Feeling exhausted again after a couple days in Amritsar, we suffered the long, obnoxious bus journey to Dharamsala. Long because it required many hours, hard seats and a few transfers; obnoxious because we travelled at the same time as the beginning of some kind of local university break. The result of this timing is that we shared the busrides with packs of loud, cocky, young men screaming in our ears at eachother across the bus, listening to distorted, too-loud-for-the-speakers Hindi pop tunes on their mobile phones, and, in one unfortunate case, reaching between the seat and backrest to [View Full Entry]

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Golden Temple Amritsar is home to the most holy Sikh site, the Golden Temple. On first glance, the people of Amritsar appear quite different from some other parts of India. They are taller, broader and, as you would expect Sikh's to be, hairier. Unlike Rishikesh, Amritsar attracts many more India tourists than foreigners so we found ourselves once again at the centre of a certain amount of staring and attention. The town itself is relatively unremarkable except that when strangers approached us, they often just wanted to ask where we were from and welcome us. The Golden Tem [View Full Entry]

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Rishikesh calls itself the Yoga Capital of the World. It could well be true. There is a whole lotta yoga going on there. Like Varanasi, Rishikesh is located along the banks of the Ganges River, however that is about where the similarities end. Rishikesh is a quiet (well, as far as India goes), clean, laid-back place where nearly everyone left us alone! A welcome break after Rajasthan and another quick stop in crazy Delhi. Rishikesh is located near where the clean-ish Ganges emerges from the Himalayan foothills. It is an ideal place to chill out, take a course, eat salad, do [View Full Entry]

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Jaipur As we headed westward from Agra, the scenery became increasingly desert-like. We arrived by bus in Jaipur, a rather dusty, crazy city on a hot afternoon. Jaipur is the capital of Rajasthan with a population of 2+ million that sprawls westward from the hills the border the town. Jaipur is known as the pink city for it's pink-painted buildings in the "old city" area. We spent three days in Jaipur, wandering the old city, bussing out to Amber and Jaigarth Forts, eating sundaes, discovering paranthas (north India flatbread-stuffed-with-potatoes-and-herbs breakfast food) and [View Full Entry]

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Pushkar is another of india's holy cities. a lake in the desert, perhaps not the only reason for being holy, but a pretty good reason as far as a thirsty taveller is concerned. a proper holy town in india must be dry and vegetarian: there is no alcohol or meat to be had here, not even eggs...unless of course you eat at the mayor's resturaunt. not even the gods themselves can stop a well-connected official. It is a nice place, clean air and plenty of ways to wile away the hours; pleasant hilltop temple walks and desert trails. the town itself [View Full Entry]

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the first thing i need to do is warn you: this blog is completely for my own entertainment. it has little to do with anything and a lot to do with nothing. so if you have nothing better to do, ie, you have washed your hair already, clipped your toe nails, taken out the garbage and there is nothing on the boob tube, not even one of those humiliation shows, then it may just be that you belong here with me. at the bottom of the entertainment barrel. in order for sense to be made of why you will see me, [View Full Entry]

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Our stay in Delhi was longer than we had hoped. A weekend, extra paperwork and the Diwali holiday created some delays in getting our Pakistan visas organized. In the meantime, we both got sick with pollution-aggravated colds. Fevers and coughs included! Exhausted and sick, we passed much of our time hiding out from the city air in our tiny hotel room watching American movies and the BBC. Finally, Pakistan visas in hand and only lingering coughs remaining, we got up very early on a Friday morning to catch our train to Agra, home of the Taj Mahal. Agra is only a [View Full Entry]

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Varanasi is one of the holiest cities in India. Located on the banks of the Ganges River, it is one of the most auspicious places to be cremated for Hindus. It is also a place that Hindus come while they are still alive to bathe, worship and bring their ill for healing. At first glance, it would seem that Varanasi is a town built on scams. First a taxi driver took us to hotels that we didn't want to go to. Instead we insisted on being dropped off at a central location and walked another traffic-ridden, dusty, noisy two kilometers to [View Full Entry]

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On our return from the Everest trek, we spent a few days eating, recovering, sight-seeing and having lots of hot showers back in Kathmandu. The city has a well-established backpacker quarter, Thamel, packed with restaurants and shops with everything a foreign tourist could desire, from clothing to paintings, brand name outdoor equipment to Mexican food. It's so much that you begin to wonder how so many stores selling almost the exact same stock can all co-exist so close together. And so we indulged in everything we couldn't get or wouldn't afford on the Everest trek: falafel, steak, beer [View Full Entry]

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Somewhere along the way, we realized that ideal trekking season was just beginning in Nepal, so we decided to stretch our legs and wander up to Everest. From the Nepal side, Everest is quite far away from the nearest road. We opted to fly-in to Lukla from Kathmandu which cuts out a 10-hour+ bus ride and several day hike up and down valleys through the forests. The Kathmandu airport experience is quite something in itself. Unfortunately, all flights had been cancelled the day before due to weather (it is often quite cloudy in Lukla), so two days worth of trekkers turned [View Full Entry]

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