We left Agra on Sunday and caught the 23 hour train to Mumbai. As we were unsure as to what to expect from an Indian train (with its 8 different travelling classes) and given the distance involved, we travelled 2nd Class 3-Tier AC. This basically mean't a bunk on an air conditioned carriage - although Rich really wanted to travel sleeper class in the jam packed carriages with the locals (its exactly as you're imagining).
Well things didn't start too well, the train was due to depart at 9am and getting Rich up that early was always going to be a challenge, but we got there only to be told that the train was delayed by an hour - it actually was 3 hours late in the end (pretty good by local standards apparently) and by the end of the journey was 5 hours late. The journey wasn't too bad and passed surprisingly quickly through eating, sleeping, watching DVDs on a Chinese guys laptop and chatting to a few locals. Getting a clean budget hotel in Mumbai however was another thing! - nothing available in our price range (ie cheap) and touts everywhere, we settled in the end for a room aka prison cell without a window in a fire trap ramshackle hotel but have since upgraded to a windowed room in a hostel.
First impressions of Mumbai - its very hot! 34 degrees during the day and it doesn't get much colder at night - so a bit different from Bishkek!. Its also very very colonial and because of this it has the feel of many european cities. Here they are much more westernised but it still feels like they are about 50 years behind the times - there are lots of cars here but they are 1950s Fiat types and the Royal Enfield motorbike is king here. They have a much more relaxed view towards alcohol here but much to Rich's disappointment the next 2 days are 'dry days' across the region. The food is excellent - we've eaten lots of seafood including Bombay duck, Squid and Crab (delicious), we have also visited the usual tourist hotspots Chowpati beach, Elephanta island, India Gate and Marine Drive. We can see what we suspect are the morass of call centres in the distance and have so far resisted the temptation to seek out either the LTSB one or First Alternatives!.
Our limited plans at the moment are to stay in Mumbai for another day and then to catch the train to Matheran (a quiet, relaxing and scenic hill top station about a 2 hour train journey away) before joining the throngs in Goa to spend some time lazing on a beach.
Tuesday, January 30, 2007
Thursday, January 25, 2007
Today we're in Agra having finished our tour and saw the Taj Mahal. The Taj is a truly beautiful building, especially the geometry and the shifting shades as the sun rises and sets. Our (cheap) hotel room overlooks the Taj so we'll get to see the morning thing tomorrow without too much effort - we saw the sunset bit today but the sheer numbers of tourists milling around kind of spoils what should be a peaceful spot. Anyway, its still not the best building in the world which as far as I'm concerned is the Sagrada Familia in Barcelona.
Our tour finished last night - after Udaipur we took in holy/hippie Pushkar, the state capital Jaipur, a "tiger safari" where the tigers didn't come out to play but there were plenty of other things to see, and then on to Agra. Some of the highlights of India so far:
The rats temple - just like an ordinary Hindu temple except that there are (literally) thousands of rats running unchecked around the place - they're holy rats apparently. Totally bonkers but taken completely seriously by the locals.
The driving - everyone who comes to India comments on the driving, so here's my turn. It's actually just a different set of driving rules - you only have to worry about the stuff in front (a bit like skiing). If something in front is in your way or looking like it might get in your way use the horn (the only time when you have to worry about what's behind). In practice this simply means that right of way goes to the first person to arrive. I like it - it rewards the inventive!
The Jodhpur fort audio tour. The tour takes a minute to talk about narcotics while you pause in front of a wizened old man with a bubbly pipe thing. It then informs you that you can ask the chap to let you sample the aroma (nice interactivity!). He then informs you that the pipe's gone out so gives you a chunk of opium instead. In the middle of an audio tour. Crazy Hindus.
The 'priests' of Pushkar were also quite funny, though not so much in a good way. They will do a prayer for you and all your family in return for a donation to the temple. This donation can be 50, 100, 200 pounds! No really sir, whatever you can afford! What price can you put on your friends and families happiness and wellbeing? Well not 50 rupees apparently. Even less so when you put the donation in the locked donation boxes instead of the tray they pass round...
We went to see a Bollywood film in Jaipur. The cinema was an amazing piece of architecture, a bit like a giant wedding cake - all pink and white swirly bits. The film we saw was something about "the journey from engagement to marriage), sort of a cross between a crap (sorry is there any other kind) soap (with the evil mother in law character and the dramatic fire) and a hollywood romcom by numbers with a cute kid who would pop up from time to time and say something funny - fortunately in Hindi. Exactly Grapes' favourite kind of film then. Most interesting was the audience participation. It was exactly like being in a pantomime with people alternately heckling, and applauding the different characters.
Having seen the Taj Agra has been largely exhausted as a destination so we're off to the station tomorrow to get tickets to somehwere. Not actually sure where yet but we'll see.
Our tour finished last night - after Udaipur we took in holy/hippie Pushkar, the state capital Jaipur, a "tiger safari" where the tigers didn't come out to play but there were plenty of other things to see, and then on to Agra. Some of the highlights of India so far:
The rats temple - just like an ordinary Hindu temple except that there are (literally) thousands of rats running unchecked around the place - they're holy rats apparently. Totally bonkers but taken completely seriously by the locals.
The driving - everyone who comes to India comments on the driving, so here's my turn. It's actually just a different set of driving rules - you only have to worry about the stuff in front (a bit like skiing). If something in front is in your way or looking like it might get in your way use the horn (the only time when you have to worry about what's behind). In practice this simply means that right of way goes to the first person to arrive. I like it - it rewards the inventive!
The Jodhpur fort audio tour. The tour takes a minute to talk about narcotics while you pause in front of a wizened old man with a bubbly pipe thing. It then informs you that you can ask the chap to let you sample the aroma (nice interactivity!). He then informs you that the pipe's gone out so gives you a chunk of opium instead. In the middle of an audio tour. Crazy Hindus.
The 'priests' of Pushkar were also quite funny, though not so much in a good way. They will do a prayer for you and all your family in return for a donation to the temple. This donation can be 50, 100, 200 pounds! No really sir, whatever you can afford! What price can you put on your friends and families happiness and wellbeing? Well not 50 rupees apparently. Even less so when you put the donation in the locked donation boxes instead of the tray they pass round...
We went to see a Bollywood film in Jaipur. The cinema was an amazing piece of architecture, a bit like a giant wedding cake - all pink and white swirly bits. The film we saw was something about "the journey from engagement to marriage), sort of a cross between a crap (sorry is there any other kind) soap (with the evil mother in law character and the dramatic fire) and a hollywood romcom by numbers with a cute kid who would pop up from time to time and say something funny - fortunately in Hindi. Exactly Grapes' favourite kind of film then. Most interesting was the audience participation. It was exactly like being in a pantomime with people alternately heckling, and applauding the different characters.
Having seen the Taj Agra has been largely exhausted as a destination so we're off to the station tomorrow to get tickets to somehwere. Not actually sure where yet but we'll see.
Thursday, January 18, 2007
We are now in Rajasthan in India, where the sun is shining though when we arrived in Delhi the newspapers were full of news about the possibly record breaking cold snap (the overnight low of +4 degrees was enough to see schools closing!).
Actually this is a very scummy country - there are open sewers in the streets, a bewildering menagerie of animals wandering and defecating everywhere, everyone is after your money by whatever means available to them and the noise and the stench and the grime is like nowhere else i've ever visited. On the other hand, all this is still just an ugly scab on top of some fabulous architecture and history.
We arrived in Delhi, and somewhat foolishly signed up for a tour of Rajasthan (they tried to sell us more but that was quite enough). Its actually quite nice to not have to worry about finding a hotel every night, and we have our own driver but the suspicion is that we could have done the same itinerary with more flexibility for half the price... We also have to face almost daily battles with our driver about not wanting to go into certain shops, not eating in certain restaurants, and battling him over which sights we want him to take us to (the commision scammers are years ahead of their Thai counterparts here).
So far we've seen (amongst others) Delhi, Jaisalmer (Golden city, best one so far), Jodhpur (Blue city - where the trousers come from), and we're currently in Udaipur (White city where they won't let you forget that Octopussy was filmed). So just the Pink one to go then... We also went for a camel ride and slept out in the desert under the stars, a wonderful if uncormfortable experience.
When we finish our tour in Agra (home of the Taj Mahal) we have to decide where else to head. So far Mumbai and Goa are the main possibilities (cos everyone goes there). Varanasi is on the way to Kathmandu so we'll probably go there and I have a fancy to head to Darjeeling and drink tea, though that's a bit out of the way.
The food here is great, though curry twice a day isn't doing my insides much good. It's very cheap but surprisingly I have yet to have a curry as good (or as hot) as we can get in the UK. Grapes is suffering a grapes shortage as wine is expensive and rare here, and beer is more difficult to get hold of than expected (mysteriously you can always get one Kingfisher Strong but they can never supply you a second one...). Rajasthan appears to have some limited prohibition and in some cities you can't even get meat.
For those that know him, we have also found the Future Mrs Miserable Bloke. Most people we meet are also on similar tours to us, but we've met (and said hello) to this woman on at least 8 different occasions but only with the barest flicker of recognition back!
Actually this is a very scummy country - there are open sewers in the streets, a bewildering menagerie of animals wandering and defecating everywhere, everyone is after your money by whatever means available to them and the noise and the stench and the grime is like nowhere else i've ever visited. On the other hand, all this is still just an ugly scab on top of some fabulous architecture and history.
We arrived in Delhi, and somewhat foolishly signed up for a tour of Rajasthan (they tried to sell us more but that was quite enough). Its actually quite nice to not have to worry about finding a hotel every night, and we have our own driver but the suspicion is that we could have done the same itinerary with more flexibility for half the price... We also have to face almost daily battles with our driver about not wanting to go into certain shops, not eating in certain restaurants, and battling him over which sights we want him to take us to (the commision scammers are years ahead of their Thai counterparts here).
So far we've seen (amongst others) Delhi, Jaisalmer (Golden city, best one so far), Jodhpur (Blue city - where the trousers come from), and we're currently in Udaipur (White city where they won't let you forget that Octopussy was filmed). So just the Pink one to go then... We also went for a camel ride and slept out in the desert under the stars, a wonderful if uncormfortable experience.
When we finish our tour in Agra (home of the Taj Mahal) we have to decide where else to head. So far Mumbai and Goa are the main possibilities (cos everyone goes there). Varanasi is on the way to Kathmandu so we'll probably go there and I have a fancy to head to Darjeeling and drink tea, though that's a bit out of the way.
The food here is great, though curry twice a day isn't doing my insides much good. It's very cheap but surprisingly I have yet to have a curry as good (or as hot) as we can get in the UK. Grapes is suffering a grapes shortage as wine is expensive and rare here, and beer is more difficult to get hold of than expected (mysteriously you can always get one Kingfisher Strong but they can never supply you a second one...). Rajasthan appears to have some limited prohibition and in some cities you can't even get meat.
For those that know him, we have also found the Future Mrs Miserable Bloke. Most people we meet are also on similar tours to us, but we've met (and said hello) to this woman on at least 8 different occasions but only with the barest flicker of recognition back!
Sunday, January 07, 2007
On Saturday morning we had our flights to Delhi confirmed for monday evening, total cost $690 with Uzbek Air which is most of the profit from the car. Flights appear to be quite scarce in this part of the world so competition isn't exactly keeping prices down...
Due to taking so long to get the flight sorted and what with it being so soon we've singularly failed to get out of Bishkek to see the country properly. This is a shame as it's supposed to be stunning but the weather is something of a problem though it's warmed up a bit here in the last couple of days (+5!). Maybe a summer trip some time.
We've also replaced Carlos with another expendable mascot. Introducing Francois the camel, who we hope shall last longer than the last one and may even feature in some photos at some point.
Expect future updates to be further apart as the need to stay in from the cold decreases!
Due to taking so long to get the flight sorted and what with it being so soon we've singularly failed to get out of Bishkek to see the country properly. This is a shame as it's supposed to be stunning but the weather is something of a problem though it's warmed up a bit here in the last couple of days (+5!). Maybe a summer trip some time.
We've also replaced Carlos with another expendable mascot. Introducing Francois the camel, who we hope shall last longer than the last one and may even feature in some photos at some point.
Expect future updates to be further apart as the need to stay in from the cold decreases!
Friday, January 05, 2007
Happy New Year everyone ! - hope you all had a good night welcoming in 2007.
We're still in Bishkek, currently awaiting a flight to New Delhi (Rich loves the snow here but its too cold to do much trekking and I need some warm weather and sunshine). The problem is that there is no longer a direct flight on saturdays, so we have to take two flights and go via Tashkent in Uzbekistan. Flights from Tashkent to Delhi run most days and have availability but the Bishkek to Tashkent flights are always overbooked it seems. The result is that we're now on a waiting list for a flight on Monday - no idea what this means although one travel agent seemed to suggest that we had a 50/50 chance of getting on board!. Hopefully we'll find out later today whether we're on or not. The worst thing is that the only airline running this route is Uzbekistan airways and with no competition the flights aren't exactly cheap - there goes the profit from the car then!!
We looked into overlanding it to Taskhkent as the route is supposed to be pretty spectacular but the Uzbek visa seems too difficult and expensive to obtain. We each need a letter of invitation (this cost us 10$ each and will take 2 weeks to get) and then if they feel like it the visa will take 4-7 working days to process at a cost of between 120-150$ each!!. We've decided that embassies in general are a country's first line of defence - it aim being to stop as many people getting into its country as possible.
We spent New Year on the busy Ala-Ata square in the centre of Bishkek where people were letting off fireworks all night from absolutely every direction. As you can no doubt imagine Rich absolutely loved it. He set off the rest of his Tesco fireworks in a nearby park. The sticks supporting the fireworks had all snapped in the car and our makeshift cellotape repair did little to help the first firework, which shot off into the night sky only to bend to the right, come straight back down to the ground and explode not far from a group of blokes. Needless to say we quickly glanced over to check no one was hurt and then scarpered!. The rest of the fireworks went up fine and looked really good. At the stroke of midnight we cracked open the bottle of Champagne we bought from Georgia and welcomed in the new year. Sadly all of the festivities had finished by 1am and most were heading home - still there was more life here than there was in the Cambridge last year.
Since then we've not really done a lot, other than eat and sleep I'm afraid, there isn't a lot to do here and until we've got our flights sorted we can't really go out for more than a day trip. As such finding a pain relieving cream called 'Ben-Gay' proved to be one of our highlights this week. We have now met some other travellers in the hostel we've moved to - its much cheaper, friendlier, warmer and they don't ask us when were leaving everyday unlike the business school hotel we were staying at.
Yesterday we went trekking in Ala-Adamin for the day, proving to us both that we could get around without the luxury of the Rover (although we did fall out with the taxi driver who tried to rip us off). Nevertheless the mountain range was very beautiful with lots of imposing snowcapped mountains, fir trees and glaciers.
Dependant on the outcome of the flight situation, we'll either go away for a short trip this weekend or head out further and for a bit longer next week - we're going to drop by the CBT office (tourism agency) and see what they suggest we can do considering we're out of trekking season and the cold weather (-17 last night).
We're still in Bishkek, currently awaiting a flight to New Delhi (Rich loves the snow here but its too cold to do much trekking and I need some warm weather and sunshine). The problem is that there is no longer a direct flight on saturdays, so we have to take two flights and go via Tashkent in Uzbekistan. Flights from Tashkent to Delhi run most days and have availability but the Bishkek to Tashkent flights are always overbooked it seems. The result is that we're now on a waiting list for a flight on Monday - no idea what this means although one travel agent seemed to suggest that we had a 50/50 chance of getting on board!. Hopefully we'll find out later today whether we're on or not. The worst thing is that the only airline running this route is Uzbekistan airways and with no competition the flights aren't exactly cheap - there goes the profit from the car then!!
We looked into overlanding it to Taskhkent as the route is supposed to be pretty spectacular but the Uzbek visa seems too difficult and expensive to obtain. We each need a letter of invitation (this cost us 10$ each and will take 2 weeks to get) and then if they feel like it the visa will take 4-7 working days to process at a cost of between 120-150$ each!!. We've decided that embassies in general are a country's first line of defence - it aim being to stop as many people getting into its country as possible.
We spent New Year on the busy Ala-Ata square in the centre of Bishkek where people were letting off fireworks all night from absolutely every direction. As you can no doubt imagine Rich absolutely loved it. He set off the rest of his Tesco fireworks in a nearby park. The sticks supporting the fireworks had all snapped in the car and our makeshift cellotape repair did little to help the first firework, which shot off into the night sky only to bend to the right, come straight back down to the ground and explode not far from a group of blokes. Needless to say we quickly glanced over to check no one was hurt and then scarpered!. The rest of the fireworks went up fine and looked really good. At the stroke of midnight we cracked open the bottle of Champagne we bought from Georgia and welcomed in the new year. Sadly all of the festivities had finished by 1am and most were heading home - still there was more life here than there was in the Cambridge last year.
Since then we've not really done a lot, other than eat and sleep I'm afraid, there isn't a lot to do here and until we've got our flights sorted we can't really go out for more than a day trip. As such finding a pain relieving cream called 'Ben-Gay' proved to be one of our highlights this week. We have now met some other travellers in the hostel we've moved to - its much cheaper, friendlier, warmer and they don't ask us when were leaving everyday unlike the business school hotel we were staying at.
Yesterday we went trekking in Ala-Adamin for the day, proving to us both that we could get around without the luxury of the Rover (although we did fall out with the taxi driver who tried to rip us off). Nevertheless the mountain range was very beautiful with lots of imposing snowcapped mountains, fir trees and glaciers.
Dependant on the outcome of the flight situation, we'll either go away for a short trip this weekend or head out further and for a bit longer next week - we're going to drop by the CBT office (tourism agency) and see what they suggest we can do considering we're out of trekking season and the cold weather (-17 last night).
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