so let me begin to tell you about the last month of our travels here on indian soil. first i advise that you make yourself a cup of tea or open a bottle of wine because this is going to be a long post. and tom is on the next computer compiling our biggest photo album of the travels, we hope you enjoy these photos while all the time remembering so many times in this country we were not allowed to photograph ...
i'll begin by reeling back the days to the 20th of feb. at first light we set off for the nepalese-indian border. once we arrived we went through the now very familiar administration procedures, got the passports stamped and set foot on one of the planets most multidimensional countries. within minutes we were fighting off just about every indian tout who were desperately trying to get some business from us. we battled through & finally got ourselves 5 seats (us 3 & amanda & lane) in a jeep for a small fee all the way to the city of gorakhpur. while this city had very little to offer us except our first indian curry it was our best location for an onward train. we secured a ticket at a cost of 62 rupees each, thats the equivalent to one euro ... which took us 5 hours along the railway line to the city of varanasi.
varanasi
they say few places in india are as spiritual as the bathing ghats lining the ganges river. this city of shiva is one of the holiest places in india where hindu pilgrims come to wash away a lifetime of sins by bathing in the ganges, here they also cremate their loved ones. the city is the beating heart of the hindu universe, a crossing place they say between the physical & spiritual worlds. the ganges river is viewed as a river of salvation where the most intimate rituals of life & death take place in public along the ghats. we spent alot of time sitting on the western bank watching so may people indulge in their beliefs. a boat ride at sunrise & the cermonies at sunset were definitely the highlight for us all. the burning ghats were surreal. we watched as men carried their loved ones who had passed away down to the river, bathed them for one last time before laying their bodies on a mound of wood & cremating them. only the men of the families are allowed to be present, the women are kept away to keep the emotions at bay. we learned how children's bodies are weighed down with rocks & dropped into the river. children are considered pure & therefore are not cremated as are pregnant women who die. if you happen to be bitten by a cobra snake you are also exempt from cremation ... instead you are tied to a tree & lowered into this sacred river as they believe those who die in this manner can come back to life ! in addition to this the people of varanasi believe that this holy city does not exist as part of the world that we know & live in, if the world ends tomorrow they say varanasi will remain untouched ! talk about breaking ourselves in gently to india !!
on to agra
from varanasi we wanted to head north west to the city of agra. together the 5 of us anxiously boarded the overnight train. i say anxiously because we were advised not to travel in the lower class section as it is overcrowded, dirty & has no air con but when we saw how cheap the price of the ticket was compared to the clean, organised, air-con carraiges we thought we'd take our chances ... like seriously could it be worse than that 18 hours hard seat trip we did in china ! the funny this is we thought it was great, just shows what a bunch of scruffy backpackers we have turned into ! we all had a decent enough night rocked to sleep by the motion of the train only waking just in time to see the mighty sunrise. then the last few hours of the journey treated us to some fab indian countryside before the wall of the agra fort came into sight. after getting our bearings, we took a rickshaw to our chosen hostel, dodging everything possible along the way ... by that i mean camels, horses, pigs, chickens, dogs & beggars. our hostel like most in agra had a roof top restaurant where we got our first view of the mighty taj mahal. we relaxed as the sun went down that evening & watched this world wonder disappear with the daylight. there was not a single inch of the building visible against the night sky. we were really surprised as we imagined the whole place to be lit up, apparently it once was but now because of terrorist threats it stands hidden in the darkness of the night.
the following morning we jumped out of bed with the first beep of the alarm, even cathy & lane which is a world wonder in itself !!!!! we headed to the west gate, bought our tickets & joined the queue. we managed to get cathy in for free ! it said under 15's were free so we chanced our arm. the guy at the ticket desk didn't bat an eye lid but then the guy at the gate refused to believe us. i felt bad fighting & winning our case to get a free ticket for something this amazing but hey a backpacker is a backpacker after all !!! it was such a class morning. the moment we walked through the arch which gave us our first direct view of the taj mahal was magical, we had goose bumps on our arms & just couldn't stop smiling. everyone was in awe. as we walked forward & saw the iconic reflection of the taj mahal in the water it did just feel unreal. even when we were taking the photos we kept laughing because it looks like we are superimposed onto the images such is the perfection of this sight. we walked, we talked & we admired this building for a few hours before we decided to move onto agra fort.
from the fort you can see the taj mahal in the distance & it was here that the emperor shah jahan, the guy who built the taj mahal was imprisoned. the most extravagant monument ever built for love, it was a memorial for us wife who died giving birth to their 14th child. but he was overthrown by his son & imprisoned in agra fort where he remained for the rest of his days where he could only gaze out at his creation through a cell window. when he passed away he was laid to rest beside his wife in the taj mahal where they remain to this day.
further west to jaipur
another overnight train took us to jaipur. at this point lane & amanda went further north while we decided to head further west. in this city we got to really exercise the word 'no' another thousand times. you know india is a crazy place especially these cities. the way men treat you doesn't borderline harrassment, it is harrassment. you really have to try to ignore it to the best of your ability but at times it really does test your patience. and there is the moments of course when those little street children just melt you, always begging, always looking for food ... one particular time in jaipur i melted over these 3 little homeless girls. what i really wanted to do was talk tom & cathy into smuggling them home with us but we settled on buying them a pineapple juice. so with the good deed done we waved goodbye to these little cutie's & headed off in the direction of the old city. but ten minutes later there they were right beside us out of breath having run the little legs off themselves, complete with 3 big empty rice sacks begging us to fill them with clothes, they were even trying to get me to take off my own clothes !!!
we did eventually break free from them & made it to the old city. we were there in search of jantar mantar, an observatory which begun way back in 1728. it was really interesting stuff where they measure time by the place the sun's shadow falls on huge sundials. one of the sundials was so big the shadow moves up to 4 meters an hour ... tom now wants to build one when we go home !
that evening the biggest elephant we've seen on the travels came walking up behind us with 2 indian guys on his back. all painted up we saw it as a perfect photo opportunity. when we took a few snaps the elephant kept pushing his trunk towards us, tom has 20 rupees in his hand which the elephant took & immediately handed up to his master. i thought what chance have we got if even the elephants are begging !!!!!
continuing west to jaisalmer
from jaipur to jaisalmer was a monster overnight plus train jourey. poor old tom had a rough night on this train, he spent the night squatting over a dirty smelly stainless steel hole in the ground with a serious dose of the 'shits' ! you see sometimes it's hard to get men to listen so when we advised tom to give up meat for his time in india it fell on deaf ears. the first time tom got the dreaded 'shits' in india he asked 'why he was the only one suffering' ??!! we simultaneously replied 'because your eating meat' to which he responded much to the amusement of the canadian girls 'but i'm a meat eater' !!! then after enduring this night on the train tom reluctantly decided to give up meat ...
it was here in jaisalmer that we did another one of those amazing things life has to offer. we did a camel safari in the great thar desert. there was just us 3 & 2 german girls, nika & rebecca. it began when we drove 60km out into the desert in a jeep to meet our guides & camels. after having breakfast we mounted the camels & began our trip. after an hour on the camels we were all in a considerable amount of pain & wondered how the hell we were going to endure 2 days ! but as the hours passed our bodies started to adjust. with not another person in sight it almost felt like we owned this desert, the quietest land i've ever known, the silence was magic. when the sun was starting to go down we all dismounted our camels & climbed to the top of the sand dunes where we watched the sun set & the moon rise. as darkness fell the guides got the campfire going & whipped up some amazing indian food. the guides even made chapati breads from scratch while teaching us a few tricks along the way. like the way they don't wash the plates, they rub sand on everything until the remaining food disappears ! i wondered about the effect this little trick might have on our bellies but we all survived the experience without any sign of delhi belly, even tom the vegatarian.
after dinner we were eager to have a lie down under the incredible night sky. our beds for the night were australian swags, the most comfy outdoor beds. basically they are a soft mattress rolled up complete with white linen & a light quilt. we all got snug & spent hours watching the stars & trying to highlight things that were familiar to each of us .... the big dipper, the big dipper, the big dipper !!! as time passed & we continued to 'star gaze' we could evidently see the way the earth rotates as the sky kept shifting in a sort of dramatic way. as the sky in the desert is so unbelievably black & every star seems so bright & visible you feel like the sky is falling down on you, cathy even had a little panic ! we didn't want to go to sleep, we didn't want to miss a moment of this special night. tiredness won the battle though & all we slept incredibly well in the great outdoors with the light of the day waking us up just in time to see the most stunning sunrise.
udaipur for my birthday
this time our only option was an overnight bus to our next destination udaipur. another crazy indian experience, the bus has seats at normal level but then above the seats it has beds, a double on one side, a single on the opposite side. now anyone except cathy who manages a nights sleep on these buses must be overdosing on sleeping tablets or whiskey ! you see cathy would actually sleep on a bed of nails & say she had a great sleep ! tom described it perfectly when he said it was like being on the nemisis rollercoaster in alton towers for 14 hours ! they really should provide helmets for the journey ... we made it to udaipur in one piece i'm glad to say & pretty much on time which we didn't expect. the bus just stopped for the usual 3 food breaks & 8 toilet stops !! tom decided to join the men for a pee on one of these stops, it was the customary indian trough where you essentialy pee into a bath that just sits there on the side of the street. and don't expect drainage because much to tom's horror there is no drainage, instead the sacred cow of india comes over & starts slurping as the men pee !
udaipur was special, it has this lake palace which looks like it's out of a fairytale but it is in fact a 7 star hotel. and before you ask no we didn't ! we wanted to but we didn't ! instead we got a boat and sailed around the palace just dreaming about what it would be like to set foot inside. only hotel guests are allowed inside this palace which looks like it's floating in the middle of the lake. one time you could go in but after the terrorist attacks in mumbai all the strings have been tightened.
the following day i turned 32 & started wearing factor 30 suncream. tom & cats took me out into the countryside to celebrate my day. they treated me to my favourite past time, horse riding but on the famous indian marwari horses. we went on a trek for 5 hours through spectacular scenery stopping in local hindu villages & at an animal aid hospital along the way. i really didn't want it to end. we went back to the ranch where they had booked a cottage for the night. we celebrated by having yet another indian curry & a few beers, just us 3 and of course i got to open my presents too ...
mumbai madness
mumbai just hits you like a thunderbolt. you leave this little bit of peace in udaipur & feel like you had been catapulted into the mumbai madness. well we did take the bus again so technically we were catapulted into this city of 18 million people. it's a manic, overcrowded, extremely noisy, totally congested city. the only 3 minutes of peace you ever get is when you enter 'silent zones', small areas in the city mostly around intersections with traffic lights, where it is forbidden to beep your horn. thats how loud this city is.
we made our way to south mumbai, colaba to be exact where we once again met up with lane & amanda. we booked into a dingy totally overpriced room just like everything in mumbai. we headed straight for dinner in leopolds cafe, a name which will be very familiar to any of you who read 'shantaram'. but as soon as we sat there the realisation that this place is not just famous to people who read shantaram but famous around the world as one of the targets of the islamic extremists back in november became too clear. bullet holes still very evident in the glass panes & an eerie feeling of should we or shouldn't we be here bouncing off every tourist in the place. but i guess life is what it is and you can't run from these places. you just got to thank your lucky stars you weren't there the night of the attack.
we visited the mumbai slums, an astonishing 55% of mumbai's population live in shantytowns, and the largest slum in mumbai and all of asia is dharavi. established atop reclaimed marshland in 1933, it incorporates 1.7sq km sandwiched between mumbai's two major railway lines and is home to a staggering 2 million people. if anyone has seen slumdog millionaire it was filmed in this slum, the children in the movie are also from the slum. they have now been put into education & if they stay in education until they are 18 they will receive their payment for the movie. i have to admit it wasn't the easiest of days but i left with so much admiration for the people of this slum who have created their own city in a city from essentially nothing & set up homes & tiny factories. we saw fully operating business going full throttle ... there would be no health & safety rules here might i add ! but then again the children, oh my god they just tug so much at your heart strings ... once again without sounding like mother theresa we could have easily done a brangelina and taken a few home. your standing there & you just see these kids coming out of pitiful squalor's and climbing on top of the rubbish dump (no wheelie bins in dharavi) to go to the toilet, months & months of rubbish piled high doubled as the toilet & then further down tripled as a place for young boys to practise their cricket. this slum just has one communal toilet for the 2 million residents, crazy !
and then the next day we're racked with guilt because we go off to a hotel, a birthday treat. the royal palms hotel was our choice this time, we choose it because the marriott at 240 euro a night was just impossible ! the palms was the only 5 * we could get for half that price so we headed off in search of luxury for the second time since we left home. a 40 minute ride on a packed local train brought us to goregan where we checked into the royal palms hotel, mumbai. the bell boy then loaded us up on the golf buggy & drove us to our room, not any old room but to our surprise a villa. our eyes were popping out of our heads as we walked in, first through the sitting room with a big home style sofa & flat screen tv, then to the bathroom equipped with a jacuzi bath & flat screen tv, then to the bedroom which in addition to beds & a flatscreen tv had a massage chair & finally to our balcony which had our very own private pool. after settling in we decided to go to the huge outdoor hotel pool. we were brought here once again on a golf buggy by our 24 hour on call personal butler ! when we were finished in the pool i suggested we walk back to our villa. cathy or 'little diva paris' was totally unimpressed as she wanted the 5 * treatment all the way. god help future boyfriends thats all i can say !!
when evening came we settled into our extremely comfy sitting room for a bit of proper saturday night tv with a few beers. in true backpacker style that beer was a 'bag of cans' we brought with us just to ensure we didn't have to spend an extra overpriced penny while staying here !! the funny thing about all this was that we ended up complaining because when we went to bathe there was no hot water. in light of this they upgraded us to the wellness villa with all the same goodness as the previous mentioned villa plus an inhouse sauna, steamroom, treadmill, extended illuminated balcony pool, the balcony now overlooking the mumbai skyline !
whats funnier in all of this was that my brother sent me a few pound for my birthday &
said it was to be spent on an night in a hotel. tom thought it would be better if we didn't put all our eggs in one basket, he suggested we spread the money over our 3 nights in mumbai to upgrade from our usual dull prison like rooms to a slightly more average room. but cats & i backed up on him & insisted on one night of luxury. of course we got our way & little did we know this would be the outcome ... of course we also chanced our arm on a late check out & got 4pm ! so thanks conor !!
goan beaches
i can't tell you how much we have missed the beach since we left thailand in january. so when the time arrived for us to take yet another overnight train we didn't really mind as this train from mumbai was bringing us to goa. this time 11 yers ago i was here in india with my good friend sarah, it was here i celebrated turning 21. and despite the few grey hairs appearing & the eye wrinkles forming i still don't feel much older !! we ended up in south goa and found a beautiful bit of paradise at agonda where we dropped our backpacks and perched ourselves on the beach for the best part of a week. it was blissful laziness of the highest order. we only mixed with one person the whole week, a retired school teacher turned novelist. we had dinner with steve each night & cathy even helped him with his latest novel, teaching him the slang words of her generation.
we then moved to benaulim which was less than an hour north. we had arranged to meet lane & amanda again here. amanda's parents have a time share here in goa and the girls kindly invited us to join them & take full advantage of this 'non backpacker' resort for a week, an offer they didn't have to make twice !! the 5 of us melted into this beautiful air conditioned 2 story villa complete with tv & a flushing toilet woo hoo, a toilet that flushes at last ! this was a week of total rejuvenation mostly spent lazing by the pool with the exception of cathy who dedicated one whole day to tv ! and of course it was here we celebrated st patricks day, not a pint of guinness to be found might i add. and it was also here that i won 7 nights in a top hotel, my choice being bali, thailand or india !! it's valid for one year so at least we'll have something to keep us going after the travels !!!! it was also here we hit the half way mark of our trip, a perfect place to rest and prepare for the next 6 months because as i'm sure you know by now life is so so hard for the 3 of us at the moment !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
from beaches to backwaters
now travelling in india is supposed to be the hardest thing for a traveller to do but seriously this bittersweet journey has blown our minds. i have never set foot in such a diverse country before and the best thing is it didn't let me down. you see last year we each picked a place where we really wanted to go. cathy picked south africa, i picked india & tom picked australia. south africa was amazing, india has rocked my world so fingers crossed our big road trip in australia lives up to tom's expectations.
anyway after saying our final goodbye to lane & amanda we made our way further down south to kerala where we spent this weekend. the backwaters that meander through kerala are considered to be the emerald jewel in south india's crown. spindly networks of rivers, canals & lagoons nourish an infinite number of rice paddies & coconut groves while houseboats cruise the water highways. we booked on a house boat for mothers day and sailed through this natural beauty. we had the houseboat for the overnight with just a cook & a sailor on board & ended our indian journey in undisputed style ...
from here to oz
now here's where the real pain begins. tonight we take a 14 hour overnight train, our very last one, to chennai on the east coast. we have 12 hours to hangout here before taking a midnight flight to singapore. here we have a 16 hour stopover before taking another midnight flight to darwin. 3 nights with effectively no proper sleep, i'll be shocked if we're all talking to each other by the time we get there !!
so a final word on india ... would we return ? 'yes', would we eat curry every single day for 5 weeks ? 'we'd try not to' ! would we spend 5 weeks here again ? 'no 10' !
