Home again

Well, that was the quickest three weeks I can recall, but alas all good things must end, and we need to return to reality and start paying of the bar tabs from all the hotels we have stayed at (which are lengthy!!). India was amazing, and I have learnt many things which I will try and summarise now.

 

General 

1. The only rule to driving in India is to beep your horn frequently to let lorries, pedestrians and cows know you are there.

2. Indian people like having family photos taken with Westerners - it is not as creepy as it sounds!

3. Indian people are possibly the friendliest people I have ever met! 

4. Cows do not hurry when crossing a *major* roads, they know their sacredness!

5. A dosa is the perfect way to start the day, they are a lovely breakfast pancake!

Delhi

1. Delhi mosquitoes are dirty and love biting Sarah!

2. You can get on a train to Agra without your passport (although probably best not to risk it!)
3. The Spice Route's wine list prices are enough to scare the bejesus out of most folk!

Entrance to the restaurant with most expensive Thai meal I will ever have!

Agra

1. The Taj Mahal is as impressive as people say!

2. It closes on a Friday though, and so the whole area goes into shut down with very little open!
3. Avil is great at taking down the swelling of infected mosquito bites!

I like this - Happy hour is 1 for 1!! :D

Jaipur

1. Elephant skin is not as rough as you would imagine!
2. The Palace of the Winds is not some famous Jaipur Curry House

Winner of the smallest toilet flush handle 2015

Jodhpur
1. When it is hot in Jodhpur it is HOT! bring trousers and shirts made of ice!!
2. If you are going to stay in Jodhpur, then you can't go far wrong with the Raas, a wonderful boutique hotel, with very impressive Fort views.

I love the way Indians name their shops - zero ambiguity!

Udaipur
1. Octopussy is always on TV at some point during the day when you are staying at the Lake Palace.

2. Don't wake Sarah up early in the morning to go on a cycle ride of the old city.

Lady delivering us our curry at the Lake Palace ;)

Goa

1. Egrets are fun, and will eat a surprising amount of different nibbles!

2. A meal at Vernon's bar on the beach is about a tenth of the price of that at Leela.

3. There are an insane amount of Dentists in Goa.

Our Egret stalker.....he was never far away from us

That is about all there is to say for this tour. Sarah and I have had a lovely time, seen seven world heritage sites, stayed at some amazing hotels, and basked in the Indian weather (for the most part!). I hope you have enjoyed following along! Take care until next time.

Sunsets and Kingfishers = Heaven

Our last day in India

Ok, the title is a bit misleading, as we will be in India tomorrow too, as we board the plane in the early afternoon for our long journey home. This statement is also a bit misleading, as I am currently writing about yesterday's events today, while on that very plane, which is heading home! Hope you are all keeping up? (If you are interested, we are currently over Afghanistan - it looks so peaceful down there).

The Afghan-Pakistan border (trust me!)

It is one of the luxuries of Virgin, that I can actually surf the web and keep my finger in the pulse of the international money markets (aka the football scores!) as I cruise home.

Last year it was the world's smallest sandwich, now meet the worlds smallest poppadom

Anyway, we flew out of Goa early yesterday. As it is coming to the end of their holiday season, Goa airport shuts at 12pm for essential maintenance, meaning we were back to early starts again! The flight back to Delhi was fairly uneventful, although we had forgotten what dry heat was like after out time in Goa, and so arriving to 37 degrees that didn't make you drip after 5 minutes was relatively nice! It created a lot of haze though which in turn meant for a bumpy old landing (Sarah is not a big fan of turbulence).

Goodbye to Goa......

Sadly, we are staying in our final hotel, the appropriately named Lemon Tree hotel. It is a hotel near the airport meaning we don't have to face the Delhi traffic in the morning, which can be unpredictable at best, and I say it is appropriately named as all the halls smell of lemons. It has a sister hotel which is adjoined, and I wondered if they followed the same ethos by scenting the halls after the name of the hotel? If so, I am glad we are not staying at the Red Fox!!!

They sell themselves, don't they!? Who needs health warnings!

The room is very comfy and the bed is arguably the most comfortable we have slept on, but the facilities were more school canteen than restaurant, and the service is non-existent, although I wonder if that is partially down to my expectations being raised by the amazing service at the Lake Palace. Therefore, we decided to order room service and dine in, after a couple of failed attempts to eat downstairs. I have to say the food was surprisingly good quality, showing that you can't judge a book by its cover, so we were washed and fed and all that remains is to get a good nights sleep in and prepare for our journey tomorrow (or today).

Our last drink in India, appropriate that it was a Kingfisher!

So, here ends our honeymoon. It has been a lovely journey with my wife and we haven't throttled each other yet (although we came close earlier over the mini chocolate chip cookies!!) so I am taking that as a positive sign! Tomorrow I will summarise my experience of India, after a good nights sleep in me and that will formally end another adventure. I will add some pictures to this post in due course, As all my photos are on a memory card, and I am keeping Sarah (or trying to) entertained by letting her use the laptop to watch her favourite shows - that is true love, right there!!

Goa away!

Being our penultimate day in Goa, we decided to take a break from the serious business of drinking and sunning ourselves and go and partake in a little bit of shopping for trinkets and knick knacks (also known as fridge magnets!). The Leela being in such a secluded spot meant that we needed a taxi ride to get to the main shopping area about 4kms away. The nice thing is though that taxis are so ridiculously affordable, it is not a major issue (a driver hired to drive us there wait for two hours as we mooched around and drove us back cost about 600 rupees, which equates to about £7).

I like the name of this shop. I bet they're good at slashing prices!

So, we were dropped off in the middle of the shops. Obviously, seeing two slightly tanned tourists landing in their midst, the clamour to get us to visit each of their shops was strong!! When they do eventually tempt you in, you need to be mindful that the owners of the shops are eagle-eyed, so if you linger your gaze for one second too long on anything in their shop, suddenly you are being shown everything they have in stock for that particular item! You have been warned! We we are pretty good though at being polite but forceful in refusing to go into every shop along the strip. After all, there are only so many Pashmina scarves and linen shirts your eyes can take in before they all merge into one!! 

Our walk about the town made me realise something unusual about the area. There are dentists in Goa. A lot of dentists. Without too much exaggeration I would say about 1 in 10 shops in Goa that I have seen are dental surgeons. The people here must have the cleanest, healthiest teeth in the whole world!!

You might need to enlarge to see there's three different dentist signs here!

And a bit further up the road, more Dentists!

Anyway, I managed to find my fridge magnet (it cost me 50 rupees which is considerably cheaper than in Rajasthan), and Sarah bought a couple of bits and bobs too. She is good at haggling, almost to the point where you start feeling sorry for the shopkeepers - although a part of me realises that their whole "I am making a loss on this" patois is all part of the charade, as they are not silly enough to sell you anything without making money on it!

Another industry that is prevalent here: Chemists and Druggists

Owing to the humidity, even a couple of hours out shopping saps your energy, so as soon as we got back to the hotel we dipped straight into the pool and ordered a Kingfisher, which helped cool us off! This evening, being our last in Goa, we decided to push the boat out a bit and have a lovely Italian meal at the hotels signature restaurant. It was very nice way to end our Goan holiday, as sadly our time in this lovely part of India has come to an end. Tomorrow we fly back to Delhi for a final night before heading our way back home to England. It seems like only yesterday that we were arriving, and while I know that we have done a lot in three weeks, we have only scratched the surface of what India has to offer.

The sun is setting on our Indian honeymoon....

So, only one more post to go, and then I will try and summarise what I have learnt about our trip to India.