Blogs from Manali, Himachal Pradesh, India, Asia - page 5

So... Where to begin? Well, Manali is beautiful! Lots of mountains, pine trees and wild weed growing everywhere!! Seriously though... EVERYWHERE!!! The most shocking thing of all is the cold, cutting, piercing cold!! Completely unexpected but at some level appreciated! Started off, we got off the bus after 9 hours of white knuckle mountain side roads and immediately were leapt upon by a hotelier who then proceeded to follow us down the street touting his hotel. After about 10 mins of this and 2 price reductions we decided to go and check it outwhich i'd like to add was a good call. Hotel(name to follow as we cant remember at the moment) was really nice, situated right on The Mall(high street) was a steal at 250Rs per night(a few pence over 3GBP). Unlike Delhi, the people ... read more

Good afternoon people, time for another update!! I have actually come across a couple of minor problems since the last entry I submitted, so this update won't be anywhere near as busy as the last one, hence less reading for you which you are no doubt ecstatic about! This episode begins in a little town called Pushkar. Now I ended up here because, after complaining that I was moving along too slowly and taking action to tackle this problem, seemed to get carried away and sped along far too quickly during the last leg of the trip (really can't quite seem to get the balance right!), so came to this quiet little town in order to get some chill out time! And that's exactly what I did, as there really isn't an awful lot to do ... read more

The news this day was that the Rhotang Pass was closed but would hopefully reopen later in the day so we headed off in nice weather back towards Khoksar where the army were holding up traffic while the pass was cleared. A Dutch guy stopped for a chat. He was doing the tour the hard way and taking all his gear with him (we had support vans carrying most of ours). He opened the conversation in Dutch! Long time since I've been mistaken for a dutchman (since my blonde hair fell out or went grey). He had also visited New Zealand and said, "no offence but this is even more beautiful". I had to agree with him. I hope that's not treachery? After eating lunch there again, we saw an army truck heading up the pass ... read more

Today's ride involved a climb back to 2050m to the picturesque resort town of Manali (as the itinerary put it). This was along some spectacular river gorge scenery and through a very long dimly lit tunnel. The lack of lighting and narrowness of the tunnel did not deter the truck drivers who continued to overtake one another regardless of who was coming the other way. On one particularly windy bit of road, I found a Mahindra (Indian Jeep) that had obviously been in a collision completely wrecked but just abandoned in the middle of the road. It had a flat bed and had been piled up with vegetables which were now all strewn over the road. We had a choice of two routes into Manali from one point and we took the more windy and scenic ... read more

Apres l'experience du Taj Bouuuuhal, c'est sans demander notre reste que nous avons vite quitte Agra...Pour une montee memorable vers le nord de l'Inde. A la gare, muni de notre ticket seconde classe, nous sommes monte dans le premier train en direction de Delhi sans savoir que celui-ci avait deja 4h de retard sur son horaire et s'appretait a en rajouter 2 supplementaires pour notre plus gand bonheur. C'est donc en 4h au lieu des 2 prevues que nous avons rallie Delhi. Une fois descendu du train, pas le temps de flaner au alentour, la fin de journee approchant dangereusement, si on ne veut pas devoir se mettre a chercher un hotel pour la nuit, il est plus que temps de reserver un siege sur le bus pour Manali. Nous avons traverse la ville en compagnie ... read more