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Published: October 16th 2010
Oct 2 - 12, 2010 - Toronto to Chennai
Well, its that time of year again! I'm about to head off on a 2 month trip to India and Nepal. This is my first trip to this part of the world. My girlfriend, Shelly, will be joining me in India for the first three weeks, and then returns to Canada. I will then fly to Kathmandu, to spend the next 5 weeks touring Nepal and the Himalayas.
Many people have asked me how I plan these trips. Do I use a travel agent? Is there a tour company involved? Isn't it going to be dangerous? Are you concerned about your safety? What about your health? Well, I don't claim to be a travel expert. Up until recently, most of my travel was business related, and as many of you know, you don't really get to appreciate a new place since you tend to fly in, do your business, and get out. It had always been my dream of mine to travel the world after I retired. Now, I am fortunate enough to be able to live the dream.
I do plan alll of the trips myself, although
certain segments are organized through a third party. I can't imagine doing it without the Internet. There is so much information available, in fact, sometimes too much. It is difficult to sort out the good, the bad and the ugly.
When I was on my motorcycle trip in South America 2 years ago, I met an individual that told me about a
Rick Shaw Race in India. Without hesitation I decided that this would be added to my bucket list. I looked on the Internet and discovered that there was an October race this year that fit in perfectly with my travel schedule(Oct 15 - 22). So this became the focal point for my trip this year. Originally, I had thought that I would spend a month in India, and then a month in Australia/New Zealand. If you read my blog from my last trip in the spring to Europe, you will recall that I met a woman, Phillipa, that owns a company, Saffron Road Motorcycle Tours, that organizes motorcycle trips through India, Nepal and Bhutan. After talking to Phillipa, she invited me to participate in a charity motorcycle tour in Nepal from Nov 20 - Dec 5, with her tour
company
Saffron Road Motorcycle Tours. She didn't have to twist my arm. I now had the beginning and the end of my trip. I just had to fill in the middle.
Since Shelly was on the Rick Shaw team, and the race was only 8 days long, we researched India and chose to spend our second week in the Rajasthan province in the North West of India. Not surprisingly, this also happens to be a major center for polo. Another friend of mine, Mike Diamond, recently did a trip to Rajasthan with his wife and gave us some great advice. Consequently, we booked a flight to Delhi, arranged for a tour guide, identified the key places we wanted to see and activities we wanted to do, and laid out a plan. Next, I had to fill n the time between India and the motorcycle trip. Phillipa mentioned that she was doing a charity project building a school for your girls near Mount Everest with a group called the
Edge of Seven . Doing charity work has always been important to me, so I volunteered to participate. This left a wheel between India and Nepal. I will sort out what I am going to do when the time
comes.
As far as health and safety go, it has never been something that I am terribly concerned about. Using common sense and being prepared are the keys. In all my years on travelling, I have never run into a serious problem. I have been told that India and Nepal are two of the safest places in the world, relatively speaking. Now health is another issue. I also understand that it is pretty well guaranteed that there will be stomach issues. So the plan is to take Pepto Bismal every day, and pack lots of Immodium.
Since we will be away for a while, we decided to have a going away party for ourselves, with an Indian theme. (By the way, please accept our apologies if you were not formally invited - we threw it together quickly.)Shelly managed to find an Indian couple to cater the event - Peter and Belinda. They were introduced to us by friends, and we didn't meet them until the night of the party. Well it turned out that they exceeded our expectations. they brought decorations for the room, printed menus, name plates for the various Indian dishes, a going away book for
guests to sign, and Indian music for us to listen and dance to. As a special surprise they did a little cooking school, preparing a wonderful appetizer from scratch, explained each step along the way.
D-day (departure day) arrived too quickly. For me, being away for almost 2 months, meant not only packing for a multi-faceted trip, but also wrapping up everything at home; last minute business meetings; making sure that Willow Farm was in shape to sell; preparing for the horses to be shipped to Florida; and most importantly, spending quality time with family members - a least those that are in Toronto. At the present time, Jeff and Heather and my beautiful 2 year old grandson, are living in Nanaimo, BC,on their 5 acre country property.
My second youngest son, Robbie, is travelling through Europe with his friend, Cody Offen, for almost 4 months. He left on Sept 8 and is planning to return to Toronto around Dec 20. You can probably catch some of their adventures on Facebook.
Sheremet, one of my adopted sons from Kosovo (not officially adopted, but may as well be) is living and working in Newfoundland. After graduating in Avionics,
and spending about a year and a half at Sky Service, he accepted a position with Provincial Airlines in St Johns. I just heard some great news that he has passed his final test and is now and an accredited Avionics engineer. Congratulations Sheremet
My daughter, Michelle and Travis, and there beautiful 7 month old daughter, Maya, live in Markham. It has been a special treat spending time with my favorite granddaughter, most recently at our family Thanksgiving dinner. I am so fortunate to have 2 lovely, healthy, and entertaining grandchildren.
Musa, my other Kosovo son, also a graduate in avionics from Canadore College in North Bay is working at Porter airlines in Toronto. Musa is living the good life at his bachelor pad near Queens Quay. He is expected to complete his Avionics apprenticeship before the end of the year.
Last but not least is my youngest son Johnny. Johnny and I were fortunate to spend a week in western Canada this past August. We flew to Calgary, rented a car, drove through the mountains to Vancouver, flew to Vancouver Island to visit Jeff and family, then flew to Terrace in Northern British Columbia for 4
days of Salmon fishing. What a great way to spend time together before John headed off to Georgian College in Barrie to complete his business degree.
Shelly's two children, Travis and Justine are also very excited about the trip. Both were at the party, with Justine looking beautiful in her Indian outfit .
Well, I think that accounts for all of my kids that I know about.
We arrived at Toronto airport 3 hours before departure. Part of my master plan was to get their early and see if we could get a cheap upgrade. It worked! Given that we were going to be travelling 20 hours to Chennai >>> India, I thought it was worth a few hundred extra to travel in style. While standing in line, we met some very friendly people. Veronica and her retired husband, were travelling to Goa to live their for 6 months. At the check-in counter we met another woman, Prity, who was returning to India after spending time visiting her sister in Toronto, her brother, a doctor in Florida, and travelling around North America for 3 months. She immediately wrote downtown her contact info and insisted that we visit
her.
I was already impressed with how friendly everyone had been, and we hadn't even left Toronto! I was sure that this was a sign of things to come. We boarded our Jet Airways flight on time and departed for the first leg of out trip, Toronto to Brussels, an 8 hour flight. In Brussels we had a 3 hour layover. We ran into our friend Veronica, whom we had met in Toronto and had a lovely chat. We then proceeded to the Jet Airways lounge, and who did we sit beside, but our other new friend Prity. She again insisted that we take time out to visit her at farm just north of Delhi. They had an active farm growing Mangoes, and other fruits and vegetables. Her husband died last year and they basically shut down the farming operation. She explained that she had two 10,000 sq foot houses - one for her and one as a guest house. She lives there with just her servants. WE are definitely going to try to make it there, but it will be tough based on our schedule. Stay tuned to see what happens.
We departed at 10:30 am on
Wednesday, a nine hour flight that put us into Chennai at 11:30 pm. Time to take a sleeping pill and hit the sack for a good nights rest before the adventure begins!
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Sandra Cormier Turnsek
non-member comment
Wonderful post!
What a great opening post to your upcoming adventure! The party was spectacular and it was wonderful to meet new friends and say hello to old ones. I'm looking forward to future updates. Have fun!