What an amazing adventure! India is truly incredible with everything in extreme--extreme beauty, extreme culture, extreme wealth, extreme poverty, extreme traffic, but most of all, this is a country of extremely kind and generous people. Yes, India can be daunting and frustrating at times, but we believe that's what makes this trip so special. It takes a bit of work, but with proper planning, patience and an open mind, what we get back is so much more than any effort we may have exerted to make this trip one of the most amazing experiences of our life. We are seasoned travelers [View Full Entry]

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Took a short flight to Varanasi, the sacred city of the Hindus aka city of light, and so far, I think it's one of my favorite places in India. Manageable and less crowded albeit that it's Sunday and there's not much traffic on Sundays. After we settled into our hotel and rested a little, we headed out to the Ganges River to take a boat ride. Ghats of Ganga are perhaps the holiest spots of Varanasi. The Ganga Ghats at Varanasi are full of pilgrims who flock to the place to take a dip in the holy Ganges river, for their [View Full Entry]

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June 11 On our way to Agra, we stopped by Fatephur Sikri, (which is a palace and a mosque) during a sandstorm. Sand and dirt blowing up into our faces and mouth, not very pleasant. Maybe it was the long car drive but we were feeling miserable and was not in the mood to be harassed by taxis, tuk tuks and "tour guides" but this little precocious boy of 15 was not aggressive and for some reason, we both found him charming. We agreed to pay for his companionship since we didn't need a tour of the place and quickly realized [View Full Entry]

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Finally, internet access and tv!!! We arrived at our hotel, Khem Villas, around noon... just in time for lunch. I knew we would be having vegetarian for the next 3 days so I wasn't thinking our food would be good but it was so amazing! My gosh, the hotel, grows their own vegetables and herbs so everything we ate is grown here... so fresh! 18 days in India and I was starting to feel homesick for some Korean food but now, I think I'm okay. The spiced potatoes w/ some peppers was made to perfection, all it needed was some anchovies [View Full Entry]

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June 5th - We arrived at our hotel which is considered to be the best place in town but that's not saying much... food was horrible and their pool is not a pool but a pigeon fountain, totally gross! No internet access here and nothing else to do right now but to ride camels here. June 6th - We left early to go to the Ghats. Pushkar has 52 Ghats and 500 temples. All devout Hindus try to make at least one pilgrimage to Pushkar and bathe at the holy ghats to wash away their sins, thereby earning themselves a place [View Full Entry]

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Today we did a tour of Daulatabad Fort, Ellora caves, and Mini Taj Aurangabad aka Bibi Ka Maqbara. Today was more or less the same as yesterday (Ajanta caves and being photographed for being Korean, etc) We first started off seeing the Daulatabad Fort. We literally took about 10 mins to look around and I didn't think it was worth seeing but it was on our way to Ellora so we saw it. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone else, just a waste of money. Next was Ellora Caves - Ellora represents the epitome of Indian rock cut architecture. The 34 [View Full Entry]

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From Cochin, took a flight to Mumbai, then from Mumbai, hired a car to take us to train station and our driver drove us through the Dharavi slums (as in the movie, Slumdog Millionare), then took an overnight train at the Mumbai CST train station (formally known as Victoria Terminal) to Aurangabad... and boy, what an adventure. When we first arrived at the station, we were overwhelmed by this really nasty awful stench... that smelled of feces. I really can't describe the smell that well but it was the most awful smell I have encountered. Maybe in a lighter description, it [View Full Entry]

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Yesterday we arrived in Goa and it's beautiful... at least our hotel that is. For the first week in India, we're just trying to relax and take it easy... trying to prepare ourselves for the "Delhi belly" but we haven't gotten it yet... knock on wood! Today we did a tour of Goa. Guilty to say we did most of the tour in our car though. I don't mind the heat that much here but it's the humidity that is unbearable. Haven't gotten my hair done in a year so right now it's like that Vietnamese glass/cellophane noodles, when you add [View Full Entry]

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Today we went did the Kerala Houseboat that was recommended as a must do. We rented a 1 bedroom houseboat which was really nice. It was really beautiful and relaxing but 6 hours on a luxury houseboat was a bit too long for me. If I was able to do some fishing or prawning, that'll be a different story. The food on the other hand was a pleasant surprise. I usually expect small sandwiches but in this case, I wasn't sure what we will be getting for lunch. They had so much food out that I thought the other men would [View Full Entry]

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When we left our room, they were lighting the lake w/ tea lights... so beautiful! I'm just sorry I couldn't take a good picture to upload. When we got to the restaurant, there were dancers and live musicians. I'm so surprised how many people there are at the hotel since it's the low season and also, bc it's really "hawt" and muggy. Our first dinner at the hotel was so good! The chicken tikka just melted in your mouth. It doesn't taste like anything we've had in NY and London. The food here is really good. Mutton Saag Paneer was really [View Full Entry]

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