Well what can I say as we head towards another stunning beach - it's a hard life but someone has to do it and it might as well be us... A couple of hours later in a taxi we arrive at Palolem Beach in south Goa. The beach itself is set in a bay with a rocky headland at either end and in between are countless palm trees and beautiful soft sand - oh and of course a thousand or so beach huts and bars. The huts vary in price from about 200 rupees a day to over a thousand, we opted for a hut with a bathroom for 800 which turned out to be a very wise investment... The atmosphere in Palolem was quite a bit different from Anjuna and a lot livelier although it ... read more

So were finally starting the Everest Base Camp trek - but I manage to hide my excitement on the way to Kathmandu airport as it’s only 4.30 in the morning and my spirits are still subdued as when we arrive at the airport - it’s closed, not a good start. Eventually the airport opens and after a short debate with custom officials who were after a quick backhander, Suzanne, myself and our guide, Panoy (a.k.a. Bob as we couldn’t pronounce his name properly just yet), are shown to our wee puddle jumper - or in this case hopefully our mountain jumper and after a quick flight with some amazing views of the Himalaya mountain range we arrive at Lukla airport - and what an airport. Due to the obvious lack of runway space in the mountains ... read more

Varanasi to Kathmandu Well its catch up time again if I can remember the last time I wrote we were heading towards Kathmandu, Nepal. The first step of the trip was to catch a train from Varanasi to Gorakhpur, once again the train ride was pretty much as before but this time we didn’t have to get a sleeper as the train journey was a mere 6 hours - oh joy… So we arrive at Gorakhpur to spend the night and to say “culture shock” would be an understatement. We had previously met another couple heading towards Kathmandu at the train station who had made the journey before so we followed in their footprints to try and find a hotel that was at least stay-able for one night - trust me this was going to be ... read more

Well as mentioned before - no more champagne backpacking for us as we no longer have a personal driver and as we arrive at Agra train station, come back British Rail - all is forgiven, well almost everything, the only plus side is I cant see any train spotters with their thermos flasks and cheese and pickle sandwiches… After a wee wait our train eventually arrives, well we hope it’s our train as we nearly got on the last one that was on the same platform. To be honest when we arrive at our bunks it’s not as bad as I thought it would be - a little cramped maybe but not too shabby. During the night we managed to get a little sleep but not exactly the standard eight hours as we were a wee ... read more

And at last we leave the cities behind to look for Indian tigers - well it would be rude to at least not look but we're not expecting to see any - especially as we're traveling around in a diesel truck - I don’t think we'll be creeping up on too many tigers in this thing, especially with 20 other camera clicking tourists, but as I said before - you have to try. So we get up at stupid o'clock in the morning and join all the other excited tourists and head off to the national park just before dawn where we are greeted by plenty of salesmen all trying to sell jackets and shirts all covered in tigers - there may just be tigers in here after all… So we head off into the park ... read more