Your indistructable, always believe in....Gold!

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shimla was fantastic and we left there very happy. Since our last post, which was a bit rushed, we got talking to a professor in an Indian coffee house and he asked if we could meet that night for a chat. We agreed and met him in the same coffee house that night.

He was great to talk to and very interested in our travels and how we perceived India so far. He was also a bit eccentric bless him. He was on at me to teach yoga to people. Yes yoga! I tried to explain that i was about as flexible as a piece of two by four, but he wasn't having any of it. I was to go straight back to blighty and start teaching (and charging) people for my unique style of non movement based yoga.

Went back down the mountain the next day and proceeded to a magical place (not) called Ambala. Stayed there for two nights, enough said!

Caught a train to Amritsar. On the way, we were sat next to a very friendly family who shared their food with us. It was the first time we had tried guava and it was very tasty, apart from the chapata powder that had been sprinkled on it (damn you massala!).

Got to Amritsar where we found (or maybe he found us?) a slight gentleman, about 8 stone wringing wet, by the name of Shindla. Top bloke! He has been a rickshaw driver for donkey's years and knows everything about the area.

He took us to a great little place called Tourist Guest House. Very cheap, at Rs 300 and well run. It has the best hot shower (which is powered by very wet batteries!?) this side of the Punjab border.

I am now going to hand you over to my beautiful wife who is tugging at my jumper wanting to type!

Since arriving in this Beautiful city we have seen so many amazing things. The Golden Temple really is a marvel and at sunset the gold bounces off the temple and is awe inspiring. We loved it so much we visited three times and even ate in the temple kitchen which is a huge space and can seat upto 10,000 people. It is free of charge to eat there but you can donate a few rupees if you like. It is well worth it and the food is mouth watering. We loved the kheer, which is a very creamy rice pudding with cardamon, fruits, nuts and saffron. We enjoyed it so much that our driver, Shindla offered to take us to a resturant that served it cold. Tasted just as nice and we are now on a mission to eat it in every city we go to.

There is so much to do here in Amritsar that we have not had one early night since arriving. The temple, being the highlight of our visit, was brilliant, but we have also seen the boarder ceremony between Pakistan and India at Wagha, several hindu temples one of which was decorated inside entirely of little pieces of coloured glass and today we visited Jallinwalla Bagh which is a memorial for all those who were killed by British forces who opened fire on many innocent civilians without warning. It was a strange place to be. Bullet holes in the walls had been preserved for tourists to see the destruction that was caused, and numerous plaques telling us who had innocently been killed. This event kicked started Ghandi's movement for home rule.

Tomorrow we leave for a 48 hour train journey which will take us further south as we head towards Kerala. The temperature down south is around 30 degrees at present so we are impatient to get there quickly as the north is actually quite bloody cold!

Ta ta for now. Signing off, over and out, bonjour!

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