We got an overnight train from Varanasi to Agra. Arriving in Agra, we were immediately impressed with its cleanliness. It's ready-made for a quick sight seeing tour, and doesn't feel the same as the rest of India. There's lots of big roads, shopping malls and fancy hotels. Our hotel was close to the Taj Mahal, in a place called Taj Ganj - an area established by the people working on the Taj Mahal. On the first day, we went to the Red Fort - a beautiful Fort constructed hundreds of years ago. It became the Palace of Emperor Shah Jahan [View Full Entry]

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We arrived in Varanasi after the longest train journey in the world (42hrs)! The Lonely Planet book warned that as soon as you arrive, you'll be pounced on! This was definitely the case, with rick-shaws and tuk-tuk's fighting to take us to our hotel. They were bidding for our business, and we took the lowest bid. We agreed a price and got into the tuk-tuk. After 10 metres, the driver turned around and said that he wanted us to pay triple the agreed amount, otherwise he wouldn't take us!! We got into an argument and got out of his tuk-tuk - [View Full Entry]

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From Madurai we took an overnight train to Pondicherry - a lovely coastal town, which was once colonised by the French. As a result, there's lots of French style houses and restaurants, and the locals all speak at least basic French. It was a nice place to relax, and finally eat some non-Indian food!! We hired a moped for a couple of days to explore the area, and travelled north by about 15km. We hoped to have a dip in the sea, but the whole coastal area is still completely devastated from the 2004 Tsunami. The only thing still standing was [View Full Entry]

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Munnar is set up in the mountains - 1,600 metres. The town of Munnar isn't particularly pretty. The real beauty of Munnar is the miles and miles of tea plantations that surround it. Every hill side has been taken up with beatifully manicured tea plants. The plantations are owned by TATA, who employ 12,000 people in Munnar. We stayed 20 miles outside of the town, in a resort called Dew Drops. It was absolutely beautiful. Set in 240 acres of forests and lakes, we'd finally found a quiet place. No horns beeping, hawkers selling or beggers asking for money. It was [View Full Entry]

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After a hair raising bus ride through the night, we arrived in Cochin (or Kochi as it's now called). It was a big overcrowded place, so we got straight on a little ferry, and went to Fort Cochin. A lovely little island, just off the coast, and connected by a large bridge. Fort Cochin has English/Portuguese/Dutch influence, and is very quaint. There's lots of parks, quiet streets, churches and greenery. It was almost like England on a summer's day. We stayed for 3 days, and took a boat trip through the backwaters on our first day. It was stunning. There was [View Full Entry]

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We left Palolem as the place was shutting down for the monsoon and with the intention of going to Cochin in Kerala. But we couldn't get on a train and decided to go by night bus to Bangalore. This was truly horrible. The "sleeper" bus was 1hr 45mins late. When we got on we were shown to our cabin which was too short to lie down and too low to sit up. To make matters worse the lights went out 30 seconds after the bus moved off and we found ourselves bouncing around the rear axle in a small claustrophobic [View Full Entry]

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We arrived in Margao in Goa, and headed for the nearest beach - a place called Colva. Big disappointment, as it was really tacky. We didn't even get out of the taxi, and instead headed south to a place called Palolem. We'd read about it in the Lonely Planet book and it sounded fantastic - just what we were looking for. We arrived, and were immediately impressed! Palolem beach is in a half moon shaped bay - beaufiful white sand, and warm water! The beach is surrounded by tall swaying palm trees, with lots of beach huts and mini-resorts hidden among [View Full Entry]

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We arrived in Delhi on Tuesday morning, and after having to get a 'letter of permission' from the airport manager (as we didn't have a print out of our so called eTicket), we managed to get to the domestic terminal. From there we boarded a plane to Mumbai. We had to take a 2 hour dusty, hot and hectic taxi journey, finally arriving in the Colaba district of Mumbai, and checked into the Hotel Volga II. The staff were pretty rude, the hotel looked like a grubby prison, but it had a bed and A/C - which given the heat, felt [View Full Entry]

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Well we are finally off tomorrow on our world tour. I think we’re as ready as we can be, travel insurance , 9 series of Southpark on the iPod , nothing but the essentials! The first phase of the trip is as follows…. 4 days seeing friends in the Netherlands then on to India. Starting in Mumbai and going down the west coast via Goa and Kerala and over to the east via Maduri and on to Madras. Then the plan is to fly to Calcutta and take a train to Varanasi and Agra and leave from Delhi, 2 months [View Full Entry]

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