Sick

4:30am. Something didn’t feel right. Not right at all. One quick trip to the bathroom wouldn’t take long, just to be on the safe side. There was no safe side.

I had got the Delhi Belly again, just like James had got in Pokhara, Nepal. Thankfully it wasn’t as bad as the time I gave myself food poisoning from a chicken and seafood paella, but it still wasn’t pleasant. But thankfully we were in another nice hotel so the recuperating process shouldn’t be to bad.

In all truth there isn’t much I can say about the day. James looked after me like a trooper and I stayed in bed for the majority of the day. I did manage to catch the back end of Enter The Dragon which is always a bonus. By the end of the day I was beginning to feel a little bit more human but had missed out on a full day in Jaipur. Each and every day was precious now as it was officially 6 months to the day that we left England and also one more week until we would be arriving home. And after the morning I had just had home couldn’t come soon enough…

The Taj Mahal

We have a had a few early mornings in our trip, but mainly due to the need to travel to our next destination. But this time we were getting up at 5:45am to go and see one of the most amazing things in the world…the Taj Mahal.

I am fortunate enough to have been to the Taj once before and I was certainly OK to go back for a second look. So at just after 6:00am me and James walked through the dirty little side streets on the way down to the Taj. There didn’t seem to be many touts and tourists traps along the way which we found abnormal for such a massive tourist attraction. We queued up to get our ticket and waited in line with everyone else. The idea was to be inside and witness the sun rise and the changing colours on the white marble, but there were so many security checks in place that we only just about made in time.

Waiting....waiting....waiting....

There are few things in this world that compare to seeing the Taj at sunrise. Especially in winter when there doesn’t seem to be as many tourists around. Grabbing some pictures on “Diana’s Bench” whilst the white marble changes colour from orange through blue to white is just an amazing experience. The only problem that we could come up with was that the black Taj Mahal was never built on the opposite side of the river. It would have been mind-blowing!

At the Taj

We made it back to the hotel and showered and ate before walking down to Agra Fort. Agra Fort is similar to the Red Fort in Delhi, but I think that it tops it. There’s way more monkeys there too, and even one that decided to have a swipe at my leg as I got a little bit too close for comfort for it. Whilst we also managed to find some hidden bats hanging out in one of the archways and I fed some of the chinchillas. The sun was blazing down on us and it reminded us that we will be having a bit of a shock when we get back home and it is minus 5…

Entering Agra Fort

After the Agra Fort we had lunch at the hotel and prepared for our next train journey; Agra to Jaipur. We tuk-tuk’d our way down to the train station, found our platform and then waited. When the train showed we clambered on and found our rather nice looking seats – we could get used to these. But then came the other passengers. Once again we were lumbered with the kids – kicking the back of my chair and screaming blue murder every so often. But we had our music and that managed to make the journey just about bearable. We even got a “meal” on the train, but I only ate the peanuts and the juice box.

We were getting picked up by the hotel when we arrived so that was one less thing to worry about. But after 45 minutes of waiting for him we decided we should get a tuk-tuk and claim it back from the hotel. But that proved tricky. There weren’t any in the immediate area and when James came back from a scouting mission yet another local had sidled up to me and was trying to have a chat. James said that the drivers up the way could get us there for 60 rupees and the guy in orange talking to me claimed that he could do it for 50, so we followed him to his vehicle. Or so we thought…

When we arrived we stood outside what he claimed to be his tuk-tuk, but there were 3 old geezers in the back boozing away. They were babbling incoherently so we asked him where his tuk-tuk was again, to which he told us just to hang on a moment. At that point another chap came wandering up to us in the dimly-lit area of the car park and began asking us the usual questions – where were we from, how long were we in India, etc, etc. The guy in orange was reasonably dressed which is always a bit strange for a tuk-tuk driver, and in addition to the 3 guys burbling something like “ah, so sad, they haven’t come to pick you up” our spidey senses weren’t just tingling, they were ringing loud and clear.

It was at this point that I turned a 180 and stormed off to find another driver, we didn’t need this. James quickly followed and we stopped at the pre-paid booth to arrange for the short trip to our hotel. Guy-in-orange came running up to us claiming that he had his vehicle and we would be on our way but he had already lost our custom. The pink slip had been written and we climbing into a different tuk-tuk with a young lad called Irfan who, hopefully, wouldn’t be trying to take us to a dark alley to try and rob us blind.

We got to the hotel no problem and checked into the rather nice looking place. It was already late so we just hit the restaurant downstairs. That evening we just settled in to the room and checked out what delights Jaipur had to offer us.

Leaving Delhi

It was good to have a lie-in for a change, and a nice relaxed breakfast. There was only one problem though…it was raining! This just would not do, but it wasn’t all that bad, nothing on the Bangkok scale of things. All we needed to do was pack up our things and get out of the Aura Hotel, once and for all. It was a shame, as when we arrived it seemed pretty swanky, but it quickly took a turn for the worse after that. We hoped that the rest of our hotels in India wouldn’t have people shouting random things from outside our room (we think it looked out onto a mental asylum, but couldn’t be sure as the window was frosted), a very noisy water pipe in the wall and absolute numpties running the place.

Goodbye Hotel Aura!!

It was a short hike down to the train station and once we had barged our way through the other passengers we saw that our train was already delayed. We found a quiet place up near the Foreign Tourist office and sat on a dirty couch playing some cards to pass the time. Once it neared the time we were due to leave we headed to the platform and found our names on the sheet of paper plastered to the outside of the train carriage.

The excellent reservation system

We were sharing a bench/bed with two other chaps and/or a small child who was flitting between one of the chaps and her mum on another bed. The bed/bench opposite was occupied by 5 more people so the only thing to do was plug in the earphones and wait out the 3 hour journey. We would be arriving at just after 5:00pm which would give us plenty of time to get organised and fed at the hotel.

Our companions on the train

We didn’t get in til after half 7. It wasn’t a particularly nice journey either as the little kid was shouting and crying for most of it and we were cramped up against the window on a pretty uncomfortable seat. But arrive we did, and thankfully our man from the hotel was still waiting for us. We jumped in his tuk-tuk and sped down to the Maya Hotel, where I had stayed 5 years ago on my last visit to India. We checked in and got straight to the rooftop restaurant for some much-needed food. 

Trains, Tombs And Tuk-Tuks

Another early start. We needed to get to the Foreign Tourist office to book our train tickets by 8:00am. We delayed breakfast in the hope that we wouldn’t be too long and we could come back and have it once we had our trains booked.

We arrived just after 8:00am and saw there was no queue outside the office, which gave us a little skip in our step. That quickly faded when we opened the door to the office and saw a multitude of people sitting on chairs all with pieces of paper in their hands. It looked like there was some form of queue running round the room but it was unclear where it began. After standing around like wallies for a couple of minutes the queue started to move – one by one people shifted one seat to the right. We found the end of the queue, filled in our details on the paper forms and waited for our turn at the desk.

It took ages. And when I say “ages” I mean over an hour. In that time we saw all manner of people joining the seemingly endless queue, and they all did exactly what we did – stand in the middle of the room trying to work out just what was going on. We made it to the counter and managed to book all our tickets with minimal fuss. We both wished that we had gone straight there instead of wasting our time with that idiot in the hotel. But it was done and dusted so we pegged it back to the hotel to have our breakfast, and just in time too!

Enjoying the breakfast, James?

So then we could enjoy Delhi now that everything was booked. We would need some more money after paying for the trains with cash so the plan was to find a Standard Chartered bank near Connaught Place and find the local market. We did exactly that, but it was more of a market for the locals, selling clothes and loo brushes, so we marched on. We were heading towards the India Gate, just down the road. It was actually about 2 or 3 km down the road, but we had time on our hands and we fancied the walk.

Soon enough we had arrived at the India Gate and it was pretty impressive. I haven’t got any stats on it but it is big and tall and surrounded by foreign and local tourists alike. As soon as we arrived we were approached by a number of people asking for their photo taking or selling us something. With our spidey-senses on red alert we politely refused where possible, especially the gang of teenage school kids claiming that it was the custom for me to give them my camera to take a picture of me with them. Hmmmmm, I don’t think so chaps.

India Gate 

Once we had got our fill of the India Gate we wandered down the main road to Humayun’s Tomb. Again, I had already been here but I enjoyed it so much the first time that I felt James should experience it too so that he didn’t get the idea that Delhi is just all about the madness and chaos in/on/around the roads and main buildings. Inside it is beautifully quiet and serene…except for the huge gaggles of schoolkids we encountered that were just leaving as we arrived. The tomb is a pre-cursor if you like for the Taj Mahal and in itself it is a fantastic place to visit. All the traffic and noise is almost instantly removed from the atmosphere and you can hear the birds chirping and hushed voices as people wander round. Just what we needed after the mad dash round Delhi from Day 1.

The beautiful Humayun's Tomb

It was getting late in the day by then and we tried to find our way to the metro to get to somewhere else (as yet undecided) in the city but we got to a point where we ran out of pavement. Feeling the heat, lack of sleep and the energetic walks we decided to call it a day and grabbed a tuk-tuk all the way back to the hotel, which took ages but was ridiculously cheap so we were happy. It seemed that there were no good (clean!) places to eat by our hotel so we ate on the rooftop of our hotel. It was a cracking curry too, to the point where I ate far too much and felt far too bloated for the rest of the night. But then again, we were just packing our things and trying to book up our last hotel, in Mumbai, which proved very troublesome indeed!

Idiots, Ups And Downs

After having a disturbed nights sleep (sleeping in a double bed again and with the waste water pipe seemingly next to the headboard) we made it to the rooftop for breakfast. Nothing to report really apart from the fact we had to have warm milk on our cereal. Sounds like a small thing but until you try it you will never know how weird it is.

The next thing on our agenda was to speak with the in-house travel agent about booking all our train tickets through India. I had tried, and failed, with doing it online as it is a stupid flippin system that doesn’t work and we didn’t fancy chancing our luck down the presumably packed train station. We knew the rough prices and times of the trains, we just needed the seats. And any commission added on by the fella would probably not amount to much anyway. But as we descended the steps we saw a couple sitting there discussing their trip with the guy behind the desk. No problem, they wouldn’t be long.

They took ages. And when I say “ages” I mean over an hour. Another chap was floating around reception and claiming that he was part of the same group and we could go with him to get things organised as it was just round the corner. Our spidey-senses tingled and we politely refused as we were to be wary of anyone trying to divert us from our intended path for directions, tickets, etc. We ended up waiting for ages and in that time played a game of chess. James won, as I have never really been a great player of the game, give me Sensible Soccer any day.

James plotting his next move

We were also supposed to get a twin room organised to move into as per our booking, but they couldn’t even organise that. The phrase “couldn’t organise a p*ss-up in a brewery” sprang to mind. Finally the travel agent became free and we wondered what could have taken so long. We knew we wouldn’t be too long, it was only 3 train tickets.

We took ages. And when I say “ages” I mean over an hour. And we still didn’t get anything booked. He was an idiot. He kept trying to get us to book a minivan to do most of the journey as he would get a load of commission we assumed. Either that or try and add in extra journeys we didn’t want. Or take phone calls in the middle of dealing with us. Or get everything completely wrong and ask us the details again. Or just ignore our simple request for a ticket from Delhi to Agra. Gah!

In the end we had to run down to the train station to try and book the tickets through the Foreign Tourist office as they would have the ability to book the tickets and actually understand what we were trying to do. When we got down there it felt like Delhi again; the Delhi I had experienced 5 years ago almost to the day. Chaos. People, cars, tuk-tuks, rickshaws everywhere, and an occasional waft of urine (or worse) across the nostrils. The office closed at 2:00pm and it was half 1 by the time we left the idiot travel agent so we were against the clock. The clock won. Us and three other foreign travellers were turned away from the office as there were already too many people inside so we would have to return at 8:00am the next day.

So that left us with an afternoon, and a bit of a bad taste in our mouths, in Delhi. We had just about enough time on our hands to get to the Red Fort before it would close. We made our way there on the subway system, something that I hadn’t used the last tie in Delhi, and arrived at the nearby metro station. Without knowing which way it was we dallied for a while trying to determine which way to go. That was until a rickshaw driver attempted to take us there for only 20 Rupees. I knew it must be close for that price so I casually asked in which direction it was. He pointed and then I waved him away saying we didn’t need his services and then strode in the direction he had shown us. Sure enough there it was.

Red Fort, hooray! 

After paying our foreigner tax we jumped the queue (legitimately) and headed inside. It is so nice to get inside and feel the peace and quiet compared to the madness of the streets of Delhi. We wandered round and saw the sites within, along with hundreds of others that had chosen to visit that day. There were mausoleums and museums inside, but it was getting late and it was close to chucking out time so we made our way back to the hotel via the congested metro again.

Inside the Red Fort, with lots of birds

That night we ordered room service and settled down to watch the Manchester derby. At half time we nipped out to buy a couple of beers but the only place we could find that would sell us anything that wasn’t super-strength lager was a heavy pit of drunks and desperate-to-get-drunks that had a hole in the wall for express service. We managed to wade through the throng and purchase a few cans of Carlsberg, the only thing on offer that wasn’t going to strip our insides. We returned to the room to see a completely unjust victory for the red side of Manchester and some ugly scenes thereafter. As a bonus we flicked over and saw the mighty Liverpool triumph in the next game as we finished off the Carlsberg. Certainly a day of ups and downs!

Travelling Dot Com......Dot Org

It was 7:00am and the alarm was bleeping furiously at me from the floor of our room. I had put it there to make sure that we would get up and out of bed which would hopefully not lead to a repeat of the Terracotta Warriors fiasco. We crawled out of bed, got ourselves ready and headed down for breakfast. We ate as much as we could/dared so that we didn’t have to take lots of provisions with us on the road as we would be spending the entire day travelling.

After we had checked out of the hotel we jumped in nearby taxi (yes, it was the small Suzuki that we had become accustomed to) which took us to the micro-bus stand a couple of miles down the road. We were prepared for the madness of this place but thankfully it wasn’t as bad as Kathmandu and we managed to get seats on a fairly decent mini-bus. It filled up quickly and we even had a few women on board, which made it much less like a prison van, according to James. We set off and crossed our fingers that there wouldn’t be any delays so that we could get to the airport in plenty of time.

Fingers crossed we don't break down!

The journey wasn’t all that bad in the end, apart from having some bloke sat next to me (on a bucket) for most of the journey and there being loud bhangra music played for the majority of the trip. We made a stop-off for lunch and a couple of stops at fruit stalls where the drivers bought a variety of items which later ended up in the hands of one of the traffic/border police. We did see another Westerner at one of the stops, which was a change, as it seemed like these mini-buses were mostly used by the locals who didn’t want to get the local buses…and I don’t blame them!

An old Indian man looks at me and James

James’s digestive system managed to complete the journey without any mishaps, which was perhaps the best thing about the trip, and we climbed out of the mini-bus back in Kalanki Bus Park, Kathmandu. Instantly there were taxi drivers after our custom and, with a bit of haggling, we got a fairly decent price to the airport in (yes, you guessed it!) another Suzuki taxi. Somehow we made it there in one piece and looked for our flight on the Departures Board. 3 hours to wait, no problem.

We went through all the usual procedures, played some more cards and then got ready to board at half 6 in the evening. It had already been a long day of travelling and we were still only at the beginning of stage 4 of 5! Our Spicejet plane was called Dill (as all of them are named/labelled with a different spice, although I’m not sure that Dill is a spice, more of a herb isn’t it?) and we had been given the fire escape seats…bonus! Acres of legroom, even though the flight was only for an hour and 10 minutes. It was enjoyable and (because it was) uneventful and we landed in Delhi without any delays.

We were to be picked up from the airport by our hotel, after many an email between me and “Ravi”, and thankfully our man was still there holding the piece of paper with my name on it when we arrived. After apologising for being later than expected we jumped in his car and careered through the darkened streets of Delhi towards the hotel.

It looked pretty swanky and our room, although it was a double and not a twin as requested, was great. We made ourselves at home before heading onto the roof to order a late-night meal. They only had Indian food on so no snacks or sandwiches which was just what we needed – I didn’t want to eat a full meal at gone 10:00pm. And James certainly wasn’t wanting any spicy food, so we just ordered two big Kingfishers and supped them on the roof on our first night in India.

World Peace

James was nearly back to normal (whether that was good or bad is a matter of opinion) so we looked into doing what we were going to do from the off – boating on the lake. It is probably the one thing that everyone does, apart from the trekking, and there were plenty of places to get a boat from. It was only going to cost 700 Rupees, so only about a fiver or so, for the whole day.

Boats...

We paid the boat man his fee and he led us to our boat. It was nothing special, but looked pretty sea-worthy so we were happy enough. He then handed us two differently-sized oars which would probably make us go round in circles but we took them nonetheless. After a less-than-steady start we rowed away from the shore and into the lake. There were no life-jackets on offer, but I think we would have refused them anyway, the water didn’t look that deep. It was pretty hard going as there were no stirrups (or whatever) to act as a pivot, so we had an oar each and zig-zagged our way out into the middle of the lake.

James, who should be rowing!

There is a small temple out in the middle of the lake which we rowed past but couldn’t get onto as it was busy with locals ringing bells and suchlike, and also because we didn’t want to crash into any other boats, fall into the lake or lose our boat form not tying it up properly. There were lots of people rowing to and from the temple and most of them were locals who were happy to yell “Namaste” over to us, although there were also a number of Chinese tourists who would holler “Ni hao” to us to which we responded in our broken Chinese.

The temple in the lake

It was a glorious day for it too, which was great as the day had started with the usual hazy fog that seemed to linger over the lake as it did at the end of the day too. The haze had cleared and we were being baked in the hot sun, with one last attempt to get a bit of tan before returning to cloudy England. We made our way over to the docking area on the other side of the lake and tied up. Leaving our oars in the restaurant nearby we began our trek up the hills to the World Peace Pagoda that sits on top of one of the highest hills on that side of the lake.

Other boats following us to the shore!

Having heard that there had been some robberies along the way we took out multi-tools and made sure they were to hand, just in case anyone tried to jump us. But we never really thought that we would need them, just a bit of exaggeration on the Wikitravel page we assumed. It was a nice trek up too, although we had to rest a few times due to James’s lack of strength through lack of food intake.

But James, we've only been gong for 4 minutes...

We made it to the top and were pleasantly surprised by the pagoda. It had only been built in 1996 but it was a special place with fantastic views all round. The whole of Pokhara was visible to us and we tried to find our little hotel but couldn’t pick it out of the throng laid out before us. We were up there for a while, taking in the sights and trying not to spoil other peoples photos of the huge buddhas that surround the pagoda.

The World Peace Pagoda

The trek down was much better and thankfully there were no bandits that came charging out of the bushes. We grabbed our oars and rowed back out into the lake, and soon enough we were back on dry land with aching arms and slightly damp backsides. For the rest of the afternoon we made use of the market streets to do some more Christmas shopping and to barter hard, where appropriate. Back at the hotel we had another power cut, which was really unhelpful as we needed to charge laptops, cameras and phones. It wasn’t until we cam eback after dinner that we realised that there hadn’t been a power cut, simply that we had forgotten to put the key in the wall slot to activate the electrics. Whoops. But it meant that we managed to tie up a few loose ends and get ready for the last big push into India. We would be flying into Delhi, but we would have to brave the 5/6 hour micro-bus journey back to Kathmandu first.