Itinerary mostly completed - any advice?

andygoodyear

Hi All (long winded post approaching!)

I have fixed most of my itinerary now and was wondering what people thought. Also the end of my itinerary is not set yet and any info would be appreciated. My international flight arrives into Delhi and departs from Mumbai. There are quite a few places I want to see and the places below are definites. The parts of the itinerary in bold are the ones I need most advice on. Hope this is ok

October 15 - Arrive Delhi - spend 3 days or so in here

October 18 - Delhi to Amritsar by train

October 20 - Amritsar to Jodhpur - I would like to do this by train but am not sure if this can be done or if I have to go via Delhi

October 24/25 - Jodhpur to Jaipur by train

October 28 - Jaipur to Agra by train

October 29 - Agra to Varanasi by train

November 3 - Varanasi to Darjeeling. Darjeeling is a must for me as I then plan to travel to further hill stations. I know the toy train can be picked up from Delhi but are there any other places? I dont really want to travel all the wa back to Delhi.

November 18 - This is when the itinerary gets a bit rough/sketchy. I want to travel all the way down to the south of the country and the only places I have listed so far are Kerala for the backwaters, and Madurai. Once there I want to travel up the coast reaching Mumbai by the 18th December. Can anyone suggest a way to get south and a possible itinerary? Also if you think I should spend more days in the other places listed above let me know as I have a bit of ime to play with. Need to definitely get to Mumbai by 18th Dec though as I am meeting friends for christmas.

Finally! If anyone can reccomend a reasonably priced guest house in Mumbai for Xmas that would be great!

You guys n gals have all been excellent and I'm hoping you can help me with this (very) long-winded post.

Andy x

Judi

November 3 - Varanasi to Darjeeling. Darjeeling is a must for me as I then plan to travel to further hill stations. I know the toy train can be picked up from Delhi but are there any other places? I dont really want to travel all the wa back to Delhi.

Hi Andy

No need to go back to Delhi! Take the train on from Varanasi to New Jalpaiguri - the Toy Train to Darjeeling leaves from there. It's a great trip, one that I can truly recommend as memorable.

andygoodyear

Thanks

took a look through that thread but didnt really answer my questions - unless i missed some. Judi thanks for the train info - excellent

Judi

Hi again, Andy

Have you tried the Indian Railway site?

www.indianrail.gov.in

It can be quite frustrating at times, but makes fascinating reading! Full timetables for all trains are set out there (try Trains between Important Stations) first.

It seems that trains from Varanasi to New Jalpaiguri (NJP) run only on Thursday/Saturday/Sunday - although I could be wrong about that - no doubt the great Stephen Ber will tell us both if I am. The cost should be about £15. As the Toy Train only runs in the morning (@9.30 am I think) you'll need to stay overnight in NJP/Siliguri to catch it - but the trip really is worth it.

Judi

machadinha

Given the time you have, going all the way out to Amritsar and back for just two days seems like a bit of a shame. btw Where there are no direct train connections consider taking a bus instead, can save you a lot of unnecessary waiting or detouring.

New Jalpaiguri - Varanasi I had no trouble, although me and my several dozens of fellow passengers did have to wait for the good part of a day if not longer for a delayed train I think, or rather the next train since the first one never showed up or something. Maybe my automatically describing the occasion as "no trouble" should tell you something As noted the toy train runs from Siliguri, not Delhi. It's a dreadful and drab little town btw (NJ/Siliguri) but you may have to stay there for the night as noted, there's some OK hotels. Note: It was raining non-stop and cold when I was there so it won't have improved my impression of the place, maybe it's really very cheerful although I doubt it.

Going south you could take any long trainride, I did it the other way around and it was 2 nights and 3 days I think, pretty intense (Chennai - Varanasi via a detoured route and spending the last night in unreserved class at ca. 7C with just a sweater and including lengthy delays with no food or drinks in sight, I had wanted to go straight to Kolkata but everything was booked full over Christmas. This might or might not be a concern in Mumbai btw where accommodation isn't cheap and often full anyway.) If NJ doesn't serve the south directly then Kolkata will + it's a place not to be missed if you're out there if you ask me, unless you have something against mega-cities; you could pick any major destination you want from there more or less (if you're prepared to change trains you can go from pretty much anywhere to anywhere anyway), a direct train to Chennai should be just over a day's ride for instance (according to my outdated information, please note this holds true for this entire post, it's just meant as an indication).

The same goes for heading back up the west coast to Mumbai, just allow for some extra time in case of delays or trouble as your departure draws nearer. So what you could do is head for Chennai, pick a few of any number of historical temple towns in the wider area, visit a beach if you want, head to Madurai and possibly Kodaikanal (Kodai is cold + foggy in winter but still pretty, same goes for Darjeeling btw although I don't know about Nov.) and on to Kerala, work your way up along the Keralan coast, cross the Western Ghats (beautiful area) in the north towards Mysore and Hampi, then work your way through Karnataka to Mumbai via Bijapur for instance. You could do anything of course but I'm just saying this because I did it the other way around in what must have been around a month Well, maybe a little longer & don't follow the leader please.

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Anders

There is a lot more trains from Mughal Sarai which is just outside Varanasi.

-m2-

If you are really up for a *long* train ride (2 1/2 days!), the Guwahati Trivandrum/Ernakulam Express 5628/5624 would take you from New Jalpaiguri (NJP) to Ernakulam departing NJP 14:50 (wed/fri) arriving Ernakulam Jn at 01:20 (sat/mon). Ernakulam, near Cochin, would be close to the start of a backwater trip and Nov 18 is a Friday, so it would work with your plan. If you had interest in stopping in Kolkata, there are many more options. It would also be possible to break your trip in Chennai or Bangalore with different routing.

Flying part of the way would be nice, but expensive, as the budget carriers don't offer much help route-wise in your situation. If you do decide to take a superlong train trip, the upper berth in either SL class or 3ac would allow you to stretch out as much as you wanted during the daytime. The approximate fare for the roughly 3000km trip from JLP to Ernakulam would be 600/1600 rupees SL/3ac.

andygoodyear

Hi All

I am able to stop on the way to Kerala as my itinerary is fairly flexible. Which places would be good to astop at and which would be a good itinerary between darjeeling and the south. Any actual suggested itinerary would be great as I am not sure if i am up for a 2 1/2 day train rde

SHIMLA

You may think of Orissa - Puri, Konarak, Gopalpur, Chilka; then maybe Vizag, Chennai, Madurai; and then move on to Kerala.

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steven_ber

Makhu is 60 Kms. south of Amritsar (connected by highway 15, so there should be plenty of buses).

Train 9112 departs Makhu daily at 15:11 and gets to Jodhpur at 05:40.

2-tier air con = Rs 1211
Sleeper Class (not air con) = Rs 286

Going the other way: -

Train 9111 departs Jodhpur daily at 20:35, and gets to Makhu at 11:00 the following morning.

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Train information.

steven_ber

Varanasi/Mughal Sarai to New Jalpaiguri.

The Rajdhani (first 2 trains below) is the best timed and fastest train, but it's expensive.

Train 2436 departs Varanasi (Th, Su) at 22:25 and gets to New Jalpaiguri at 11:10.

Train 2424 departs Mughal Sarai(M, Tu, W, F, Sa) at 23:20 and gets to New Jalpaiguri at 11:10.


Train 5622 departs Mughal Sarai daily at 18:35 and gets to New Jalpaiguri at 09:35.

Train 4084 departs Mughal Sarai daily at 21:30 and gets to New Jalpaiguri at 14:15.

Mughal Sarai is about 18 Kms from Varanasi.


There is a hotel in Siliguri (New Jalpaiguri) that is owned & run by a member of the Darjeeling Himalayan Railway Society, I cant find details at the moment, but the rooms are about Rs2000 a night, it could be an interesting place to stay if you are interested in the railway. (the hotel name has something to do with a princess)

Judi

Andy - you might consider Calcutta on your way back from Darjeeling to the south. It's a wonderful city, and it would give you chance to catch your breath before moving on. Btw - don't know about November, but Darjeeling was cold in December, minus 5 Celcius in the night, and not much above freezing during the daytime, even though sunny. Make sure you take appropriate clothing!

As you will see - Steven has come up with some excellent train info.

machadinha

Darjeeling in Jan. was freezing cold yes, and as noted I froze my ass off on the way to Varanasi in Dec., although Kolkata that time of year was warm enough to sleep on a rooftop. Delhi at night gets pretty chilly too, cold enough to wrap up in a blanket. The freezing part was really not very funny, took me the good part of a day to warm up again, + you tend to not realize how cold cold can get when travelling through the hotter regions. Buy some warm clothes or a blanket before heading up north and in Darjeeling find a hotel with a heater, the cheaper ones don't always have them.

Kolkata is fascinating yes and would merit a lot of just aimlessly wandering around to get a feel for the city.

steven_ber

The hotel is called The Cindrella.

http://www.cindrellahotels.com/home/

The rooms are Rs 3000 a night.

The website is a fantastic site for information about the area, check it out, you'll be amazed.


I assume you have already viewed this post about the Darjeeling Himalayan Railway, and how to get to/from it.

andygoodyear

Wow!!!!

Thanks to all fot the information and thanks stephen. Lots for me to check out now. Great info