, from the taxi we drove past streets and streets full of people sleeping rough. We'd heard a lot about the slums of Mumbai, but no one ever mentions the completely homeless. We got dropped off at the CST train station, and then walked around for about half an hour looking for our hotel. We were pretty worried really as we were having to walk past some dodgy characters, but all was well and we found the place in the end. The night time temperature was around 25 degrees and when we'd left Munich it was -7 degrees, that was a shock.
We spent another two days in Mumbai, enjoying the city and the amount of energy there, crossing the road is a lot of fun, 5 lanes of traffic, everyone using their horns all the time, and two stupid western foreigners running for their lives!!
The first thing that we learnt about the Indian people was how friendly and warm they are, they often just say hello and start talking to you in the street, it's really nice to have such friendly local people when you're travelling, and i have to say the hastle you get warned about before you go, is nothing compared to Morrocco.
We spent another two days in Mumbai, enjoying the city and the amount of energy there, crossing the road is a lot of fun, 5 lanes of traffic, everyone using their horns all the time, and two stupid western foreigners running for their lives!!
The first thing that we learnt about the Indian people was how friendly and warm they are, they often just say hello and start talking to you in the street, it's really nice to have such friendly local people when you're travelling, and i have to say the hastle you get warned about before you go, is nothing compared to Morrocco.
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