Some suggestions please

Hi All

I will be travelling to India early next year....about March 2005...for up to 6 months. I am really excited but there is so much I need to know.

Firstly with regard to weather what would be a good suggested itinerary? What are the ten things I just can't miss while in India and to travel for six months staying in better budget accomadation and travelling on perhaps second class trains, eating reasonably well adn paying into stuff like the Taj etc, how much (excluding flight) would I need to bring?

Should I bring credit cards, cash travellers cheques etc?

I know I am asking a lot for my first post but all suggestions will be gratefully recieved

Cheers from Dublin, Ireland

Stephen

Hi

A worm welcome to IM. Just follow the diffrent threads in IM you will get all your answers. If you want to know anything specific, then ask it & give your itinerary i.e which parts of India you want to cover or your interest (hills,beaches,holyplaces,temp les,desert, jungles, safaris,adventure sports etc).India is a vast country there is lot of things to see & since you will be 6 months here so better plan it now.

Hello and welcome to the forum

March 2005 - August 2005? Well I hope you like it hot and wet because that period encompasses the build up to the monsoon and the monsoon itself.

10 things not to miss? - I think we would all come up with a different 10 things - it depends what your interests are.

Budget? - going on what you've said, I would say you could get by on £10 per day average living costs, more than that if you're going to be doing a lot of travelling and not counting admission charges to national monuments like the Taj. It's also wise to have access to some reserve funds, just in case.

I usually carry a mix of credit/debit cards, cash and TC's but many people these days seem to only use bank cards.

As the previous poster has mentioned there's a lot of info on this site, so if you go to the relevant section of the forum you will find all these aspects of India discussed. Have a read through them and then come back with any other questions you might have.

Hi Guys


Would £10 a day really be enough?. Alan do you think it best to not go in March then? Should I wait until later in the year.....Does it get too hot? Is the monsoon to wet?

I have travelled quite a bit but do want to ge tthe best from my trip to India

Cheers

Stephen

stephen, here is one of the daily budget threads.

my humble advice, try not to focus too hard to get the best from your India trip, just relax and enjoy it. you can always go back to catch up on something you missed on your first time.

you'll see people on this forum keep going back for 30 years and more

Stephen

The majority of foreign travellers visit India between October and March but people visit at all times of the year. It all depends on how you cope with the heat. If you can handle 40-45C as you possibly have done in other countries then you should be OK. If you think you can't, you could always spend some time in the cooler Himalayan regions.

Here's a poll from a couple of years ago on what people spend per day - you'll see it covers a wide range of spending and from what you said about "better budget accomodation and travelling on perhaps second class trains" I think you could do it on that amount, but it's always better to over budget a bit rather than the opposite.

You've got loads of time to work all these things out.

I'm heading back to India in a few weeks time and I haven't even got my route worked out yet (people on here keep telling me about good places to visit) and I'll probably start packing about 2 days before I leave the UK.

Thanks guys for all your remarks.....I can'y get over how helpful people are on here. If anybody else has any pointers for me please jump in

40-45 sounds a little hot maybe I can go north for a few months. When should I come back down South?

Thanks again

Stephen

I would say it is about going UP and DOWN rather than North and South

the Northen plains have the most unbearable hot climate

The meanest heat is in April-June. The interior plains, esp. central and north, are the worst. The coast is also hot, plus humid, but with a sea breeze. Altitude is everything. The hills are liferafts of survivors from a planet that crashed into it's sun!

March - Mumbai, Goa and the Maharashtra coast

April 1st half - Udaipur, Jaipur, Delhi, Varanasi, Agra
April 2nd half to mid June - the hills: Kashmir, Himachal, Uttaranchal

Mid June to mid July - Madhya Pradesh, West Bengal, Orissa

Mid July to end August - Tamil Nadu, Karnataka

Fly in and out of Mumbai.

stongbonger,

Welcome to the trap!!

At least 2 days of 'home work' is required before you ask the 'tough question' ("I'm going to India!!! Where to go?")

Otherwise people will ask you to climb some mountains, jump into some seas, run after tigers , smoke Hashish, sing Bhajan, do yoga, get your head massaged, eat thandoori chicken, act as a Bollywood extra..etc etc….you’ll go mad

Are you going to travel through out India for 6 months or have some specific plans (yoga, music etc)??

Burn more midnight oil with IM You’ll be quite fine with the India stuffs soon. There is big mob here to answer your questions.

Just visit this thread a year later. You'll have the best laugh in life

(I've sent a private message to you. looks like you've not opened)

Hi Beach

I have no specific plans.....new to this....how do I read private messages?

Thanks

Stephen

Stongbonger, good luck with the heat and the wet but u will really experience what india can throw at you.
My friend was there during these times and he had a love hate relationship with the monsooons he thought they were amazing but also he got wet and couldnt get his clothes dry .
I will ask him more about where he went to survive the heat and wet, i remember an e-mail from him claiming the gods were against him and the monsson was following him around the country