30 January

We rode the Parasuram Express train south to Varkala for the start of our beach holiday.  This, a four hour journey covering 182km, was a new and enjoyable experience travelling chair class, an A/C aircraft style seating with continuous food, coffee and chai on tap from the the foodie wallah’s touting their wares throughout the trip.
The train snaked it’s way through a continuous landscape of palm trees and rice paddies then finally across the Kerala backwaters. We arrived at our destination for a cliff top view of the surf beach sunset overlooking the Arabian Sea.

Varkala Beach

Sunset at the Blue Moon Cafe

We have landed in a place far removed from Indian culture, although noted for being a religious place where Indians come to scatter the ashes of their loved ones in the sea. What we found instead was an ethnic mix of mainly European new age and old age travellers, so baggy trousers, flip-flops, reggae music and dreadlocks appear to be de rigueur.

Our accommodation at Kerala Bamboo House Resort is a bamboo hut with a tin roof and open air shower, but here’s the nice touch, it is wi-fi enabled.

28 January
One thing that sets Kerala apart from the rest of India is that this state democratically elected a communist government in 1957 and they have been returned at each subsequent election to date, it is the first place in the world to do this. This mix of democratic socialist principles has achieved some very impressive statistics and has been described as the most socially advanced state in India.

Che Guevara  watches over

Keep the red flags flying high

Apart from a fairer system of wealth distribution it has achieved a 91% literacy rate, a life expectancy that is 10 years longer than anywhere else in India and an infant mortality rate that is one fifth of the national average, the dark side is they have the highest suicide and alcohol consumption rates, and their economy has become increasingly dependent on the tourism boom, so it feels good to be part of the solution for a change.

Local fishermen still using traditional canoes

Make-up and performance of the Kathakali dance

26 January
Sunrise on the Ganges was a pleasant change from the fog of the last few days. Today we are flying south to Kerala via Mumbai. First we have the return 15 minute trek through the back streets to the closest point a taxi can come but this time we have porters to carry our luggage.

Back streets trek towards the taxi waiting for us on the main road

It was midnight by the time we stepped onto the tarmac at Cochin Airport and wow, this place injected an immediate uplift into our spirits after an eight hour delay in Mumbai.

27 January
We are staying for a few days in the harbour town of Fort Cochin which is a fusion of Portuguese and Dutch colonial architecture set in a palm fringed tropical landscape, our accommodation is a Heritage Homestay and it is incredibly beautiful. We were woken this morning to a cacophony of tropical sounds, a world apart from the dust, grime and noise of our journey to date.

Breakfast on the verandah, coffee approaching

Stepping out for the day we came across a game of Sunday cricket in full swing, the interesting twist to this game was instead of tea and cakes in the pavilion, these young gentlemen prefer something a little stronger from the tricycle rickshaw man. Look closely at the refreshments picture and you will see a bottle of bacardi and the cocktail shaker in action.

Sunday cricket

Refreshments

One of the star attractions of Fort Cochin are the Chinese Fishing nets, outside of the monsoon season the only thing they seem to catch are tourists taking photo’s.

Hauling up the Chinese fishing nets is a five man operation, it looks like another poor catch.  

Sunset and hundreds of crows have come home to roost in a tree outside our window kicking up quite a racket, the mozzies are also out to dinner, there’s always a dark side to tropical paradise.

25 January

Varanasi is not for the squeamish. Life is very hard here where 41% of the population have a monthly income of around £30.
We started the day with a wander along some of the Ghats, these are series of steps leading down to the river Ganges, there about 80 sets of them spread over 4km. We’ve changed the name of some of them to describe the different activities peculiar to each Ghat.

Bathing Ghat

Laundry Ghat

The 2 bathers Mr Hep A and Mr Hep B might just get to heaven quicker than they expect.
The river being an excellent way to transfer blood born viruses.

Wedding Ghat

Exploding Buffalo Ghat

Sadhu Holyman

Wood weighing scales at the Burning Ghat

It takes 200kg of wood to cremate a body, the poor people who are unable to bear the cost of the timber are allowed to use the remnants of the last rich person’s fire.

Late afternoon boat trip on the Ganges :

Boat Builders

Kite Flyers

Peanuts and crisps boat

Our boatman

24 January

Although the train was only an hour late leaving Agra last night, by morning we were running 6hrs behind schedule, however the midday sun is slowly trying to burn through the fog and with luck there will be fewer delays.
While travelling across this seemingly endless fertile plain known as  the heartland of India, The  scenery rolls by like an endless green conveyor belt cultivated with mustard seed and what appears to be rice and other crops we do not recognise, interspersed with stands of trees, bamboo and rubbish strewn rural communities with their dusty cricket pitches where the game is played in earnest by the local children.

We have also noticed large colourful stork like birds along the way, but are not sure what species they are as it is impossible to take photographs through the grime of the train windows.

Varanasi, aka the ‘heartbeat of India’ is one of the three great religious cities of the world alongside Jerusalem and Mecca, This year and every 12 years the Kumbh Mela festival is taking place just a 3hr bus ride from Varanasi in Allahabad, where it is said that the Hindu God of creation landed on Earth at the confluence of the holy rivers Ganges and Yamuna, this auspicious place is where you can wash away your sins along with an estimated 30-40 million festival visitors and pilgrims, making it the largest gathering of people on the planet.

Stepping off the train at Varanasi is one of those life experiences that cannot be compared or forgotten, a maelstrom of people swirling in all directions, and a noise level that is off the scale.
Comparative tranquilitiy was finally achieved after a trek with our luggage through the narrow lanes of the old city to our hotel on the banks of the Ganges.

Sunset brings on the Ganges showtime, it’s been a long day.

Sunset on the Ganges

Multiple cremations at Manikarnika Ghat

To many, this is a holy river and bathing in it will wash away your sins, we are destined to remain sinners as there is no chance of us plunging into this bio-hazard.

22 January

Plans for today have been curtailed as Linda has been put out of action by a dodgy dinner at the hotel. We’ve been playing russian roulette with food safety since arriving in India, but this was a squew ball that came from the kitchen of our hotel, this event makes street food, bus station pit stop food and mud hut family lunch a safer option than this hotel. There is an alleged scam by city hotels in this area which involves a cosy relationship with local doctors. “Would you like us to call a doctor”? Hmmm no thanks.

Agra Sunset from hotel room window

23 January

Linda has self healed during the night and sunrise brought us a foggy day and by lunchtime visibility has improved enough to step out of the hotel.

Agra street with Camel passing Costa and cycle rickshaw

              
We visited Agra Fort which is perhaps the most important fortress/palace in India, prior to Delhi this place was the seat of government.

Agra Fort

View of the Taj through the fog from Agra Fort

Tonight we board the overnight Marudhar Express to Varanasi, it has been an anxious day with the fog that has been causing widespread delays on train timetables, plus this is the dreaded Marudhar Express that didn’t show last time, but with just a couple of hours to go it’s looking promising that it’s on schedule, however, fog has been forecast for much of the journey so it looks like a long night ahead.

       

       

20 January
The overnight express did what it said on the can and arrived on time around 6.30 in the morning after a 10 hour trip.  Things went pretty well considering the time of day, the hotel arranged a car pick up and by 7.00am we were checked in and having breakfast.

The rest of the day was spent wandering around the old part of town called Taj Ganj combined with a visit to one of the seven wonders of the world, the Taj Mahal, enough words have already been written about this building so there is little point in adding further comment apart from this little factiod: It receives 3 million visitors a year, that’s three times the population of Agra.
The attendance figures were pretty high during our visit.

Linda in Wonderland

21 Jan
We headed 40km west of Agra to Fatehpur Sikri, is it a fortress city, a palace, a tomb or a mosque? Well this place has all of the above, and for us it was an even more enjoyable outing than yesterday’s.  
Herein lies the tale of Akbar a 16th century Mogul Emperor who allegedly had 3 wives, one was Hindu, another was Christian and the third, you guessed it a Muslim, to add to this list of bedfellows he also had enough concubines to keep most men in a state of exhaustion.

No matter how hard he tried Akbar could not produce an heir to the thrown, then after a blessing/prophecy by a Sufi saint, well what d'ya know, a boy child is born by the Hindu wife and she gets the big palace while the other two don’t do so well.

17 January:
A planned Safari to the Bishnoi village had to be abandoned today as rain stopped play, this unexpected change in the weather has given us a breather to catch up on the blog.  We hope to resume play tomorrow.

18 January
Blue skies resumed after an unusual 24 hrs of heavy rain.  We headed off on our Bishnoi village Safari run by two enterprising brothers Shambhu and his brother Chhotu, they live in the village of Salawas where their family also run a homestay and a traditional weaving business. www.bishnoivillagesafari.org and www.salawashomestay.com . They are hoping to get some press coverage in the Lonely Planet guide to kick start their business, Trip Advisor has given them top reviews.

Shambhu and Linda

Chhotu weaving

The Bishnoi are a Hindu sect that broke away from the main stream religion some 500 years ago. Bish means 20 in their language while noi is 9.  These numbers are significant in that they constitute the rules they live by, they are strict vegetarians and live by a moral code that all life is sacred, the upshot being that sightings of timid wild animals that enjoy protection here can be more readily seen.

Antelope and gazelle

These peace loving people were dealt a cruel blow in 1730 when the Maharajah decided to chop down the trees on their rented land with the aim of building a new palace.  A mass tree hugging  protest took place followed by the slaughter of 363 Bishnoi protesters by the employees of the Maharajah. On hearing of this atrocity the Maharajah stopped work on the palace and donated the surrounding lands to the Bishnoi.

Camel 

Blue Bull

The Bishnoi  live in thatched adobe walled compounds, this is where we met with a village elder who was in the process of filtering opium tea, it involves crushing a compound of sugar and opium mixing it with water then filtering it about six times to produce the tea.

Linda enjoying a morning cuppa while breakfast is being prepared.

Traditionally the married women in the village wear red with a noticeable ring through the end of their noses, the married men wear white.

Chhotu’s house at Salawas where we had lunch together with his mum, wife and baby in the kitchen.

A thoroughly enjoyable day was rounded off with a visit to a local potter and then on to a factory that recycles old hand made garments converting them into shi-shi designer items.

19 Jan
A lazy day as we prepare to leave Rajasthan on the overnight Supa fast express to Agra.