Chrissie Tatum
Chrissie is a swashbuckling crime-fighting superheroine. Her special skills include the deadly 'tut of fury' and the all absorbing 'smell of veggie cooking'. Her sidekick - Matt - is a poor old bag carrying downtrodden chap. His special skills are waiting for ages in clothes shops and tolerating veggie restaurants.chrissieandmatt
To follow their daring adventures through India and South East Asia, just pick a blog entry and read on dear friends. (Also e-mail support of poor old Matt would be most appreciated).
Travel Blog Posts
May 25th 2009
Right, it's been ages since we did one of these and we're home in a couple of weeks so not sure it's worth it anymore. That said, Chrissie's got a bad head and is snoozing and I'm bored, so here goes. Kerala is the state at the very south of India and despite it getting even hotter (we read that it got to 120F!!!) we had a lovely time there. We headed straight for Kochi, the capital, which is largely a big port, but has a sweet colonial district which is superbly looked after and preserved. It was colonised by the Dutch and the influence is still strong. Due to difficulty booking an onward train we ended up having about 5 days in the town. We didn't need so long, but we fluked a beautiful superior ... read more
May 6th 2009
Oops just realised I published Kerala and forgot to finish this one! This belongs between Goa and Kerala. It's not easy to leave an idyllic beach, so it was with our bottom lips poking out a little that we headed into the state of Karnataka and towards Hampi. By the middle of the afternoon we were happy again, realising that we had swapped paradise for paradise. The village of Hampi sits in a boulder strewn landscape that has seemingly randomly piled up rock in strange arrangements and shapes. The rest of the landscape is rolling paddy fields, with a picture perfect river running calmly through the middle. We had heard of huts across the river from the village where you could stay, that provided the perfect view of the scenery. Hopping with our backpacks into a ... read more
April 25th 2009
After Chrissie's few days of sickness and the accompanying requirement to stay in the hotel room, it felt fantastic to get to Goa, with its beaches and wide open spaces. We spent 8 days in Goa, but for 6 of these we, to all intents and purposes, did exactly the same thing - relaxed at the beach. India is so hot, busy and hectic, that it was wonderful to get to a couple of beach resorts and just kick back for a while. We visited two villages, called Anjuna and Arambol, the former for 2 days and the latter for 4. During the 60's and 70's both thrived as favourite hangouts for hippies and there is still evidence today. They are, of course, much more modernised and commercial nowadays, but the relaxing and carefree vibe still ... read more
April 25th 2009
Having completed our circuit of Rajasthan we headed off to the state of Uttar Pradesh, deep in the interior of India. Although the states share a border, they are vast and our journey covered several thousand kms using bus and train and took 23 hours. The part on the bus was very hot as it was through the day, but we were encouraged by the knowledge that our connecting overnight train was going to be lovely. The more expensive beds on the overnight trains have air conditioned coaches, beds with clean linen and food and drink services. We had several reports from travellers we had met on how wonderful they are and the smashing chatty interesting middle class Indians you meet. On the whole the train turned out to be okay, the linen was nearly clean, ... read more
April 5th 2009
Jodhpur, not just crap trousers, but a splendid city too! The ‘blue city’ (unlike Jaipur it is actually the colour it’s supposed to be) sits deep in the desert in Rajasthan and is hot and dry, so we were over the moon we’d picked a guesthouse that meant we had to climb up an enormous hill. On arrival the climb was worth it, as from the rooftop restaurant the view of the blue town and the fort was spectacular. No need to go trekking off to find a sunset point here, we were staying at it. Our first day we hid from the sun for a while and then went for a wander round the old city. The trouble with everyone painting their houses and shops blue is they all look the same, so it’s very ... read more
April 5th 2009
Leaving hassle filled Agra behind us, we got a bus for about 6 hours to Jaipur - the Pink City. It is known as the pink city as a huge section of it is painted pink (clever name!), although it’s more a peachy orange colour (not such a clever name then after all!). It’s the capital of Rajasthan and has about 2.6 million residents, but feels remarkably calmer than Agra despite its size. Our hotel was sweet and relaxed and after a lazy lunch, we were ready to explore. We found ourselves a tuk-tuk driver and hired him for a couple of hours and the whole of the following day. He spoke good English and when I told him of our experience in Agra and that we would NOT be wanting to go shopping at all, ... read more
March 21st 2009
Morning and welcome to our shiny and spanking new blog. South America was just like soooo last year that we felt we needed a fresh blog for our new travels. This season's in thing is India - I hear it's a quiet little place with a pleasant cool climate and barely a spot of dust in sight. Okay, enough silliness, we left Bexleyheath on a warm afternoon and headed to the airport. The flight was passable, the dinner curry of course (which was yummy) and we got to watch Slumdog Millionaire. For those who haven't seen it, we both thought it was pretty good, not essential cinema viewing, but a lovely dvd night in type of film. We arrived at Delhi airport expecting it to be packed, ruthless and confusing, but it turned out to be ... read more
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