First draft of itinerary for next June/July/Aug

It is easy to get it transferred through Travisa, only it costs money.

Others will probably suggest that you can carry your old passport with visa and your new passport without. In theory the boys at Immigration should honor the visa, and you will be regaled with stories of people who have done it successfully.

We, having one fat passport already (extra pages), didn't want to carry a second fat passport as well, so paid the bucks to have the visa transferred. Besides, we're basically chicken when it comes to messing with Immigration and don't want to deal with some guy who's had a bad hair day and/or is looking for a "favor."

sperehealfe

I've been checking out flights and it looks like it won't cost much more to fly into Delhi and out of Mumbai. So if I cut Kolkata and Tirumala, going by train from Varanasi to Hyderabad, and then head to Mumbai after Ajanta caves and build in a day of down time after travel days, I might be able to keep everything else in the time frame I have. I think...

Day 1-2 Air travel arrive Delhi
Day 3-5 Delhi (3 full days Delhi)
Day 6-7 Amritsar (Taking the Shabatdi Express from Delhi in the am day 6)
Day 8 Travel Amritsar to Chandhigar (Train)
Day 9 Travel Chandighar to Kalki (Bus)Kalki to Shimla (Toy Train)
Day 10-12 Shimla (3 full days Shimla)
Day 13 Travel Shimla to Manali (bus)
Day 14-17 Manali (4 full days Manali)
Day 18 Travel Manali to Chandighar/Ambala? (Bus)
Day 19-20 overnight train to Varanasi
Day 21-24 Varanasi (4 full days Varanasi)
Day 25-26 Varanasi to HYderabad (overnight train?)
Day 27- 32 Hyderabad (6 full days Hyd.)
Day 33 travel by train to Hospet/Hampi
Day 34- 38 Hampi (4 full days Hampi)
Day 39 -40 Overnight train and then bus to Auragabad
Day 41 Ellora caves
Day 42 Travel to Ajanta (3 hrs bus?)
Day 43 Ajanta
Day 44 Travel to Mumbai (Train?)
Day 45-46 Mumbai (2 days Mumbai)
Day 47-48 fly home

That's adding a week almost. If I am unable to add that extra week I can take Manali out and just visit Shimla

So is it looking more reasonable now?

I'm still going to sketch out a South only route..

Looks like my passport is good untill 2019 so I will get the 10 year visa.

JJake,
I think you have a great plan.

Not far from the Ajanta caves is Jalgaon, from there are plenty trains to Mumbai.