We had a long journey to get to the Serengeti by the end of the day, so most of the day was spent in the car. It was interesting to pass through the villages, most towns had buildings which were little more than shacks and generally were built with logs and mud and thatched rooves whilst other houses/shelters outside of the towns were made of anything that was available - sticks, logs, canvas bags and corrugated iron. We also noticed: 1. Speedbumps - there are little to no warnings (generally the latter) for each speedbump, so sometimes they could come as [View Full Entry]

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Our ride back from Amboseli involved me taking a turn in driving Fi's 4WD for a few hours which was some really interesting roads again, and I have a new found appreciation for bicumen. This appreciation was renewed again on the road the next morning as we began our Tanzanian tour which started from Nairobi and involved a 5 hour drive to Arusha. Well, 5 hours in theory. We were about 1.5 hours late leaving - during which repeated to ourselves 'This is Africa' (otherwise known as TIA) - a slow pace for everything tends to be a way of life [View Full Entry]

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After some kerfuffle, I finally got the all clear from the doctor that all was okay to travel and thankfully we made it to Africa! We met up with lovely Fiona on Thursday night who picked us up at the Nairobi airport, and then the next morning we were immediately off to one of the Kenyan Wildlife Services Park - Amboseli. We took the two 4WDs, boys (Paul and James) in one car, the girls in the 'hungry hippo car'. The terrain in Africa is immediately identifiable as we travelled along the road; the thorny acacia trees; massive termite mounds; red [View Full Entry]

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Our bus into Agra was relatively uneventful, but we immediately felt like we were in back in a big city - home of the Taj! We were finally going to see it and couldn't wait! We got into Agra about midday and were picked up by 4wDs to take us to our hostel. It seems we were staying just outside the East Gate of the Taj which was about a 5 minute walk - if that! The weather was predicted to be crap the next day, hazy and overcast, so we were off to the Taj that afternoon. We decided to [View Full Entry]

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The morning started with an evil wake up hour, another crazy/windy/cold tuk tuk ride to the train station and the inevitable late train. Thankfully some chai helped to perk us up, unfortunately it didn't last long with one of the most uncomfortable and cold train rides yet. The small mercy was that it only last about 5-6 hours and then we arrived at the smelliest train station in the world - I swear to god it reaked of pee. A short bus ride later and we were in Pushkar - a blissfully small town of 15,000 people which is situated on [View Full Entry]

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We had a relatively early start and headed by 4WD to see some local villages before heading to Udaipur. We visited a Bisnoi tribe who are largely self sufficient and who care for all living things and try to help protect the environment and animals. They are also one of the only tribes who are legally allowed to consume Opium - apparently this helps when working out in the fields. One of the tribe leaders showed us how he makes it and then proceeded to taste a bit which he mixed with water - it was a tad funny as he [View Full Entry]

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Alas, it was time to leave lovely little Jaisalmer and catch the local bus to Jodhpur, but not before we had our pictures taken for the region's newspapers! Yes, my fame is spreading slowly yet surely. We were wondering around the streets and a journalist wanted to take a picture of all of us with our sunglasses. We then found our piccie in the paper the next day (I've got a copy and will scan a copy later) of a massive colour print of us and a caption stating that we were so over-awed by the beauty of the city that [View Full Entry]

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Okay, so our train was meant to leave Delhi at 530pm. We rocked up a bit early after some really bad peak hour traffic to find that it had been delayed till about 730pm. So we pulled up our backpacks and sat down for a while. We decided to go over to the platform at about 7pm'ish, and it was absolutely jam packed with people, their bags as well as wheelbarrows full of cargo - you name it, they had it. We were entertained by some local kids who were on the way back from Guides, and I was asked for [View Full Entry]

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After some dramas again with the visa (they told me it wasn't going to be ready in time for travel) I finally picked it up the day before Christmas! I flew out to Delhi on Boxing day night and arrived in Delhi at about 11am in the morning. I hung out in the arrivals area for a few hours for Rachael to arrive and then we hopped into our transfer to the hotel. Okay, so I'm a little bit used to traffic chaos (Egypt), so we were expecting the same kind of craziness, but it didn't really happen. There are heaps [View Full Entry]

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Guten tag! My first foray to Oktoberfest in ze land of ze Germans consisted of waiting FOREVER to get our baggage at the airport, and finding Dana & Rochelle who flew into the other terminal in Munich - the airport is humungous! After standing in line for a taxi and being entertained by a group of guys in sombreros and ponchos accompanied by a stereo playing latin music (as well as the Austin Powers theme song WTF?) we zoomed off to our hostel. And by zoom, I mean about 150-160km p/hour on the highway - James was very excited. Our friend [View Full Entry]

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