Udaipur

Bond, James Bond!

Remember good ol Roger Moore? Well, in Udaipur you cant get enough of him!
A major part of the old bond film Octopussy was filmed in Udaipur. From our hotel we had a brilliant view of the famous Floating Palace/Lake Palace.
Although didn't fancy going over for some munch....the 50 pounds per head price for a buffet dinner had something to do with it!
A view of the lake palace from the boat
Most of the hotels play re-runs of the film everyday. Of course we went to watch it! It was good to see ol Roger after such a long time! It was quite surreal to watch the film and think 'Didn't I just visit that place this morning?!'
Up close - this is one of the hotels on the lake

The City Palace in Udaipur is one of my fav so far. While we were there, we managed to get a sneaky look at the set of a film thats shooting there at the moment. Its called 'Cheetah Girls'. Apparently, Udaipur is quite popular with the celebs. The bollywood actress Ravina Tendon hired out the palace when she got married. The city palace
There are some flashy hotels dotted about around the lake or even on the lake. The Maharaja of Udaipur owns a number of the snazy hotels and makes a good living out of it I can imagine!
One of the many ghats on the side of the lake
Here I managed to find another gooorgeous jharokha! This one has some wonderful carvings on it and an interesting 3D shape. Thank god for the car!

Pushkar

After 3 nights in Jaipur, it was time to move on to Pushkar.

This is a very small village, with a strong religious vibe.
Its quite strange, there is nothing to see here but lots of tourists! Its like being in hippy-ville! Most of the foreigners walk around with dread locks with big Om's printed on their baggy cotton tops and a colourful shoulder bag over their arm!

Pushkar is said and still considered to be holy ground, there is no meat or alcohol to be consumed in Pushkar at all, but it seems people supplement there driking with smoking, everybody seems to smoke like chimneys here! But it was nice to know that we could eat and drink everything in every place we went to, and try the food we did, dont expect 5 star type restaurants here, more like cool laid back eateries, or on roof tops in tucked away streets or by the road side. In the evening it was nice to sit by the lake and contemplate our travels, and how lucky we were in being fortunate enough to travel.

On our way to Puskar we were told that we would pass a beutiful Gurdwara on the way, we thought it would be nice to go and pay our respects, but after asking around (thats how people get about in India) we didn't find it. Arriving at Pushkar we were told that we should visit the local Gurdwara by locals, who were mainly hindu, They all called it the baby Taj and seemed proud of it, so we went in search for the Gurdwara, which was easy as everyone knew where it was, on arriving at the Gurdwara and speaking to the Gianis (priests)and Sewadars (volunteers) we were told the tenth Guru of the Sikhs Guru Gobind Singhji rested here on his way to Hazoor Sahib near Mumbai. This made Pushkar a whole lot more special to us, if its good enough for our Guru, then its more then good enough for us!

There is a huge lake where you can see gorgeous sunsets.
Also - lots of shopping! We managed to bag a beautiful jharokha made out of teak wood and a couple of very old looking frames. A jharokha is like a window frame with a shutter. These are found in the Rajathani palaces. You see, the maharanis were not allowed to be seen in public - so these shutters were placed so that they could look out of them without being seen from the outside.

It's lucky we have the car cos the one we bought is massive!

Tour of Rajatan - Jaipur

We planned to spend about 2 weeks in Rajastan, starting with Jaipur, the capital.
From Agra we hired a car and driver to make things more comfortable. We have been traveling for over 5 months now and have not had much trouble with getting from a to b. However, we realised that India is a whole new ball game!

On the way we stopped over at a place called Fatehpur Sikri, which has a fort with a mosque dedicated to the grandson of the well known Bhagat Kabir (I cant remember the full name, but it ends with Christi). Apparantely, the mughal emperor Akbar asked for a son, and this Muslim saint blessed him and he had a baby boy, named Shah Jahan.

We got to Jaipur quite late in the evening. Unfortunately, the car broke down just in the outskirts of the city. But we eventually found our 'palace' which turned out to be quite a gem with a very friendly manager.
Jaipur is like any other city in India. It has a palace which the public can view and a popular Hawa Mahal. Other than that, there's lots of shopping!

The Taj Mahal - the actual one!

After Khajurao we planned to head to Agra by train, to do this we arranged transport to Jhansi where we had pre booked a train to Agra, at Jhansi station i was joking to Preet how bad the service of the train used to be when I was last visited India. So what happened?? the train which every single official confirmed comes to platform 4, without fail, everyday on platform 4! This meant only one thing, that the day we were catching the train it would come on platform 5, ahead of schedule to no announcement!! And how did we find out, we looked at the train on platform 5 and said to each other how nice it would be if ours was like that, guess what it was ours!

If you can travel by the Stapdi train, do so, its great, comfortable and quick, you also get fed too, with regular and timely tea and complementry mineral water when you board.

Agra, lots to see here but a dirty, smelly city thats over run by package holiday makers and locals trying everything in the book to rip off the poor holiday maker.

With that a side, the best time to see the Taj is at sunrise or sunset, as our guest house was 5 miute walk away we decided to walk it for sunrise. As mentioned earlier we were in traveller mode and had decided to get in all places of interest at local prices, as a comparison it is about £10 per person to get in to the Taj for foreigners and about 50p for locals. So we went in our Indian best and managed without any issue to get in for the local price.

Once inside you are in awe of how breath takingly amazing the Taj Mahal is, even after seeing some inspiring architecture in South East Asia and other parts of the world we have been to, you have to agree with all the books, documenteries and travel programs that this place is to be seen to be believed. Thats not what the British thought, the Taj Mahal, once the Moghul empire had crumbled wanted to auction of the Taj for its weight in marble! Brits on holiday eh?

Even at 6 in the morning the place get quite busy, being a landmark tourist destination for India thats going to happen! but its still worth the early morning as the morning light changes with almost every picture taken. The colour of the marble goes from cool blues to oranges and pinks to bright white.

The complex is quite large with a still used Mosque flanking one side of the Taj and another near identical building on the other side.

The symmetry of the structure is striking and makes you wonder how they managed to get everything so perfect in the days before modern precision instruments, power tools and heavy machinery. But they did!

It must be remembered that the whole thing is a tomb for the wife of Shah Jahan, so that the king can look at it and remember his favorite wife. Its ironic that Shah Jahan commisioned the building to be semetrical and now the only thing breaking the semetry is his own coffin, placed alongside Mumtaz's afterwards.

Some advice, do a day trip to Agra, which can be arranged from Delhi to see all the sites but try to avoid staying in Agra itself as there is nothing to be inspired about in that place.

Our hotel was not very far from the Taj. So we managed to get there just before sunrise.

cup of chai?

Preet was going to photo every cup of Chai we had in India, but this failed after the first two pictures, we just drank way too much tea!two teas on the same day in the same place, note the variation in the cup, these are large tea cups as indian standards go.

Khajuraho

If you dont know the lure of this place do a quick google search to find out. to get here we decided to indulge and fly from Delhi, we booked the flight the night before and paid about £120 for both of us one way which wasn't too bad.

To get to the airport was straight forward but we got dropped off to the wrong terminal, nothing is ever simple in India, luckily we got a free shuttlebus to the correct terminal..

Once at the terminal we had to go through security to get into the terminal , after hunting down the correct desk we went to check in, once at the desk we were told that we have to go get our bags x-rayed and banded up, so we found the place and went through the process. We queued up again, only to be told that we went to the wrong banding machine as the plastic band said 'Kingfisher' not 'Indian Airways'! so at this point Preet lost her rag a little, but there was no convincing them that a band and security check is the same regardless of what machine you go to, Indians are so stuck in buerocracy they rarely understand why they are doing something! So we went back and got our bags x-rayed by the correct machine.

After our pleasent enough flight we arrived at the tiny but nice airport, and met with our tranfer chap to the guesthouse.

The temples around Khajurao are magnificently carved, some of the best we had seen on our travels, even compared to the Temples at Angkor, Cambodia. After all, this is the architecture which inspired the ancient Cambodians.

There is no explanation to why these temples have the imiagry that they do, but some explainations are they were instructions to the temple boys once they went back to their normal lives. Others say that it is a natural thing and one of the phases of the mind that one has to go through to reach enlightenment. Overall these famous images represent a tiny part of the temples.


Above is a very common image around the temples of Khajurao, dont know what it means though
Two figures being friendly, maybe sharing the latest gossip about Big Brother (please Boycott this program!!)
an example of the amazing carvings, its shocking to see how well the temples are preserved, even open to the elements the detail has survived, this is due to the dry climate and lack of rain, and dissolved pollutants when it does rain.
Some flowers growing in the main complex of temples, we got there as the sun was setting which made for great photography, or attempt at photography!

The above is the feet of a statue in one the temples. the temples were used and worshipped in and still contain imagry from the Hindu Religion. To preserve the temples, only one of the ancient temples in Khajarao is used to worship in.
Man made lake with the sun setting in the back. When we were there the locals were saying that there is a water shortage and because lack of rain crops were dying, it was indeed very dry around the town.

Me pretending to be one of the statues, not quite perfected the pose yet!

Delhi

We landed in India with an open mind, tired from the night flight all we wanted to do was rest. After resting we met up with family who were in india at the time and staying not to far from our hotel.

The next day we decided to do a tour of the major sites in Delhi, a good deal can be had from the India tourism Office in Connaught Place opposite Bangla Sahib Gurdwara.

After being in so many countries where we being the obvious foreigners and getting ripped off with entrance fees it was time for payback!



the above is the Lall Gilla or the Red Fort, where many Maharajas have ruled India, including our very own Maharaja Ranjit Singh. By the way those are not pegions flying around but Kites.

one of the interior buildings at the Red Fort

this is the Gandi memorial, thousands visit each day

Not part of the tour but an essential for anyone that visits Delhi, Bangla Sahib Gurdwara, where the 8th Guru Siri Har Krishan Sahib held his seat and cured many from Small Pox. The water here is said to have healing qualities.

one of my favorite pictures with the sun light beaming in and the detail in the ceiling

It was soo good to see family after such a long time and having a cup of tea with biscuits!

Me posing Bollywood style at Jantra Manter which is a rather large observatory from back in the day. there is another one in Jaipur, Rajestan
As you can see the weather was quite refreshingly cool, but nice and bright, perfect for exploring.
The Lotus temple, the place of worship for the Bian's, all are welcome, but must abide by the strict rules, kind of needed in india where people openly do there morning abulations and sacred cows roam.
the something Mineret, rather tall and tower like, like minerets should be, was built and added to by two generations of kings.

India, expect the unexpected!

Out of all the countries we have been, India for me has been the oddball, odd as in i dont know what to expect. Its been 10 years since i last visited, have things moved on? Should i expect the same thing? Coming from other third world countries which look after there tourists, has india come round to this or are we still going to have all the hassle from touts, rickshaw wallas, etc etc.

The answer is, India is uniquely India, it cant be compared to any of the countries that we have been ...

to be continued..

This is the end...

...my friend!

Oh its a sad sad moment. :o(
Time has just flown past! It feels like only yesterday we were wondering what to pack for 6 months of travelling!
It's been a wonderful 5 months - absolutely wonderful!

Back to Bangkok with a bang!

We started in Bangkok - now we're ending in Bangkok!

SO much has happened in between!

We arrived a couple of days before our flight - just so we could sort out our shipping and do some last minute shopping.

On one such shopping trip, we noticed a Mr Singh and his wife - so naturally we rushed over to say hello. Turns out he lives 5 minutes away from us in London and moreover, his daughter was in the same class as Gurcharan! Another example of how small the world really is. You may never meet people that live 5 minutes from your home and you will end up meeting them miles away from home. It was wonderful to meet them and we ended up spending a whole day with them. They we're great company!

Manav, Bobby, Raj Uncle, Aunty, and the 'UK Couple'

Later that evening we were fortunate to dine with another very good mate of ours - Bobby. That's not all, the great Manav SIngh also gave us the pleasure of his company. Manav has his own blog where he posts dilruba lessons! He is a very good dilruba player himself. We only know him through his blog - it was good to meet him in person! (infact, he is single and very good looking hint hint!!!hehe!) ;o) It was quite the party - Manav took us out for some midnight ice cream treat at a 'cool' funky ice cream parlour. I had a ferrero rocher and nutella ice cream! mmmm! they even had...DURIAN ICE CREAM!!!! can you believe that! yuck!

Ban's resort - Ko Tao, Thailand

This cost us 15 pounds a night.
Can you believe it - this luxurious resort for 15 pounds a night?! The views were breath taking. Sitting on the balcony watching the sunset after a hard day's work of diving, sun bathing on the beach or swimming in one of the two pools was divine!

Moreover - this place had a whole other room! Yes, we could actually walk out of our bedroom into a whole different lounge room! We found that very strange as for the last few months we only have one room and a bathroom to ourselves!

The beaches in Ko Tao are some of the best we have come across. The vibe and atmosphere here is great. The water is crystal clear and you can even spot a few fishes near the beacht. The sand is soft white and powdery. It's small enough not to be too commercial - but big enough to have some swanky restaurants.

KO Tao is one of three islands in the south of Thailand. Ko Samui is for the package tourist and too commercial - so we didn't bother going there. Ko Phan ngan is where the infamous Full Moon Parties are held. We gave it a miss as it has more of the party all night vibe, which we're not into.
We ended up spending a whole 13 nights here - the longest amount of time we have spent in any one place.

It was our last destination in the whole South East Asia backpacking trip. It was a great way to say goodbye - it couldn't have been better!

Swimming with sharks!!!

yes...SHARKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

SO, Gurcharan and I are fully certified Open Water PADI Divers!

It was the most fun I've ever had. In fact, I had so much fun that we decided to do the Advance PADI! Unfortunately, Gurcharan had a massive migrane and could not complete his course - the crazy boy still went out to do 2 deep water dives though! NUTTER! Despite his migrane and throwing up he still managed to get his core dives done, so atleast he can do the deep dives. I on the other hand am a certified Advanced PADI diver. I got to do the night dive - which was a spooky but exciting experience for me. The last two dives require navigation without the instructor! He just throws you over board and wishes you good luck! This was kinda daunting at first - but the training and instruments really prove useful here!

Diving is one of the most amazing experiences of my life. Its a whole new universe down there. The live coral was teaming with all kinds of aquatic life. Its unbelievable how many different shapes, colours, sizes God has created on this earth - diving with these animals just puts a whole new dimention to the diversity of life on this panet.

Gurcharan all kitted up. Hmmmnnn...Crissy and Camile look perplexed - are they checking out his butt?!
Preet all kitted up! The scuba gear was heavyy - not the best thing on a rocking boat!

My buddy Daphna and me. She's a cool fun loving chick! :o)
Daphna and I again - this is what we look like in the water!

The team. From the front L to R: Kate from London, PReet from the jungle, Amilie from France (works in CHina), Daphna from Israel. In the back L to R: Gurcharan from Ludhiana village, Quintin from France (in China now), Marcel from Holland (one of our instructors - lives in Ko Tao now the lucky bugger!), Camile from US, Flavius Marcus Alexander III from Holland (Flav for short - he is one of the main instructors in the diving school) and Crissy from US.

Small World

Meet Harnek and his lovely wife Sabrina

Harnek Singh and Sabrina are travelling the world - in 9 months! They're from West London and are not planning on getting back for a long time!
We met them purely by chance in Ko Tao. Hmmmnnn...small world!
Basically, before we started travelling one of our mates, Diwan, mentioned that a couple of his friends were travelling the world - and that was that...until...we spotted a Singh randomly in Ko Tao, Thailand and went over to say hello. You see, its so exciting to meet another Singh where most Singhs dont dare to venture and also when you haven't seen one in months! It turns out this couple was the same couple that Diwan mentioned all those months ago! We're so stunned that we should meet them, especially as the chances of being at the same place at the same time are so slim!
Just goes to show that some meetings are destined to happen - no matter how far away from home.
That's Sophie- she's travelling with Harnek and Sabrina for a little while.

Chinese New Year

Gurcharan looking uber cool at the uber cool Siam Emporium. This is where all the hip and trendy hang out.

7th Feb was Chinese New Year - it is now the year of the Rat. From what I hear, its a good year for romance and for the economy! So either start looking for that special someone or invest in the stock exchange!!!

Me trying to look uber cool!

The decorations for the Chinese New Year were so funky!

The camera man asked for my cheesiest grin! :o)

Khao San Road

Any

Anyone who's been to Bangkok has heard of Khao San Road.
This is where all the backpackers hang out. Its a crazy street with equally crazy set of shops/stalls - anything from bead shops to stalls selling fried crickets, scorpion and worms!

This is where I had my hair braided.

It goes wild here at night when all the tourists hit the restaurants and pubs causing the usual chaos associated with holidaying in Bangkok! A bit too wild for us two oldies, im afraid!
Khao San Road by day