Train Journeys

---

Hey,

We have been travelling quite a lot overland since I last blog. The big one was leaving Darjeeling to Delhi a 29 hour train jouney which shortly followed a 12 hour train journey to Bikaner, so basically we went from far east india to far west in one big swoop. The journey wasn't too bad didn't sleep much but I always felt pretty safe and this was in sleeper class (sort of basic).

When we arrived back into Delhi we were surprised to see that there is actually a nice side to Delhi in Connaught place. Although current construction was underway to revamp it, it was a lot less busy then Paragange and less noise. It even had a park in the middle where you could sit under the tree and relax without any hassle. The only problem was that it was about 40 degres and we were baking!

The other problem was that we couldn't find an internet cafe to book our other train journeys, so we resorted back to paragange. It wasn't as bad as I remebered less hastle, but maybe we don't look like fresh meat anymore, or maybe we are just used to it.

Anyway we got back on the train to head to Bikaner. In Bikaner we stayed at a really nice place for 500 rps a night, and they also sorted out camel safris as well. The food that they cooked was awesome probably the best indian food I have tried so far! and it was all down to the family run business highly recommended. If anyones planning on going there its called Vija's guest house or Camelman. Vija is a bit of a local celebrity and we managed to blag a dinner and entertainment at the princess of Bikaners place for 400 rps it was pretty special. The performance was put on soley for us, we felt we didn't really deserve such treatment.

We had our camel safri and slept the night under the stars which was pretty cool and wasn't too cold either. The day was hot as you could imagine, reached about 40 degrees but we escaped under a tree around midday. The camels are quite fun hurt after a while but worth it, mine also seemed to have a habit of blowing bubbles at both ends which wasn't great!!

30km out of Bikaner is a Rat Temple, which was brought about when one of the gods wanted to bring back the life of a storytellers child but the god of death refused so she reincarnated all the story tellers to rats so that the god of death couldn't get them. The place is pretty horrible as you can imagine. Rats rule the temple and people feed them continuously. However, they weren't big which again wa strange maybe the excerise lots. Apparently if you see a white rat its seen as very lucky so I was on a mission to find my luck unfortunatley no luck was found, just more disturbing images of rats some eating dead pigeons which is a sight that does encourage vomiting!

Today we got the train to Jodhpur and although we spent 30 mins trying to find this reccomende hotel we gave up and settled for a place that seems pretty reasonably 250 rps per night for 2. Tomorrow we are going to the fort so should be good and I might even try a lassi.

Hope you are all well, speak to you soon.

Mark

---