Nepal into India
From
Pokhara we embarked on the long journey to India, aiming to get to the north of
India where the heat is less intense. We took an 8 hour bus journey heading south
out of Nepal to a border point called Sunauli and walked across the border into
India before getting another bus down to Gorakhpur another couple of hours
south. As soon as we walked across the border into India, culture shock hit
again... it was manic and the crowdedness and filth was overwhelming.
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| Nepal-India border crossing |
Gorakhpur
was similar with so many people hanging around and the streets filled with
rubbish, sewerage and animals. There were so many people trying to get trains
towards Delhi that we soon realised we didn’t have a hope of getting out of there
by train within the next few days. It was very difficult to make any
arrangements for ourselves as not so many people spoke English and were
noticeably not as friendly as we’d seen in Nepal. With all the trains booked
up, it seemed bribery was the only way people were actually getting onto trains
without long waits.
After
trying and failing to do this ourselves through a travel agency, with the help
of a crazy old Indian guy with no teeth, we decided to take the plunge with a traumatic
21 hour overnight bus journey on a government bus. The bus was rammed full of
people who had chosen the cheapest way to get to Delhi. During one of the road-side
pee stops in the middle of the night, Caroline managed to slip knee deep into a
hole full of mud/poo.... but we don’t talk about it! Despite the trauma, the
bus got us out of Gorakhpur and it was a relief to eventually arrive in Delhi
the next day.
Delhi
We spent a
couple of days in Delhi mostly arranging our onward travel. We had been told
the easiest way to book our journey up to our next destination, Manali, would
be to drop into a local travel agent in Delhi and do it via them. Our hotel
owner took us to one he knew who then tried to tell us that there were no bus
tickets available for 5 days so that he could sell us a tour to the Taj Mahal
and make himself more money. We rumbled him though and found a way to book our
own bus tickets online that we originally wanted. Everyone who stopped us in
the street in Delhi was very forceful to try and get us back to their travel
agency so that they could make some money out of us. They all said that other
agencies were all cheaters but their agency was government approved but it was
fairly obvious they were all out to cheat us of our money!
Manali
The trip up
to Manali was another overnight bus journey but this time on an ultimate luxury
Volvo sleeper bus. We met a lad from Kashmir on this journey who organised us a
place to stay in Manali and introduced us to his family who owned a couple of
pashmina shops in the town. In true Indian style, we spent a fair bit of time
hanging around their shops with his hospitable family for our few days in
Manali drinking chai (sweet Indian tea) and eating biscuits.
Although we had originally planned to head from Manali up to Leh in Ladakh, the family convinced us to go there via Srinagar in Kashmir, their home town. We were unsure whether to go since the foreign office website warned against travel there because of ongoing conflict. This would void our insurance and due to very recent disturbances it didn’t sound that safe. However, we understood we would meet more of the family which had been so accommodating in Manali and that Kashmir was ‘heaven on earth’ and unmissable especially since we were so near to it.
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| Amazing views during the journey from Delhi to Manali |
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| Dinner Indian style! On the floor eating sloppy curry with our hands at a home restaurant |
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| With the family who run the home restaurant |
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| Being measured up for the tailored outfit... |
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| ...et voila...looking like a local! |
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| With our welcoming friends - drinking chai and eating biscuits in one of their pashmina shops |
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| Playing Caram |
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| Breezers at ours! |
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| Central Manali |
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| A local wedding party celebrating in the streets of Old Manali |
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| Local women watching the wedding celebrations |
Srinagar, Kashmir
After our 24 hour journey up to Srinagar via Jammu with the lad we had met on the bus to Manali, it turned out to be a mixed experience. We soon found ourselves tied to him as we discovered that what had originally started out as a kind offer to meet his family and show us his home town had turned into a very restricted few days.
Unfortunately his general behaviour and our disagreement with his expectation for us to pay for all food, transport and activities for us, him and a driver each day made the vibe more and more sour. In the end, we cut our stay short and arranged our escape to Leh a bit earlier than planned. We never actually met his family and friends or saw his home so we didn't quite get the 'local' experience we were hoping for based on our time with the rest of his family in Manali.
Unfortunately his general behaviour and our disagreement with his expectation for us to pay for all food, transport and activities for us, him and a driver each day made the vibe more and more sour. In the end, we cut our stay short and arranged our escape to Leh a bit earlier than planned. We never actually met his family and friends or saw his home so we didn't quite get the 'local' experience we were hoping for based on our time with the rest of his family in Manali.
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| Sleeping was hard but staying awake was harder after 24 hours on the road |
From the limited amount of Srinagar we saw, there was an overwhelming police and military presence with heavily armed vehicles and riot police waving AK47s throughout the region (not many photos of this!). However, we did a couple of cool day trips to some beautiful places outside of the city including the National Park at Doodhpather, a ski resort at Gulmarg near the Pakistan border and Dal Lake and Kashmir University on the outskirts of Srinagar. Here's some of the highlights:
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| Horse riding at Doodhpather |
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| Caroline with her crazy horse man! |
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| Steve going solo! |
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| Nice robes Caroline! |
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| With some inquisitive kids who let us into their family home at Doodhpather |
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| Is that a cow on the roof?! |
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| Local style of simple home - made from wood and buried into the hillside |
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| Cramped local transport |
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| ...another example ... FIVE on a motorbike! |
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| A taste of the local delicacies - barbecued corn |
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| Proramic half way up one of the world's highest ski lifts at Gulmarg near the India/Pakistan border |
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| With some friendly Sikhs on a glacier at Gulmarg |
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| Hot but icy! |
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| Spot of sledging in the sunshine! |
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| Cow ... not much you can say about this one! |
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| Dal Lake in Srinagar |
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| A the animal sanctuary in Srinagar |
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| Headscarf needed for some parts of Srinagar! |
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| Some Indian fancy dress in the park ... |
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| ...the paparazzi go crazy for the white girl dressed as an indian! |
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| The official snap |
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| Didn't feel stupid one bit! |
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| Smiles all round after some heated negotiating for the photos ! (we were still ripped off!) |
Leh, Ladakh
We were
relieved to leave Srinagar and got on a fantastic 2 day bus trip east over to
Leh in the Ladakh region. The road there was one of two famous mountain highways
to Leh, the other being the direct road from Manali. The landscapes and scenery
were incredible and we took a crazy number of photos & videos! The road
snaked up and down through the mountain terrain, crossed glaciers and scree
slopes and super narrow parts where it felt like one bounce off a pothole could
send us tumbling down the precipices below. At one point, we got stuck for
three hours while the army cleared a landslide on a particularly dodgy stretch
of road. Rocks were still falling as we crossed this pass but the driver just
seemed to put his foot down and hope for the best! Everyone on the bus shit
themselves but we survived!
Our pictures don't do it any justice:
Our pictures don't do it any justice:
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| Steep winding road up the mountain side |
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| Many people were stuck on the mountain road for a few hours while the army cleared the landslides |
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| Two-headed sheep? I think we were going mad up there! |
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| Accidents are all too common, this driver was lucky he drove into a ditch and not off the mountain side. |
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| Welcome to 'moonland' |
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| The winding road through 'moonland' |
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| The road was literally sliding away in many places! |
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| Cracking views as the sun set |
Leh was one
of the coolest places we’d been so far, especially in contrast to Srinagar.
There was a relaxed atmosphere and the surrounding scenery is indescribably
beautiful. We spent
quite a lot of time strolling around Leh town through the markets and hippy
shops and the old towns’ back streets where the houses are built into the
hill-side. Leh palace is situated on a hill just above Leh and gave us 360
views across Leh and the valley.
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| Main Bazar, Leh |
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| Mmmm street food |
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| Entrance gate to Leh |
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| Caroline and her necklace maker in the Tibetan refugee market in Leh |
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| Leh Palace built into the side of the hill |
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| Poser! |
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| Leh palace from the other side |
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| Mountains, sunshine...what more could you want? |
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| Exploring the town by scooter! |
Since our
time was limited, we chose to do the best looking trip out of Leh to Nubra Valley.
To get there we crossed what is claimed to be the highest motorable pass in the
world, needless to say, this 6 hour trip was spectacular. We stopped in three
villages; Sumoor, Hundar (where we stayed) and Diskit. Apart from the highest
motorable pass, the main selling point for this trip for us was the opportunity
to ride camels in the sands dunes surrounding Hundar. The other two villages
had attractions of Buddhist monasteries and an impressive giant Buddha statue
in Diskit. We shared our trip with two cool Japanese guys Banno and Yoshi.
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| Awesome views across the landscape towards the top of the 6,000m of the pass. This photo does not do it justice! |
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| One of the numerous warning signs on the way up |
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| Crazy winding & steep road |
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| At the top of the 'World's Highest Motorable Road' |
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| Check out the views! |
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| Despite the sunshine it was still snowy at the top! |
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| Across the valley leading to the top |
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| With Yoshi and Banno at the temple in Summor |
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| Doooonng! |
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| Flat planes in the Nubra Valley |
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| Steve on his fat camel |
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| We survived our first ever camel ride! |
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| Yoshi and Banno |
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| Riding through Nubra Valley sand dunes |
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| Ride like an Egyptian! |
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| Caroline with her new friend! |
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| At the giant Budda statue in Diskit |
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| Scary statue in the temple |
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| View across Nubra Valley and the Budda in Diskit |
After we
got back to Leh, Caroline was ill again for a couple of days. Steve made the
most of some alone-time and hired a bike and pedalled out into the hills. In
order to see the area in true local style we decided to hire a scooter the next
day which we took out to explore the wider area and some other monasteries and
stupas. It was the first time either of us had driven a scooter and Caroline’s
first time on a scooter so it was quite an adventure for the views and the bike
experience!
Delhi and
Agra
We’d had
enough of long bus journeys by this point after racking up over 150 hours on
various standards of bus, so we jumped on a plane from Leh back to Delhi and a local
tuktuk took us from Delhi airport to our hostel on the Main Bazar. We tucked
into a late breakfast with a few other English and Dutch on the terrace and arranged
to go to Agra and the Taj Mahal with a new friend from England, Anna.
We took our
first Indian train journey together to Agra and arrived in time to go and check
out the Taj from the gardens across the river at the back. As the Taj was
glowing in the sunset a huge storm was brewing behind it which created a
fierce backdrop for our numerous photos. We then took a whistle stop tour
around Agra in the evening with our original friendly tuktuk driver, seeing the
Baby Taj, the main markets streets and a marble crafts shop which practices the
same engraving techniques as used on the Taj Mahal itself.
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| A typical view from the street in Agra |
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| Gridlock in the constant rush hour traffic! |
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| Caroline and Anna at the Baby Taj - the warm up event before the Taj Mahal |
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| Picturesque views from the back of the Taj Mahal as the sun went down |
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| The view from across the Yamuna river towards the back of the Taj Mahal |
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| Locals hang out at this spot |
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| A family ask us to take their photo taken for money, a common request for tourists |
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| The epic view of a storm brewing behind the Taj Mahal at sunset |
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| The storm clouds getting more dramatic! |
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| The three of us soon after sunrise at the Taj |
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| Rainy weather at the Taj |
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| The entrance to the massive Agra Fort |
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| One of many carrot topped Indians! |
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| Some local kids mess around after some heavy rain in Agra
When we arrived back in Delhi, we got a death ride across the city with the craziest tuktuk driver we’ve encountered so far! We stayed another couple of days in Delhi, did some shopping down the Main Bazar, Janpath Market and Connaught Place. Caroline and Anna both got henna tattoos done on the streets.
Anna left a day before we did while we spent our last day trying to sort out our flight to Hong Kong which had been cancelled without warning! After getting nowhere on the phone trying to find out what the hell we should do, we went to the airport and our original airline, Air India, seamlessly arranged us another flight with a different company for later that night.
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| Shoe shopping in Delhi! |
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| Caroline and Anna get some Indian henna tattoos done on the street on the Main Bazar in Delhi! |
