| "O, pretty pretty palm tree..." | | This posting is meant as a reading guide for the journals that follow. Hans t(r)ips India has got 4 entries. We have stories here about our trips to India in 1997, 2005/2006 and 2006/2007. Unfortunately there are no reports from the trips Hans made in 1983 and 1992 and Hans' and Mirjams trip to Sikkim and Darjeeling in 1998. But feel free to ask questions.
We have journals for:
Our 1997 Honeymoon
Our first trip to India with our kids in 2005/2006
Practicalities from our first trip with the kids
Our second trip with the kids in 2006-2007
You'll find general tips about travel to India with children here.
We hope you will enjoy our stories. Once again feel free to post a comment or send a personal message when you have any questions.
Have Fun!
Hans, Mirjam, Frank & Marit | | Back to India with the kids | | Yes, It's finished and most of the typo's are gone (I think).
All went well last year, so that was a good reason to go back to India with the kids. This time it was to be Delhi, Rajasthan and Agra. As Frank was no longer allowed to take off during school-time, we only had two weeks, but we put these to maximum use, leaving on Friday and coming back on a Sunday. This report describes our experiences during the Christmas Holiday 06-07. Our kids were 6 and 4 years old at the time of travelling. For general and practical information see our last years report further down or: India with kids
Hans. Mirjam. Frank and Marit.
Thursday December 21st, 2006.
The week before Christmas is a bit of a stressful week. We’ve booked flights on British Airways, but it’s one of these classical periods with fog over the channel; continent isolated. The TV reports and papers are full with thousands of stranded air travellers all over the UK and the weather reports for Friday are lousy; the fog will stay. I try to rebook via KLM or Air France, but BA’s solution is to rebook me to Gatwick on Brussels Airlines, where we will have to take the bus to Heathrow and then we will have our normal BA flight onto Delhi. Will this work?
Friday December 22nd, 2006.
The kids go to school in the morning so mum and dad can do the last packing. With the new regulations on fluids in hand luggage, we have all kind of small plastic containers with essentials as DEET, contact lens solutions etc. But we are even better organised than last year. Only two backpacks weighing 22 kilograms in total (including papers and magazines to read and loose on the way) and two daypacks to take on board, that probably weigh much the same (well 10 kg in total). The taxi driver picks us up at 1400 hours and we drive to Zaventem Airport in bright sunny weather. As the parents both have visions of spending Christmas on a sidewalk in front of Heathrow Airport, we’ve decided only to leave Brussels with the boarding passes for the flight to Delhi. Although there is a lot of administrative and computer mayhem, this is professionally and friendly handled by the ground staff of both British Airways and Brussels Airlines. Good work of them on such a busy day. The flight to Gatwick leaves with half an hour delay, but as the flight times to the UK are always exaggerated, we land almost on time on Gatwick. It’s an empty and almost spooky airport with almost all flights cancelled and just the occasional traveller. We don’t bother with the long lines at BA to get the free bus tickets to Heathrow we’re entitled to, but go straight to Gatwick express counter, where the bus leaves only a couple of minutes later. The traffic on the M25 is relatively light and 35 minutes later we reach terminal 4 at Heathrow. This is going (too?) smoothly. In the departure hall there are about 5000 people waiting for check in. As we’ve already checked in for the London-Delhi leg we are looking for the luggage drop off point, but as one of the abundant and friendly but not very helpful BA-staff states they’ve cancelled it. The alternative: just stand in line Sir….. Well, that’s not the alternative I’ve got in mind. As there are 10 to 20 families with small kids waiting in the area between the A- and B-part of the terminal we join them and follow them dropping of our bags once a counter is free. Security only takes another 20 minutes and more then two hours before the departure time we’ve reached the departure gate. We speak with an American couple who have lived on Heathrow for two days now, which is a lot on a one week holiday to India. The kids fall asleep but wake up again during boarding and as the flight leaves with a two hour delay. The kids have a great flight with “Cars” on the IFE and an excellent kid’s meal. The parents “enjoy” the usual economy meal, space and entertainment.
Saturday, December 23rd 2006
After a good English breakfast we arrive in Delhi. As we are allowed to use the diplomatic channel we're fast trough immigration, after which the kids have to go to the bathroom. In true good fashion not at the same time, but that's OK as daddy has to change money anyhow. A good hour later we are outside, where we are being met by the reps of hotel Sri Nanak. They try to fit us with two other guests in a three person car, but need little persuasion to find a taxi for the other two guests. You don't fit four grown westerners and two kids in a mini minibus. It's Saturday, so the traffic is light and less then an hour later we are in our hotel. We've booked a Maharaja suite at 3490 Rs including breakfast, but get a bigger Presidential Suite at the same price as the Maharaja is not available. While we wait for our room, the friendly staff is playing with the kids and Marit gets her first present of the trip from them: a wooden snake.
The room is huge with a separate bedroom (it would easily sleep six) and all the amenities including fruit and chocolates. Marit and dad go outside on a reconnaissance of the neighbourhood which turns out to be pretty dull. They do find the necessities though (Cola, water, potato chips etc.). Ma and Frank stay in the room. We find our favourite channels back on the telly (POGO!!) and rest away the jet-lag a bit. We order room service that's excellent with the exception of the French fries. It's early bedtime for the whole family....
Sunday, December 24th, 2006.
It's an uneventful night for some of us. Frank sleeps 12 hours in a row and wakes up like a little ray of sunlight. Dad sleeps 10 hours and is reasonably fresh. Marit woke up every hour, but does OK. Mum was woken up every hour by Marit and is knackered.
Starting the family up takes some time, but after breakfast and a couple of hours we are ready to set of. As we've booked a night train to Jodhpur, we take a taxi to New Delhi Railway Station (NDLS) and put our luggage in the cloak room. Then the first Auto Rickshaw of the holiday to the Red Fort. There is a long row to enter the Fort, but there is a separate one for westerners although you pay for the privilege (100 rs each). Kids don't have to pay, as is the case at almost all monuments in India.
There's a clean washroom at the fort and as ma uses the facilities, Frank and Marit score a couple of small free gifts from the merchants at the entrance of the Fort. It's a nice relaxed Sunday afternoon at the fort. Families are picnicking and we feed the squirrels in the park. The kids are obviously more at ease then during their first trip to India, as they do not cling to their parents, but run all over the place. After the fort it's time for lunch and we end up at McDonalds. Sigh. Why they call the meals happy is a mystery to us. Maybe the presents are, because that's the only thing they are interested in. We chat away with a mother and her grown-up daughters, amaze ourselves at the mobile phone loading dock (we don't have these in the Netherlands) and while away a bit in the aircon. We take another Rickshaw to the station and have chai and sweets in the excellent station cafeteria (I forgot the name, but if you're facing the station, it's to the left, near the cloakroom). The kids take out their drawing books and start making drawings for the staff. Our train is supposed to leave at 18.30, so we pick up our luggage, buy samosas and apple pie for the train and set out to find it. Not very difficult if you hire a porter. We booked our tickets over the internet (www.irctc.co.in) on the first day that it was possible (2 months in advance). It was almost X-mas though so there was a heavy demand for tickets and we and got the last four side berths (2AC) on the train. Side berths are like coffins, but with less room. We will come back to that later.
The kids immediately take a liking to the train and the possibilities of changing the seats to beds. We transform two of the seats to one (lower) berth and the kids start climbing up and down to the upper berth. The train is a bit delayed, so there's ample time to buy chai. When the train leaves we start socialising with our French neighbours. We find out that Bacardi (theirs) and cola (bought from the platform) form an excellent combination with samosas (ours). The kids have apple pie and Fanta and vitamin pills to compensate for the lack of veggies.
After a couple of hours and some more baco's and samosa's it's time to put the children to sleep. They want to sleep upstairs which would be sensible given the room available. It is totally insensible if you look at the security as there is ample space to fall down. The kids get the lower berths and go to sleep after a reasonably short period of the normal stuff (hug, some water, another hug, I have to go to the loo, I'm too excited to sleep on a train, where's my toy, I don't want to sleep on a train, I want some more water etc.).
Mum and dad climb up to the upper berths and both get an acute attack of claustrophobia. There is not enough space in an upper side berth for an average Westerner (be forewarned, ye newbie Indiamikers). Mirjam does get some sleep. Hans none at all.
Monday December 25, 2006.
On the first day of Christmas, my true love gave to me. No that's not where we were with our story.
Mirjam does get some sleep. Hans non at all. Which is good (?) because now he hears Frank falling out of bed at around 0200 hours. No damage done, but getting out of the upper berth is as dangerous as falling out of it with the chance of a hernia thrown in. All I want for Christmas is ... Comfort (old backpacker memories; where are the days that we didn't mind taking a 40 hour train ride from Varanasi to Chennai...but that was in normal berths.)
The next morning the family wakes up; the kids that is, the parents were already awake. We arrive in Jodhpur and hustle the family off the train. We are in for two surprises, a nice one and a not so nice one. The nice surprise is meeting Monica and Saulius, two Lithuanian colleagues from Brussels. We knew they were also going to India, but meeting someone without an appointment in that 10 minute timeframe where we arrive and their train leaves for Jaipur is one of these things that amazes you all the time. Only in India. They have been in India for just a week and Saulius has already lost 6 kilograms. Poor guy!
The station is full of sleeping people. We make a call to the Durag Niwas guesthouse, where we have reserved rooms for our next three nights. We are told that we will be picked up soon. We are waiting for another 10 minutes and a guy approaches us to bring us to the guesthouse. Not in a car as promised, but in a rickshaw, but hey this is India.
This really is India, because at the guesthouse we find out that the guy who took us there has no connection whatsoever with the guesthouse, but certainly does have a connection with the operator of the phone booth at the station. We are (were) being scammed, but it is a funny scam, because the only ones that are losing time and money are the scammers. Govind, the hotel owner isn't going to pay commission for guests that already have a reservation (or pay commission anyhow) and I certainly am not going to pay for the rikshaw ride. Cut your losses I would say, but the incompetent entrepreneurs keep waiting in front of the guesthouse for a couple of hours with the vain hope that we eventually might come out to pay them anyhow.
We have breakfast at the guesthouse and relax for a couple of hours in the huge room cum annexe. The two interconnected rooms cost 650 Rs. The big one is very nice with an area with cushions to relax (or to play with). The small one is a bit gloomy. Govind is a nice guy, who does his best at making the guests feel at home. The guesthouse is in need some delayed maintenance, which we understand has been done a couple of weeks later.
We take an autorikshaw up to Mehrangarh fort for 45 rs. Entrance to the Fort is 250 Rs including an audio guide. The kids get in for free and naturally they claim the audioguides. This means listening to the guide in English and as they do not speak English then once again to daddy, who does a simultaneous translation in Dutch. It's a good fort and a good audioguide, so we spent a nice couple of hours visiting. Highpoints are playing drums together with the band at the entrance and the big spikes that deterred enemy-elephants. The hands of the women that killed themselves rather than succumbing to the enemy also make a big impression. We have lunch at the restaurant in the fort; pizza for the kids and thali's for mum and dad. Nice food for a reasonable price given the location.
We walk down from the fort through narrow streets and chat with the friendly inhabitants. We do some shopping at the market and take a rickshaw back to the guesthouse.
After some more rest and games at the guesthouse, we go for dinner at Bollywood Dreams, a restaurant in the fore court of Khas Bagh, a wedding extravaganza place that does Bollywood over the top.
The food is good tandoori fare and bland noodles (as requested) for the kids. The kids fall back in their routine and make drawings for the staff. Everybody is pretty tired, it's an early night for everybody. The kids don't like to sleep apart in the small room, so we all end up in the big bed in the big room. Quite cosy.
Tuesday, December 26th 2006
After a reasonably good nights sleep we wake up at seven and are ready for breakfast at ten. Yes sometimes these things take time as parents know.
We have a look the sambhali-trust, a small project at the premises of Durag Niwas set up to empower women. The girls the harijan community come here six days a week and get basic lessons on health, hygiene, personality development and other general activities. They are taught English and handicrafts, so they can provide an income of their own. Their products are sold in a small shop at very reasonable prices. It's a small, but nice project, doing good a grass roots level.
We've rented a car from the guesthouse for the day to go to Osyan. It turns out to be a miniminiminivan (yep, it was that small), which is not the ambassador we've come accustomed to since last years trip. It costs 800 rs which is reasonable. We decide though that this is not the car we are going to rent for the rest of the trip.
We remember Osyan from our honeymoon as a friendly place and it still is. It's main temple is on top of a hill (what's new) and it's fairly busy with people worshipping and presenting their kids to the temple for the first time. These kids get their heads shaven and the innocent bystanders get Prasad (holy food). Frank and Marit like the sweets. The attention for our kids is well meant and not too pushy. The temple itself is a bit difficult to appreciate from the start, but really nice if you take the time to get to know it.
We walk around the village, visit the Jaintemple that is still under construction (as 10 years before) and use the facilities of the Jain community that lives around it. The cleanliness connected with this specific religion is as always a nice surprise. The toilets are spotless. After banana's, cookies and a soda, we head back for Jodhpur.
Next to the hotel is a fair ground where a home appliance fair is being held. Although the discounts offered are huge, we decide not to buy a solar water heater. BA wouldn't allow it on the plane.
Some more time is spent hiring a car. The small minivan on offer doesn't do it for us, so Hans gets some quotes from the travel agents further down the road. Prices quoted for an Ambassador are in the 2500 - 2800 Rs all included range. The market survey gets noticed at the guesthouse and Govind lo has something on offer. The first car he comes up with is huge, but without any real explanation unavailable after we've had dinner. He does have an alternative: MP Singh (better known as Papud) the cousin of a nephew (or whatever relation) works for a travel agency that normally only works for the Home market. His brand new big 4 wheel drive look-a-like Chevrolet is available for hire, so we rent it for 21000 Rs for ten days (around 35 Euros a day, everything included).
The dinner is again at Bollywood Dreams. One other lesson learned: if the food is good for the kids and the parents, don't go looking for a better place. We are in luck, as there is a Bollywood(ish) wedding going on at the neighbours. As always, the band is amazingly loud and amazingly lousy and as always the groom looks thoroughly unhappy on his horse. The food is once again really nice, as is the beer. We develop a slight preference for Fosters as there seems to be less conserving agents in this beer than in other brands.
We don't even bother to let the kids sleep in their own beds (sigh).
Wednesday December 27th 2006.
We have breakfast at the guesthouse with reasonable good pancakes and we take a look at the little shop that is run on the premises by the Sambhali trust. We buy clothing, tablecloths and some nice scarves, not only to help the project, but also because they sell nice stuff.
We leave around 10 and enjoy the great car we've rented this time. There's lots of space (we could have stuffed in at least 4 more (Indian) people and MP / Papud is a good natured guy with not a lot of English or experience with foreign tourists, but willing to learn.
We drive though the arid Rajasthan desert. We make a stop in Fulna, where we visit a gold JAIN temple that is still in progress being gilded. The kids get the opportunity to help and both and put little pieces of gold leave on the temple. Under the temple is a hilarious tunnel totally fitted out in gold and mirrors. Better than a fairground! In totally three and a half hours we reach Ranakpur. We have an improvised banana and cookies lunch in front of the temple that is open for non-jains in the afternoons. The Jaintemple is truly amazing, but our visit is interrupted....
Intermezzo
Why is it that just when you've truly started something kids have to go to the bathroom. E.g. you’ve just removed all backpacks and shoes, handed over your ticket, passed the turnpike climbed to the top of the temple that kids have to go to the loo.
.....after a visit to the very clean toilet (thank you once again, Jainism) and a half hour later, we can have a good look at the amazing temple. Although you may turn a bit blasé after so many temples, this is one that should be on anybody's itinerary when the visit Rajasthan. Perfectly carved and perfectly balanced Ranakpur is a place that is peaceful, relaxing and energizing at the same time.
We take a look at the lovely Fateh Bagh hotel, but it's full so we end up at the Maharani Bagh. This hotel is also a lovely place with bungalow style rooms that are spotless and well fitted out. We get one of these rooms with two extra beds bargained down from 6500 to 3800 Rs, including breakfast.
The garden is great to relax, to play, to sip tea and a beer, to eat snacks, to explore, to pass a couple of nice hours. The birds are singing, the kids play in a swing chair; it's a real real holiday-day!
In the evening it's quite cold when we go for dinner at the hotel's (indoor) restaurant. The food takes some time to prepare, but it's fresh, really nice and the kids enjoy their pasta with tommatoos.
Thursday December 28th, 2006
Everybody has had a good night of sleep and we celebrate Hans’s birthday. We enjoy a full English breakfast in crisp morning in the hotel's garden restaurant. We drive over a reasonable country road through small villages to Kumbalgarh. It takes about 1,5 hours and the trip is broken up by a couple of rounds on a bullock driven waterwheel. Who needs merry-go-rounds if there are bullocks?
Kumbalgarh is an immense fort. Not that beautiful, but it's nice fresh weather so the walk up to the main living quarters is not that strenuous. After the visit we have lunch with samosas and french fries at one of the small restaurants at the entrance of the fort.
The drive onto Udaipur takes another two hours. It's a bit difficult to find accommodation. All the hotels around the lake are full as there is a long weekend coming up. Hans steps into little phoneshop annex travel agency to call some hotels in the Survival kit. There are a few who have a room, but at high prizes and only for one night. When coming out of the phone booth there's a young guy, who states the travel agency is actually a hotel and that they have two rooms left, as they had a reservation that did not show up. One level higher is the lobby of the cute Udai Niwas Hotel. We pay 1600 Rs total for two very clean and pleasant rooms. Nice decorations in the rooms and a pleasant staff that cheerfully runs up and down the stairs the whole day.
We walk around a bit, buy T-shirts for the kids and buy loads of textiles in the government run Rajasthali shop near the City Palace. The hotel has a cosy rooftop restaurant with good views of the city and the lake palace, good Indian Food and western pancakes. As an extra feature they show Octopussy on the video every night. Well every restaurant shows Octopussy every night, but it's a good place to watch it. Frank loves it and want to see it again the next day. I've got a feeling that it is special to watch movies in their original location. We have to buy the DVD when we get home, because the film is to long to watch the end before bedtime. Marit and Mirjam are sharing one room at the back of the hotel and Frank and daddy have the one at the front. The temple on the other side of the road makes a lot of noise at 10 in the evening, but we have a good night's sleep.
Friday December 29th, 2006
At five o'clock we are woken up by the temple on the other side of the road. It takes about ten minutes so we can go back to sleep. Breakfast is a bit chilly on top of the hotel, so we move inside one level below. With the open windows, you till have the feeling you're outside, but it is a tad bit warmer. Around 10 we arrive at the city palace, which is a couple of 100 metres from the hotel. It's full with French and Indian tourgroups, but not so full that we're not able to appreciate the beauty of the palace. The visit takes us about two hours, which means there is a lot to be seen and be told (like I stated before, if you don't know the story of a castle make one up, or delve into your vault of childhood stories and fairy tales. Rapunzel can live in any tower..).
MP picks us up to go for lunch which is not easy. the British ambassador is visiting Udaipur, so the authorities have decided to close the allready cramped streets of the inner city totally for half an hour or so.
Once outside the city we head for Shilpi village. Shilpi is an open air museum, and pretty busy, as the yearly festival is in full swing. Before we enter the grounds we have lunch at the Shilpi restaurant next door. It's a very posh place with an great garden to dine in. The waiters are friendly and helpfull, the prices reasonable and the spaghetti great, so the kids decide that they want to eat here every day for the rest of the holiday. Indian food is also pretty good at this place.
After a leasurely luncheon we walk over to the fairground. There's a special festival entrance fee, that's higher than normal for Indians, but far less than the normal foreigners fee. So we get in for 15 rs and the kids get in for free. Once inside it's not too crowded and there is a festive atmosphere all around. We visit the houses from all over Rajasthan and all over the place there are craftsman producing handicrafts. hey hae enough english to explain what they are doing, so this is not only fun, but also educational. A ride on a camel may seem a bit touristic but it rounds up the visit.
Dinner is at the hotel and pretty much the same as yesterday night, including James Bond and the pancakes.
Saturday December 30th, 2006.
We leave Udaipur at 07.45 and arrive at the ruined fort of Kumbalgarh at 09.45. The trip includes waiting for a closed railroad crossing for 25 minutes. Inside the Fort it's mostly ruins, but there's an interesting temple and an even more interesting tower. You can have your picture taken in Rajasthani folk costumes and whole families are doing this. Mirjam is asked by a nice lady to also dress up and it ends with both Mirjam and Hans dressed up as rich farmers. We try to persuade the kids to do the same, but they have more sense, so only the parents look totally ridiculous. The pictures won't show up here, I promise.
We drive on to Bassi, that is being advertised as the place to buy kavads. These are multipanelled, brightly coloured chests with loads of panels each painted with a part of a story. storytellers would travel around with one of these on their back and tell stories for a fee. A carpenter takes us to his house and while drinking a cup of chai his son explains the various parts of the production process. Not a sales pitch, as he only produces big ones to order. There are some small shops geared to the occasional tourist, so we are able to buy a couple in a more sensible format.
The rest of the day is spent travelling to Bundi. This takes a bit to long and we have difficulties finding a good place to eat on the road. The lst 120 Kilometres take three hours and we arrive after 5 in Bundi. As Papud does not know Bundi at all, finding and reaching a hotel takes another hour, as there is a traffic free zone in the town. Most hotels are full, so we stay at haveli braj bhushanjee in a overpriced but pretty nice "suite" room at 5000 rs with 2 extra beds and (good) breakfast. The 5000 was discounted from 6200, but was still too much. Laws of supply and demand.
We eat dinner at the nearby Katkoun, that's also a hotel. Good Indian food and al the childrens favourites (pasta!) at decent prices.
Sunday December 31st, 2006
It doesn't feel like Newyears Eve, but it is. After last days long carjourney we spent a very relaxed day in Bundi. After a good, vegetarian breakfast we climb up to Bundi Castle. The kids like it, but have as much fun with the swingchair in the courtyard of the haveli.
We do a little siesta and find out that Marit suffers from tummy aches. She seems to have blocked intestines. Yes, everybody would expect the opposite in India, but Marit is not everybody. Allthough our travel medicine kit is pretty extensive, we did not expect this ailment, so dad goes out to find a pharmacy. Finding it is not that difficult, explaining what the problem is to three guys that don't speak english is. It's pretty funny to do a pantomine involving bowel movements. After 5 minutes the diagnosis is done and an enema-kit bought. We wil spare you the further details, but the remedy is fast and effective.
At the end of the afternoon we go out for some shopping. Bundi is a relaxed place and does not seem to be on the main Rajasthan circuit. The locals are very friendly for our kids, who get little presents from several shopkeepers. Dinner (as lunch) is again at Katkoun, where the atmosphere is hightened by newly placed coloured lights in the garden, the food is still good and the staff once very friendly. They bend backwards to make the children feel at home.
Monday January 1st, 2007 New year.
Stress in the morning. Frank has lost "Boomslingeraap" his toy monkey and the whole haveli is turned inside out to find it. Without a lot of success, so Franks is crying untill Papud turns up with the car and Boomslinger. We get into the car and drive 2,5 hours to Tonk. We visit the local mosque, after having battled through a pile of very obnoxious beggers. They probably don't get a lot of westeners (or westeners with kids) here, because the mosque committee turns up for a friendly guided tour of the mosque. Outside the crowd isn't that friendly, so it's back to the car and on to Jaipur. On the basis of a good review in the Lonely Planet guide we go straight for the Jaipur Ashok (Jai Singh Circle, Nani Park, Jaipur - 302 016). Part of it seems to be under renovation, but we get one of their 60 square metre enormous suites at the back of the hotel including two extra beds and breakfast for 2600 Rs. Great deal. We have a late and very good lunch in the hotels restaurant. Marit and Mirjam are tired, so they stay in the room. Hans and Frank go out on a Toy Ambassador car hunt. It´s an interesting afternoon of shopping and strolling through Jaipur´s back streets. We are able to see numerous artisans at work, who are more than willing to show Frank everything. We do find the Ambassador cars and buy six cars for Frank and his friends. At night we go to Pizza Hut for ....eeeh pizza.
Tuesday, January 2nd 2007.
Early rise for a bright, crispy and excellent day. We drive up to the lovely Nahargarh fort, which is a pretty castle with a maze of interlocking rooms and stairs. The kids love it. Afterwards it's on to Jaigarh Fort, where Marit has to go to the loo (and again, and again). It seems she has a serious attack of diarrhoea, so we decide to go back to the hotel. Marit has no fever, we give her some Imodium and she spends the rest of the day in the hotel room with daddy. Papud takes Mummy and Frank to a paper factory and they also go shopping. Best buy of the afternoon is "Delhi Taxi". A very nice game, that teaches kids the landmarks of Delhi and driving a taxi through the city. Less realistic are the fixed prices that these virtual taxidrivers get.
Room service takes a very long time and this night the cook is obviously not the same guy that cooked us lunch yesterday. After two complaints the management turns up, decides that the food is indeed not so good, arranges something else and puts nothing on the bill.
Wednesday, January 3rd, 2007.
Marit feels much better, we decide to give city palace a miss and drive straight to Agra. The drive to Fatehpur Sikri doesn't take that long; 2,5 hours. Kilometres before the town guys start jumping in front of the car. Thy are really worried and probably afraid that we won't be able to find the sights in Fatehpur. As the road is clearly signposted we ignore these guys. Which is quite difficult and Papud succeeds a couple of times in not killing one. He also succeeds in not getting lost, which isn't that obvious, as we find out that he's never driven to Agra. Whether he's been there as a young boy may be possible, but still remains vague.
The touting goes on outside the mosque in FS. It's not funny, but we ignore the guys and walk up to the mosque, that still has the enormous bee-hive (and the bees!) at the top of the entrance. Inside the mosque, it's sunny and peacefull and the kids enjoy a bout of running around. They even pose for pictures with the crowd, so they really must feel relaxed.
Somewhere aloong the way we have lunch in an roadside "A1-restaurant". The name is well chosen; great thali!
Papud is totally lost in Agra, but with the help of the Lonely planet map we reach the area south of the Taj. Hans goes hotel hunting on the mall, looks at 5 possibles and finds the Amar Yatri Niwas. It's a nice 3 star hotel with friendly staff. We had a huge (Mugal) room and a standard room (with connecting door). They discounted the combination (with breakfast) from 5000 to 3700 Rs. With nighttemperatures around 5 degrees centigrade, the heating was also a nice touch.
At night we eat at Pizza Hut downstairs. It's quite uneventfull untill the manager and staff decide that it is time for some entertainment. Namely: "dancing on the floor". After announcing it to us (solely) 15 times, they start by turning up the music system to hurricane force and yelling "dancing on the floor". Without a moment hesitation our whole family gets up as one and head for the door. As at that same time our pizzas arrive they choose wisely, turn the music down and apologize profoundly. Another interesting night out on the subcontinent.
Thursday January 4th, 2007.
The breakfastbuffet in the morning is reasonable, but the waiters are very slow (but friendly though). We use the time to chat to some other Dutch guests. It's a fresh and crisp morning outside with brilliant sunshine as Papud drives us to the Taj Mahal. No need for a rikshaw for the last 500 metres, but Frank gets to sit up front on one for free, with Marit in the seat. The picture is well worth the tip.
The Taj is, well, the Taj is, well...
It's one of the sole things in the world that's better in reality than on a picture. It's my third time here and I'm more than happy to return once again if I'm ever near. The kids are also impressed and we spend quite a while in and around the building.
After a banana and cookie lunch we visit the red fort for a couple of hours. Best feature for Frank and Marit is feeding the squirls cookie crumbles.
At night we have dinner at the Prakash restaurant. A great place where I ate in 1983, Mirjam and I ate in 1997 and now we're back with the family. Food is still good.
Friday January 5th, 2007
It's seems to be Frank's turn to be a bit ill; he's got a fever, but we decide to drive to Delhi anyhow, as we we're leaving on sunday. We give him paracetamol and he rests a bit more as we pack. I carry him into the small elevator and on the way down he vomits (all over us). Back to the room, new clothes etc.. Vomiting seems to have helped.
The drive to Delhi takes 5 hours, including a lunch break and we check into hotel southern. A nice place, a bit far from the centre, but near a metro station. I booked the room by telephone from Agra and obviously sounded Indian (enough) to get the Indian rate in rs.. Foreigners are supposed to pay in rupees, but on the basis of a rate in dollars. I did not go for that and still got an executive suite with breakfast and an extra bed (marit slept on the couch) for 2790 rs. Good deal!
We say goodbye to Papud, who will drive back to Jodhpur straight away.
The rest of the day we spend at leasure in the room, with the exception of a shoppingtrip in the nearby gigantic market area by Hans. Roomservice is excellent and cheap with special thali, and pasta for the kids.
Saturday January 6th, 2007
Our last full day in India. After a nice breakfast with both Indian and western items (the cook even makes eggs to order for the kids). We rent a car and driver for the day and set of to the Indian Railway Museum in South Delhi. Admission is 10 rs and 3 for the kids) with another 5 rs for a train ride. It's fun! Lunch is at a nearby Subway, where the children decide that they want the same sub for dinner. So it's takeout for them.
We drive back to the city and shop a couple of hours in the State Government Emporiums on Baba Kharak Singh Marg. Amongst others we score little tables, bronze statues, lots of fabrics, papier mache dolls and a chest/cupboard that's quite big but hopefully small enough to defy the airlines measurements and weights. The cupboard is sewn into fabric and looks really authentic on the roof of our taxi. After a quick look at Laxmi Narayan Temple it's back to the hotel for evening room service, Subway subs and a couple of self bought beers (as it's not available at the hotel). We sleep well.
Sunday january 7th, 2007
Our last day in India. Frank is again not feeling well, but we have to go back and give him some paracetamol. Not our favourite course of action, but staying behind in India is also not an option. After breakfast the packing goes well (with one extra bag). The hotel gives us a free transfer to the airport. At Delhi airport there is the usual scrum of people, a bit less than normal as it is a sunday. The packaged chest is frowned upon a bit at security, but the X-ray does not show anything special, so we don't have to unpack it we even give it an extra layer of plastic. Checking in goes fast (we're allowed to use the bussiness check in; it helps to have kids sometimes). Immigration also poses no problem and the departure lounge is relatively calm. There's also a Subway, so we spend our last rupees on subs. Flying back takes 8 hours to the UK, where security even on a slack sunday night still takes an hour or so. The flight to Brussels is delayed, but we reach Zaventem around 10, where a friendly neighbour is taking us back home. After having filed a PIR because once again BA lost our luggage in Heathrow. We got it back one day later.
We loved the vacation but also have some mixed feelings about this trip. Marit only got ill one day, But Frank needed antibiotics back home. Lesson learned; don't rush through India with kids. Two weeks is to short to overcome the jetlag and you don't have time to stay longer in one place if necessary.
We'll be back though 
| | ‘O, pretty pretty palm tree, life is beautiful with thee’ | | Trip report; South India with young kids 2005 - 2006
It was absolutely fabulous to be back in India. After having travelled all over Asia since the mid eighties, we paused for a couple of years after our kids were born. The travel bug was no longer content with France though, so Mum and Dad decided to go to South India over Christmas 2005 and Frank (5,5 years old) and Marit (almost 4) agreed wholeheartedly. For the parents it felt like coming home and the kids loved it. Climbing up Chamundi Hill in Mysore, riding elephants and speedboats in Munnar, Relaxing on the lake in Ooty, performing arts in the park in Pondicherry, staying with a wonderful family in Cochin, running through temples screaming “ayappah…” in Tamil Nadu; everything was great. The friendly attention of the Indians for the kids was a bit much at times, but then there was always the private space of our own Ambassador car and the care of our wonderful driver Gandhi. This report combines our impressions with some practicalities and travel advice. Forget Disneyland, India is the place to go!
Hans, Mirjam, Frank and Marit Damen
The Trip
Brussels – Frankfurt - Chennai
(101205) We’re Dutch but currently living near Brussels in Belgium. Jeannot, a friend of ours is picking us up to take us to Zaventem airport. After all those weeks of preparation and anticipation it is about time. Dressed up in our fleeces, with broad smiles on our faces we head into the airport looking for the Lufthansa counter. The smiles vanish a bit after we have been told (inter alia) that the our kids have been waitlisted, that we cannot be issued boarding passes as the weight limit on the flight to India is already reached, that we have double bookings and that we don’t have tickets. Only the last part is true, as all of us have been issued E-tickets. Well, let’s spare you the next forty minutes, but do let me tell you that it helps a lot to have the email confirmation and the booking codes available when checking in. So much for the famous German and Lufthansa’s efficiency. We got their profound apologies a couple of weeks later.
We get our boarding passes to Frankfurt and to Chennai and we start the long walk to the Shengen-pier. As this is Frank and Marit’s first flying trip everything is new, but very recognisable, as we bought a ‘what happens at the airport’-picture book a couple of weeks before. Mum and dad have trouble keeping up with them as they run over the long moving walkways. There is no need to hurry though, as the flight is delayed anyhow and also has to wait for de-icing. We leave with a 45 minute delay. In Frankfurt we run through the airport and with 14 minutes to spare we arrive at the departure gate. Well the flight is delayed anyhow, but as it is also heavenly overbooked we are happy to arrive in time. The waiting-area is overfull, but as they have just started the pre-boarding for families with kids we head straight into the plane. Great to have kids with you on a plane ride, because it ensures you room in the overhead luggage compartment.
We leave with an hour delay, so our luggage is also on board and both adults cannot stop smiling. Yes, after more than seven years we are on our way back to India! The flight is uneventful; the legroom in the lowest category, the food lousy, the Personal Entertainment System none existing, the kids meals not available, but the service provided by the flight attendants friendly and attentive and the flow of alcohol leaves nothing to desired.
Chennai
(111205) It is half past one on Sunday Morning once we arrive at Chennai Airport. Our kids who have been active with the toys we took from home during the whole eight hour flight both fall asleep as we hit the tarmac. We two sleeping children over our shoulders and four pieces of hand luggage we stumble through the airport to Immigration where luckily we are allowed to use the diplomatic channel, thus avoiding the 500 + person long line. The kids wake up while we wait for our luggage and with each of them sitting on top of a luggage cart we head into a melee of at least 1000 people waving placards with names at us. The travel agency reps do not have a lot of problems recognising us (not a lot of westerners with two small blonde kids leaving the airport). We are taken to our Ambassador, meet our driver Gandhi and are welcomed with flower garlands. It is far after midnight, it is hot, it is humid, it smells like India and it feels great!
Mahabalipuram
(111205) It is after three o ‘clock when we arrive at the Sea Breeze Hotel(11 othovadai cross street, seabreezehotel@hotmail.com ). Without any formalities we are brought to our suite. Well suite, basically one large and one small room with two bathrooms that have been built so impractically that they cannot be rented out separately. The big room is OK with a nice view of the sea and the Shore temple. As we booked from abroad we pay the top price of 75 euros per night which is too much. We put the sleeping kids in the biggest bed, the adults are wide awake and a bit hyper with all the excitement , but around 5 o’clock everybody sleeps.
The kids do not suffer of any jetlag whatsoever, so at 8 o’clock they are wide awake and ready to concur the world. Mum and Dad are knackered and ready for nothing. 5 hours of sleep seem to be enough for the kids. We have pancakes for breakfast in the hotel (yes, another one of these travellers’ favourites: banana pancakes).
and we go for a swim in the hotel swimming pool. As it is about 27°C it is an excellent way to start the day. After our swim we take a walk over the beach. There is not much damage left from the Tsunami, but the fishing boats tell the tale. They are all brand-new and have the name of the sponsor prominently displayed on their sterns. We walk into town, where some streets are flooded. Some guys tell us that walking through the water is “Indians only” and show us a detour. “Ajuna’s penance” is a big display cut out of the rocks. The kids like climbing the rock behind a lot more. They don’t like the locals pinching their cheeks and they also don’t want to figure as an exotic extra in Indian family pictures. For daddy the make the exception, so we make all the obligatory photo’s of the kids seemingly holding up an enormous rock in their hands. We have an early dinner in the restaurant of the Mammala Heritage hotel. The kitchen does not open until 1900 hours, but does provide snacks, so the kids eat French fries and the parents have a Massala Dosa. Everybody is asleep by half past seven.
Tirukkalikundran
(121205) When we wake up Mamma sleeps in Franks bed and Marit sleeps with daddy. This is not the way we started out yesterday night, so the jetlag has hit us. Marit (and Hans) are awake early and do a pre-breakfast stroll. Mirjam and Frank have to be shaken back to consciousness. By and by everybody managed to get 10 hours of sleep, so we didn’t do to badly. After breakfast and a change of clothes (mum manages to get more coffee in her lap than in her stomach) we head of to Tirukkalikundran to visit the Vedagirishwara Temple. Tirukkalikundran is a small village about a 45 minutes drive from Mahabalipuram. The trip is hampered a bit, because the roads are partly flooded. Frank and Marit are wildly enthusiastic about driving through the water and don’t want to miss a single drop of it.
The Vedagirishwara Temple is situated on top of a hill and can be reached by a 560 very steep and wet steps. We hire a basket on a pole and three guys to carry our kids up the hill. All right, it is a bit colonial, but it is money well spent given the steepness and condition of the steps. Gandhi takes good care of the kids making sure that they don’t fall out the basket. Mum and dad sweat an puff their way up in near 100 % humidity. Once again we attract a lot of attention, but it has more of an easy feel than yesterday. The road up is better than the temple itself, because it is dark and gloomy. The views from the top of the hill are great.
We go back to Mahabalipuram and for lunch we have our first thali-meal of this trip in the Mamalla Heritage (rs 60). The kids don’t really want to try the Indian food and have macaroni. Although we eat a lot of Indian food at home with all the spices, we leave out the pepper. We have to admit that the food in the south of India is a lot hotter than we remember and certainly to hot for our kids. After lunch we buy cushions for the kids, so they will be able to better look out of the car window. We spent the afternoon in the swimming pool of the Seabreeze hotel, which was probably not a good idea (we’ll come back to that) and have dinner in the hotel. Reasonable North Indian food for the parents and omelette for the children. Indian food is definitely different in the Netherlands, but hey, what’s wrong with four weeks of pizza, pasta and French fries? They won’t starve and long live the vitamin pills!
Mahabalipuram – Bangalore
(131205) As the weather had been very bad and more monsoonal rain was predicted we opt to change our itinerary and visit the south counter clockwise. This means a very long day in the car, but afterwards anything will be shorter. We leave at eight o’clock and decide to have breakfast en route. The first few hours we don’t cover a lot of distance, as the rains are very heavy, some of the roads are flooded and we have to make a couple of detours. Driving through flooded roads does make the trip a lot more interesting for the kids.
It’s half past eleven when we reach Kanchipuram, where we stop for brunch. The Saravana Bhavan restaurant does excellent dosa’s . There’s also a bakery attached, so the kids have cakes and Marit munches the rest of the day away eating breadsticks. After the stop we hit the NH4/NH7 highway. The roads get a lot better, but this does not mean that the travel goes a lot faster. Even four-lane highways are used by everyone and everything and the median strip is an excellent place to shepherd your cows and sheep. Once the highway reaches a town or village it does not go around it, but right through, thus making up for all the time gained on the highway. Well, we are not complaining, but happy with the progress we make. Around 1700 hours we reach Electronic City at the outskirts of Bangalore. We personally experience that Bangalore’s roads have not made the speedy transformation that its computer industry has. The next twenty kilometres into town take 3 hours. So it is after eight once we reach our accommodation with the original name ‘Bangalore Accommodation’ (116, 1st Cross, Ramakrishna Gardens, New BEL Road, Behind Gowri Apts, (91) 9845 670576 or (91) (80) 23606176, yourhost@yahoo.com, www.bangaloreaccomodation.com) .
We found the guesthouse on Internet (guess what search term we used ;-) ) and it is good value for 750 rs per room. Free internet access and breakfast are included in the price. Excellent evening meals cost Rs 50 per head. The owner Shimij very much makes us feel at home.
The last couple of hours Frank has a swollen cheek and has been very quiet. Too quiet according to Mirjam, so she checks his temperature. He’s got 38.4 Celsius and complains of a mosquito that has bitten his tooth. On closer inspection Frank has a very thick cheek, so we decide that a visit to a doctor is needed. Luckily the Bangalore University Hospital is one kilometre down the road. As we’ve sent Gandhi off after 12 hours of driving Shimij goes out to find us an autorickshaw. Frank livens up with the prospect of his first trip in a tuktuk, so Hans an Shimij set off with a sick, but exited little boy. The hospital is clean, quiet (at 2130 hours) and efficient. Within 45 minutes we’ve prepaid Rs 150 (no pay, no cure), seen 8 nurses, 4 doctors and one paediatrician and vomited on three of them (at least Frank has), are diagnosed (Frank again) with a bacterial infection and are back on the street with a five day course of antibiotics (another hefty Rs 150). The rickshaw ride back is another treat. Frank gets his first dose of antibiotics, and he and his sister are put to bed. The parents have a late supper that had already been prepared by Shimij. We have time to brood on the thought that it is only the third day of our holiday and now already is happening what everybody expected and predicted; our kids will get very ill in India. We suspect it is caused by the swimming pool of the Seabreezehotel in Mahabalipuram that on second thought did not smell of chlorine. Seeing other westerners with kids using the pool set us off guard. We don’t sleep well during the night, not only because we are worrying, but also because the beds are Indian standard issue, thin mattresses and very hard.
The antibiotics are already working so next morning Frank is much better. After an excellent breakfast (just tell them what you want) we decide to stay at least another day to see how he’s progressing. Mirjam and Marit go into town with Gandhi to do some shopping and find a new pair of trousers for Marit. In order to have some flexibility they take an autorickshaw. Hans stays home with Frank, who is more than happy to watch the POGO children channel on television. Over the holiday POGO proofs to be the favourite out of 50 odd channels. Besides Oswald and Pingu, Takeshi’s castle proofs to be the hit series (mad Japanese falling in, out and over any obstacles you can imagine). Frank and Hans do some shopping in a nearby supermarket (computerized checkout, 8 kinds of dog food, is Bangalore really India?), after which Frank sleeps for a couple of hours. In the afternoon Shimij housekeeper prepares an excellent fruit salad with ice-cream. Dinner is in Pizzahut, as McD is to far away (yeah, how low can you go). By the way, if children normally don’t drink Coca Cola it is not a good moment to introduce them to it around 7 o’clock at night! At night we discuss the intricacies of running a guesthouse with Shimij. One of the conclusions is that in Bangalore paying taxes is cheaper than paying bribes.
Mysore
(151205) We have not yet figured out where all the stuff has to be, so packing takes a long time. By 1000 hours we are on the road though. After a pleasant three hour drive we arrive in Mysore. Positively one of our favourite cities in India. It’s green, reasonably cool as it is situated at 1400 metres, has some pretty sights, good food, so it is a good city to spend a couple of days. After arrival Hans goes hotel hunting around Sri Harsha road opposite the palace. Lesson learned: what was perfectly acceptable before the kids came, is now not adequate anymore. The kids need room to play and a clean floor, so we are definitely upgrading our hotel standards. Well, at least in India luxury is affordable. We choose The President hotel (Near Harding Circle, BN Road, hotel_president@sancharnet.in , www.theviceroygroup.com ) were we get a spacious aircon executive suite with two extra beds for 3500 rs (a 700 rs discount after some haggling). Breakfast is complementary and good, but with a somewhat limited choice.
We have a late lunch (or early dinner? jetlag!) in the restaurant of the hotel, that is according to Gandhi the best in town. The kids have excellent French fries and we a very spicy and very tasty Andra Pradesh style chicken. We relax and play a couple of hours in our room and at the end of the day we head to the Brindavan gardens. The gardens are situated some 45 minutes from Mysore at the bottom of a barrage. It consists of a series of fountains and waterways and is artificially lit at the beginning of the evening. Entrance fee is Rs 15/10 adult/child. It is a huge attraction for the Indians and completely daft. It’s good for running around and shining your torches around, so the kids like it. Supper consists of cookies. Marit falls asleep on the way back to Mysore.
(161205) Frank is wide awake at six o’clock in the morning and starts the day by telling Hans stories about cars in general and cars in India more specific for over an hour. After Marit and Mirjam wake up we go for breakfast where both kids decide they don’t even like white bread anymore. Mum and Dad happily munch on away on idly. We head for Mysore Zoo, that is supposed to be one of the best in Asia (rs 20/10, camera 10). It is certainly one of the better ones in Asia we’ve visited and it is quiet and peaceful at 10 in the morning. The weather is ideal and the air has a nice crispness to it so early in the morning. Once again a great place for safely running around and losing some of the energy. We’re just in time for the feeding of the Elephants and everybody is amazed by the size of the riceballs they are eating.
For sentimental reasons we have lunch at the Parklane Hotel on Sri Harsharoad. Mum and dad have Southern Indian vegetarian and the kids Italian vegetarian (yeah, spaghetti). After lunch we have a bit of a rest in the hotel room. Mum could use a longer rest so daddy and the kids head for Mysore Palace at the end of the afternoon (rs 20/free for under 10, camera 5). The sultan that lived there obviously had some money to spare, so he spent it on a building that, although large, is beautiful and not too pompous on the outside. The inside is different though, here the royal family went for a Technicolor extravaganza. In and around the palace there are about 3000 girls wanting to pinch Marit in the cheek, so the kids have another chance to practice their polite refusals. We score money at an ATM and an ice-cream at a bakery. Gandhi is a good guide in telling us which brands to take and which ones to avoid. We have pizza for dinner (sigh) in an Indian rip-off of Pizzahut. Not bad though.
Chamundi hill
(171205) It is possible to drive up Chamundi-hill to visit the Chamundeeswara temple on top. It’s what most Indians do, but it is very uncool. The way to visit Chamundi-hill is to walk up the flight of 1060 odd steps. We know that Frank will have no problems doing so, but we are not totally confident in Marit’s willingness, given her normal initial lack of enthusiasm for physical activities.
It is another clear, bright and crisp morning as Ghandi drives us to the bottom of the hill and the start of the steps. Gandhi has to search a bit for the right road ‘because normally people always drive up’. He waves enthusiastically as we set off. The first steps are fine. We pass some small temples, the first monkeys and today’s representatives of the cheek pinching brigade. After 80 steps Marit decides that this is going to be a hell of a flight of stairs and that she wants to be carried. We decide to do a pits-stop and as the steps are numbered, we plan to do one stop every hundred steps. Madame agrees to this proposal and during the seven stops to come after the first one she eats 16 cookies. That happens if you skip breakfast. It must be said though that she turns out to be a tough cookie herself as she walks the whole way to the top. This is quite a feat, as some of the steps reach above her knees. Walking between Mum and Dad she manages to cope even with these ones. Our sixth stop is three quarters up the hill where an enormous statue of a Nandi (bull) is being attended to by devotees. Marit is really interested by such a big cow. The rest of the way is less steep so everybody gets a chance to regain their breath. Frank has no problems at all and probably covers an extra 50 percent of the distance running up and down in front of the rest of the family. Like often, it is not the destination that counts but the journey. The temple at the top is not very noteworthy. We share a couple of coconuts and a Coke and the kids get a small statue for free from one of the vendors around the temple. The presence of lots of beggars around the temple triggers an educational talk in our family. Why do you give to some beggars and not to others? We try to explain that we don’t give directly to young kids, as they should be in school and that we try to help them a bit through Plan International (www.plan-international.org). Older or handicapped people get a handout once in a while and where possible we sponsor temples that have a food program for the poor. It’s never an easy subject while travelling in a third world country, but on the other hand: staying away doesn’t help the poor either.
Gandhi picks us up from the parking lot near the top of the hill. We have lunch at Dasaprakash, another favourite from the earlier visits. Mum and the kids go back to the hotel for some relaxation while dad checks the email in one of the many internet cafés. Jenny, whom we know via a contact on Indiamike.com has sent a mail telling she is in Mysore at the time. Jenny has just started a small travel business and a guesthouse in Cochin and is happy to book us as her first official guests. She agrees to meet us after dinner in our hotel. In the afternoon we try to visit the sandalwood and the silk factory, but both are closed at the time. Alternatively we go shopping at the Cauvery Emporium where we buy a small copper Nandi and a necklace for Marit. Dinner is in the forecourt of the Parklane Hotel again; pasta for the kids and fingerfood and kingfisher beer for the parents. The children have fallen in a pre dinner routine where they draw and colour as if they are being paid for it. Finished products are presented to the members of the staff of the restaurant, who are not allowed to pinch their cheeks to say thanks. After dinner Jenny comes up to the hotel and we talk some time about our stay in Cochin. She seems to be a lovely woman and we look forward to staying with her. The kids sleep within two minutes and after jenny leaves the parents take the same amount of time.
Thekkady
(181205) We definitely survived the first week and are in the mood for the second. The trip from Mysore to Ooty takes four hours in principle, but we intend to spend some time in the Mudumalai Wildlife Park. Most big temples in South India have their own Elephant that Ganesha Once every year every Temple Elephant in Tamil Nadu is entitled to a 45 day holiday. All these elephants and their mahouts spent their holiday at the government sponsored holiday camp in Thekkady in the Mudumalai Wildlife park. We drive through the park and spot deer, lots of apes and one wild elephant. Their tame family members can be visited for rs 15 and photographed for rs 25. We pay our dues at the central cashier on the main road, drive to the Tourist Department guesthouse for a couple of chais and walk to the camp. The camp is well organised with kitchens, a mess hall , medical care, sleeping barracks for both the mahouts and the elephants. Well, the elephants sleep outside. The place is great to visit. Some elephants are being washed, some are fed, some are paraded in front of the visitors. Not a lot happens, but we happily spent an hour and a half watching the camp. . Frank and Marit are impressed that elephants can drink water straight from the tap and are even more impressed if they see how much an average elephant can pee in one go.
Ooty
The road from Thekkady to Ooty is not a good one, but we have a stop on a fantastic viewpoint halfway and we stop for lunch. It is after four when we arrive in Ooty. We drive up Strawberry hill to visit a couple of places in the survival kit, but they are all full. Signs direct us further up the hill to the Howard Johnson the Monarch hotel (Off Havelock Road, Ooty - 643001, (Up Church hill) Tel: +(91) (423) 2444306/2443655, Fax: +(91) (423) 2442455
themonarch@vsnl.com), so we decide to check it out . It’s a luxury place certainly worth its three stars. We check out a couple of rooms and suites and we go for the two room grand suite of 80 square metres, two televisions, big fridge, heating etc.etc. We pay 4000 rs with breakfast and two extra beds (haggled down from rs 7600). We start the heater as it is quite chilly while the room boys make up the extra beds and provide us with complimentary coffee, soft drinks and chocolates. The backpackers have thrown the towel completely, but hey; India is a swell place to do so. Mum and the kids watch Pogo while dad goes out to do some shopping in the village.
Gandhi sees Hans walking out of the hotel and drives straight after him to take him down with the car. The fact that Hans wants to walk down is something he cannot figure out. On top of that Gandhi thinks it is far to cold anyhow. In the centre of Ooty Hans is the only one dressed in a polo shirt. Everybody else (tourists and locals alike) wear thick coats, hats and even gloves. Winter evening temperature in Ooty equals autumn in the Netherlands but it is obvious all Indians (including Gandhi) thinks Hans is nutters walking in the streets virtually naked. In order to avoid littering Ooty has banned plastic shopping bags, which is certainly a good thing. In addition to some provisions, Hans buys Amar Chitra Katha (‘Amar picture books’), comics with stories and legends about Indian gods. As the restaurant at the Monarch also is chilly we order room service. The kids have fish and chips and the parents an excellent tandoori platter. It is excellent. Long live luxury or to sum it up: in the eighties Hans only visited this kind of hotel to use a sit down toilet and to nick the toilet paper.
(191205) It is a bright, fresh day (well 20 degrees Celsius compared to 32 in the lowlands). After a good breakfast where the kids in general and Marit specific did not like anything on offer (sigh; we always thought our kids were easy eaters) we head out into the village. We visit the lovely 175 year old Franciscus church and head for the botanical garden (rs 10, camera rs 10). As Marit has not eaten she has a real sugar dip and her behaviour is super annoying. After a biscuit or two she gets much better. The botanical garden is nothing to write home about. The best part of this visit are Frank and Marit who are getting better and better in avoiding pinchers and picture-takers. After that we head for Jollyland (rs 10), which is not really jolly being a playground in bad repair. The good thing though is that they have two person Go-carts. Both kids get a couple of rounds with daddy, making this one of the highpoints of the day. After the carts we head for Ooty lake, where a trip in a motorboat (rs 200) is considered ‘fat cool’ by at least 50% of the family. We have lunch in the trendy Sidewalk café in the centre of Ooty. They try their best to make pancakes, but they are made from riceflour , so they don’t qualify as ‘real’ pancakes.
We take the car for the one hour drive to Conoor. In Conoor we will board the toy train for the one and a half hour ride back to Ooty. We were afraid that the normal 6 hours would certainly be too long and a bit concerned about the small stretch too. Well we needn’t have bothered. The kids adore the ride, especially as we are in the first compartment in the first carriage and as the locomotive is pushing us, we are in front of everything. The kids take turns in being the conductor, ticket collector and meal provider and are having a marvellous time. The 1.45 hour trip is almost to short and costs us 79 rs (adults) and 59 rs (5 years and up). At night we have roomservice again in our lovely suite; fish and chips for the kids and tandoori chicken and pineapple-raita for mum and dad.
Cochin, Kerala
(201205) Travel in India will always take more time than you expect. Although this is a fine day and the roads in Kerala are good, it still takes a lot of time. After breakfast (good!) we drive two hours on very winding roads to get out of the mountains and to Mettupalayam, where we stop for chai. After that it’s straight ahead to Coimbatore, where we have a thali for lunch at a banana-leave restaurant that Gandhi selects. The thali is only 20 rs and tastes great. The kids eat cookies (sigh). The stretch to Cochin should not have taken more then two hours, but we end up in a massive traffic jam in Ernakulam, so it becomes four hours. After a detour and some searching we around six o’clock arrive at le Royale. The whole family (Jenny, Jose, and their son and triplets) is waiting for us on the porch. We are warmly welcomed with jasmine flower garlands and chilled coconuts. It’s as if we arrive home after been on a three year worldtrip.
Le Royale (www.cochinkerala.com, Kalathiveetil, Vaduthala P.O, Cochin – 682, fourens@eth.net, +91 484 2394989, +91 484 2436280) is a splendid private home that receives visitors. It is nothing like a hotel, it is much better. You not only have your room for use, but there is also a very grand communal room for the guests to use. It is very well suited for families with small kids, as there is ample space to play. There is even an in-house cinema. Le Royale is run by the adorable Jenny and Jose, who do their utmost to fulfil all wishes of their guests. Jenny cooks excellent Keralan meals or western food if you like. They also run a travel agency, so they can help you with your onward travels. We cannot recommend them enough. A double aircon room with breakfast will cost you around Rs 3500.
The kids feel at home right away and start exploring the premises. Jose sends out a servant to buy ice-cold beer and Jenny starts preparing the food for the kids. Real pancakes, YES, real pancakes made with real flour. After only half an hour Jenny is Frank and Marits favourite Indian by far. We start with a beer and after we’ve put the kids to bed in their sumptuous room, we have cosy dinner with jenny and Jose. The Keralan fish and chicken dishes are wonderful (and so is the very cold beer).
(211205) Breakfast is Riceflourthingies cooked in banana-leave with channa (Keralan speciality which name we did not write down) for the adults and pancakes for the kids. Gandhi drives us to the Jewish quarter in Cochin. It is very busy. There are hundreds of people, a dozen or more busses and a lot more shops then last time we visited. This is not the friendly place we remember from our last visit in 1997. The kids don’t like it at all, and neither do we. We retreat to Malabar House, a colonial heritage hotel that we especially liked during our earlier visit (and which we remember for its special bathroom). It is still an oasis of peace and quiet and we decide to have lunch there. Frank eats spaghetti, Marit the baguette and the parents have Keralan Fish and a Thali. Bit expensive, but Frank loves the spaghetti and both kids get a goodiebag after the meal, so Frank decides that this restaurant is even better than McDonalds. We could not agree more. After lunch we take a stroll through Cochin Fort and are happy that it still has the relaxed feel we like so much. We visit a couple of sights and walk along the waterfront and the Chinese fishingnets. The short autorikshaw ride to the ferry is a treat for the kids and so is the ferryride to Ernakulam where Gandhi picks us up. We skip the kathakali performance, because it is scheduled around kids’ dinnertime. The kids don’t mind, because they get to watch Shrek in the in house cinema in jenny’s home. The kids eat vegetarian (without spices) at night and the parents have a wonderful beef stew (and beer).
(221205) Backwaterday. As the kids don’t swim yet, we decide that 24 hours on a houseboat might not be a really relaxing time for the parents. Therefore we rent a rather large motorboat (1300 rs for 3 hours) in Aleppey. The weather is nice, the backwaters are wonderful and the trip is very relaxing. The kids are allowed to steer the boat and are able agree on changing places once in a while on their own. This is holiday as it should be. We drive back to Cochin where we visit the children’s park where Frank is unbelievably fast in his little red toycar. After some time he even learns to brake, thus saving the legs of lots of little Indians. After another visit to the cinema, Mirjam cooks chicken, potatoes and vegetables for the kids (real food as Marit remarked) and once the kids sleep the parents both get an enormous lobster followed by a chicken dish (and beer). It is fun but difficult to slaughter a lobster with your bare hands, so we send Jenny some utensils a couple of weeks later. It is once again a very enjoyable night.
(231205) In the morning Jenny teaches Mirjam to make massala dosa. After breakfast and the last visit to the cinema we have to say goodbye. As someone else put it: staying with Jenny and Jose is a bit like being adopted into the family. We feel sorry that we have to leave.
Munnar
The drive to Munnar back in the mountains takes 4 hours, which we break up for a 45 minute lunch. The kids are doing fine in the car, not only today, but during most of the trip. They read a bit, they look outside, they colour a bit, basically it’s amazing how well they cope with the hours in the car. After some searching around we end up in the luxurious 4 star Tea County hotel (www.ktdc.com/Teacounty.htm). It’s operated by the KTDC and real good value at 4500 rs half board in a suite with two extra beds for the kids (even though it’s the last room they discount it by 2000 rs). The kids play a bit and watch POGO, mum lazes a bit on the veranda of our room and dad gets out to score some survival rations (fruit juice packages, crisps, cookies). We head for dinner which starts at 1930 hours and consists of a large buffet. Normally we are wary of these, but everything is fresh and tasty. The staff are very friendly and bend over backwards to make our kids feel at home. The cooks prepare dishes from the buffet, without spices, but it’s a bit late and they don’t really eat. Just as in Ooty at night we have to start the heater as it gets definitely chilly at 200 metres altitude. We sleep very well.
(241205) ‘t Was the day before Christmas. But except for an abundance of light features in the garden of the hotel there is not much to remind us of this. The breakfast buffet is as good as the buffet the day before (and interesting because you can order you egg from a real cook). We head through an abundance of tea plantations for a barrage and the lake attached to it some 15 kilometres away. Speedboats are operated on the lake and when in Europe we wouldn’t even want to be found dead in one, we now happily set for a 20 minute trip (200 rs). The speedboat scores another ‘fat cool’.
One of the things that Hans really wanted to do and really looked forward to is a trip on an elephant with the kids . Well there is one (1) elephant available so daddy and the kids set out for another 20 minute ride (rs 300), now on the back of an elephant, while Mirjam runs around the pachyderm (vary your vocabulary) to make all the required pictures. After the speedboat the ride only qualifies as ‘yeah fine’, which disappoints dad a bit. Well he should just have had a little less high expectations. We drive on a bit to the place at the lake with a distinctive echo. We’re glad that the vast majority of the does not understand Dutch. Via a second elephant that’s loading logs onto a truck we head back to the hotel for lunch. French firs (sigh) American Chop Suey and Indian veggies. The hotel’s little playground is probably the high point of the day. After a small siesta we head for the tea museum (rs 50 adult). According to the Survival Kit it’s supposed to be a disused tea factory, but when we get there it is in full operation. For those who still use teabags: the lowest grade tea available is called ‘dust’. Dust remains after the real tealeaves have been filtered out using a five stage sieve. The dust used to be given away to the factory workers, until the teabags were invented. Dinner is once again a bit too late for the kids, although Father Christmas is bringing us a visit. Accompanied by 50 % of the hotel staff and a tape-recorder playing loud Christmas songs, Father Christmas delivers a Christmas Cake. Because of X-mas the buffet is even better than the night before. Great hotel!
Kumily
(Christmas 2005) The perfect nights sleep is only disturbed once in a while by firecrackers. Hey weren’t they supposed to be used at new year? Well who cares. After a great Indian breakfast (we) and almost nothing (them) the kids say goodbye to almost every single member of staff and we hit the road for Kumily. The route to from Munnar to Kumily is fantastic. During the first part we drive through sunny tea-plantations with thousands shades of green. We stumble upon a mini-festival at a small temple and once we leave tea county we drive through the jungle with huge cardamom plantations. After a couple of hours we stop for chai and X-mas cake after which the kids feel a bit better (the road is quite windy especially if you haven’t eaten breakfast). Both Frank and Marit are sleeping once we reach Kumily. We check out a couple of adequate guesthouses with rooms in the 600-800 rs bracket, but without interconnecting doors. One of the homestay-owners takes us to another family that rents out a whole apartment with two bedrooms for 1000 rs (Kumily Jungle Palace Homestay; it’s on the road from the village to the park). The apartment has got a big balcony with a view of the Thekkady Wildlife Park. The view of the wildlife is limited to a couple of buffaloes, but the balcony is great for messing around with buckets of water. Mum and dad enjoy a beer on the terrace, that tastes well even though it’s lukewarm. Around six o’clock we walk to the village for dinner. The ‘Cardamom’ County hotel does a great buffet for 325 rs adult (and free for the kids). Frank and Marit are fit this night, so they try a couple of dishes. The staff cook up some of the items of the buffet without spices and they get rewarded with lovely drawings. Back at the apartment the kids sleep within minutes and mum and dad watch some TV. The sheets on our bed depicts almost every character from the Disney-stable. Ever slept with Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck at the same time?
(261205) We have a leisurely (very slow we mean) breakfast under trees in the garden of the Coffee Inn. Travellers’ breakfast (banana pancake) complemented with home-baked brown bread with peanut butter. We visit a spice garden, that once probably started with an occasional guest, but now makes good business from all the visitors (rs 50). They do tell a sound and interesting story about all the plants they’re exploiting. We have lunch at our own apartment (yes we said that we wanted cornflakes, but not really). We visit Thekkady after lunch with another 1000 or so tourists. Its seems that boxing day is the day to visit the park. We stand in line for tickets for 20 minutes (rs 300 for westerners and rs 5 for kids of any nationality) and 10 minutes later we are hustled aboard one of the smaller tourist boats by one of Gandhi’s relations. The official tickets sold out 12 hours before (to touts). No seats left, so Mirjam, Frank and Marit are seated on top of the motor-cover and Hans is pressed between an Indian family. If you are very quiet you might even be able to spot some real wildlife, but with the first suspicion of anything alive 90 Indians jump up and start yelling at the presumed animal. The animals have better things to do then being shouted at on a free afternoon, so the real exotic wildlife spotted this afternoon are only Dutch Homo Sapiens. For the rest we see five mountain-goats, one pig, one salamander, four otters and two stones that are sold to us as two unmoving elephants over one kilometre away. It is so exciting and interesting that Marit falls asleep on top of the boats motor. Playing with the shower on the terrace is more fun and so is dinner once more in Cardamom County with fried potatoes and peas for the kids and the sumptuous buffet for the parents. During dinner Marit has a poetic outburst as she pronounces unprompted “O pretty, pretty palm tree, life is beautiful with thee” (or for the Dutch natives ‘O schone, schone palmboom, het leven is een droom’). After dinner Marit scores a T-shirt with a tiger on it and we take an auto-rickshaw back to the apartment. It’s a good ending to a less brilliant day.
Madurai
(271205). After another breakfast in the Coffee Inn (which gives the slowfoodmovement a whole new meaning) we leave Kumily at ten o’clock. For three quarters of an hour an Indian family of 25 odd persons have been waiting in front of the apartment and they turn out to be our successors. It’s a fast and steep descent out of the mountains and into Tamil Nadu with the road winding between the last parts of the jungle and with every bend in the road populated by tens of monkeys. Once we leave the mountains the road is in very good condition and within three hours we reach Madurai. Hans does a bit of a hotel search along West Perumal Maistry Street. About seven of the hotels we look at are full and we end up in the King Suite of the Supreme Hotel (how much higher can you go) for 2138 rs including taxes and two extra beds. The room is OK; it has a balcony, temple view (50 % interrupted), a bathroom with some mildew and a complementary minibar with frozen cola. After lunch and some Pogo it’s time for some education so we visit the Gandhi museum. It takes some effort but afterwards the kids know that ‘Gandhi was a good guy, that he wanted to be his own boss and that he made his own clothes and his own salt’. The Sri Meenakshi temple reopens at 4 o’clock and as we want to visit it before nightfall, we pass the playground near the Gandhi Museum. A bit stupid, because there are lots of great temples, but not a lot of great playgrounds in India. Sri Meenakshi is Hans’ favourite temple in India. Hans loves the big Temple towers, and the hustle and bustle of the temple. For the kids it’s a bit too overwhelming; too dark and too many people. The temple museum is OK though and also the outside (between the inner and outer wall) is fine, because it’s a good place for running around. We head for one of the Kashmiri shops west of the temple and see the sun setting over the temple from the rooftop. The view and the complementary softdrink is well worth 10 minutes of sales banter later on and as they do not have the perfect Ganesha, we leave …with nothing. As the kids have not been in a cycle rickshaw yet Mirjam takes them back to the hotel in one. To spare the cyclist Hans takes the Ambassador back. 8 years ago we ate at the roof terrace of the hotel we are now staying in, so why change if you found something good. The temperature is very nice with a cooling breeze. The personnel is extremely nice to the kids, who feast on French fires. Mum and dad feast on Indian snacks and beer.
(281205, holy innocents day). As it is Hans Birthday, Mirjam and kids get out early for a surprise, described by Marit as: “We cannot tell you, because it is a secret, but we are going to get you a birthday cake”. Some time later they return with an excellent personalised pink birthday cake, one candle and a jasmine garland. Breakfast is cake and juice and vitamin pills. The Thiruparakundram temple is situated some 5 kilometres from the centre of Madurai. They started the temple in caves in the cliffs and later build a hall in front of it. It is not so busy as we are there and as a non-Hindu you get to see everything for 20 rs. Even the inner sanctum is shown and a the temple has a water-feature were you can feed the fish with parboiled rice. It’s supposed to be good for your Karma. Back in Madurai we have lunch in the Royal Retreat Hotel after which we drive to Trichy.
Trichirapully
Three hours later we are in Trichy. We head straight for Jenneys residency, where jenny no longer resides. The hotel has been taken over by the Breeze hotel from Chennai and is now called (guess what) Breeze Residency. We get a lovely two room suite with breakfast and two extra beds for 3000 rs (talked down from 4300 rs). The kids watch the Crazy Japanese on Pogo and Hans does some shopping. We celebrate Hans Birthday with roomservice (Fish and Chips and Tandoori) and a couple of Kingfishers. Not a bad way to end a birthday.
(291205) The breakfast buffet in the Residency is not only good, the kids once more get a goody bag, that puts McD to shame . As Gandhi lives nearby, we let him sleep in at home and so around 11 o’clock we go to South Tourism to pay Faith for the car. The office is some distance outside Trichy and obvious business is going well as they are building a new office / home. Well, it’s well earned, as we are very content with the service. The Sri Ranganatashwari temple is nearby and we visit this temple that looks more as a city. People live nowadays within the outer three walls, but what remains in the four inner walls is still very impressive. For a small fee they let you climb up a roof for a fine view over the roofs of the temple, the inner sanctum cannot be visited by non Hindu’s. We have an excellent thali for lunch at the “Banana Leave” restaurant (rs 30). The restaurant also does interesting French fries, all about the same size and stacked on the plate in a neat tower. The Rock Fort temple is the distinguishing landmark of the town, as it stands some 90 metres above it. We drive halfway up the hill and walk the rest (no other possibility by the way). The kids have really gotten into temple visits, as it gives them the possibility to around run a bit without the risk of getting hit by a car. By this time they are also no longer intimidated by the vast amounts of Indians who at times they dare to inch them in order to reprove them with a raised index finger (“No pinching (gnignigni)”). The temple as such is not very interesting, but the views over the city and surrounding countryside are great. At the bottom of the temple is the city’s main shopping district. Mirjam buys three sarees. She needs saree-lessons, and we have a lot of fun as she wriggles herself into a changing room with two Indian ladies and about seven of them shouting encouragement from outside. Meanwhile Marit and Frank are entertained by other shop attendants with balloons. We buy Marit a small gold Ganesha ring a few shops further down the road and ice-cream and Coke for the whole family. We’ve still not finished shopping and drive to the Government controlled Poompubar Shopping Emporium. After having searched for two weeks for the perfect Ganesha statue, we now find four of them. We go for the compromise and buy two: one of the dancing and one of the flute-playing variety. We also stock up on small souvenirs and give-aways and Gandhi buys Hans a small wooden elephant statue for his birthday. Dinner is the same as yesterday, with excellent fish and chips and the usual hot stuff for mum and dad.
Thanjavur
(301205) The trip from Trichy to Thanjavur only takes 1,5 hours, and finding a hotel is also not difficult at all. We end up in the Oriental Towers, the first one we visit. We get two interconnected rooms for 2590 rs, a 20 % discount after some haggling with the staff and a phone call to the boss. We even get more discount and via some strange accounting procedure by the time we leave next day. We have an excellent lunch in the bit musty ‘western’ restaurant of the hotel; pasta for the kids and another thali for you know who. We visit an art village to the south of the centre. We found it on a free map in the hotel. Art village is definitely to broad a term for a couple of houses, but there are some artisans there. The really interesting ones are casting bronze and it ism fascinating to watch the whole process. We visit the Palace Museum, which is great, because you can climb the tower via small stairs that you have to find in another corner on every new floor. Students are helping to clean old bronze statues in the courtyard of the museum and Frank amuses himself and the students by trying to recreate all poses of the statues. At the end of the afternoon the Brihadiswara temple is a good place for running and crying “ayappah”. Ayappa’s is our term for the pilgrims that visit the sacred places of the South during this time of the year. They are clad in black, they drive around in white ambassadors packed very full at great speed and run through temples calling “ayappah”. Having seen this our kids really like the concept and started imitating them. We were a bit afraid that this might be viewed as sacrilegious, but even the real ayappa’s told us they found it amusing and didn’t mind it at all. Frank is offered a small oil (ghee) lamp by a vendor and promptly burns himself trying to light it. It is just a first degree burn, so some cool water solves it . At night we order fish and chips and something nice for mum and dad. This is a good place to note that although mum worries a lot about the kids not eating enough, they did not loose any weight in India and the vitamin pills took care of the rest of the potential hazards in the food department. Everybody has an excellent night of sleep.
Chidambaram
(311205) New Years Eve and Pondicherry is today’s destination. On the way over we visit the Airotasvara temple in Dharasuram and the Brihabeswara temple in Gangakudacholaduram. Are we not temple tired by now? No we are not and this is also the case for the kids. Both temples are nice, quiet and peacefull, the weather is fine, the lawns surrounding the temples soft and running around temples becomes more and more fun. You cannot scream Ayappa in a church in Europe, can you? Marit teases Indian teenagers to pinch her, just to be able to tell them ‘no pinching!’. We take it easy and reach Chidambaram around 1400 hours, where we take lunch in the restaurant of the Saradharam hotel (opposite the bus station). They serve an excellent thali. From the office Gandhi has heard that most hotels in Pondicherry are full for New Years Eve and a couple of phone calls confirms this. We decide to stay in Chidambaram and check into the last free room of the Saradharam hotel. The three bed room with aircon and one extra mattress on the ground costs 1125 Rs. We relax a bit and Hans burns a couple of backup CD-ROMS with pictures in a local photo store. The Nataraja temple is closed for the afternoon but opens again at 1645. There is fierce competition between the two shoe guardians in the front of the temple. They see the fun in the bidding contest we start, but we end up splitting the commerce over both of them. Taking pictures is forbidden in the temple, but it is a very friendly place with priests eager to explain what’s happening without asking for the usual fee. The kids are now running full Ayappa speed around the compound and it’s a bit difficult to keep up with them. Frank hurts his toe, but the first aid kit is enough to deal with it. Sun is setting and a 1800 hours a fire ceremony is performed before the statue of Shiva. All kinds of candles and oil lamps are taken and waved in front of Shiva, while meanwhile all bells in the temple are ringed . An interesting and certainly ear shattering experience. It’s a bit too late when we have dinner in the restaurant of the hotel, so Frank falls asleep at the table. The snack food is OK though. Some interesting insects crawl over the floor of the room , we put both kids in a single bed and don’t use the mattress on the ground. We are waken up at 2400 hours by some fireworks, but the bus station opposite the hotel makes a lot more noise. Happy New Year everyone!
Pondicherry
(010106, New Year) The breakfast in the cafeteria of the Saradharam was very good, with probably one of the best chais we ever had in India. Gandhi has washed his Ambassador extra well because of the new year and at half past ten we drive to Pondicherry. We arrive there two hours later and first try two of the Ashram guesthouses. Very unfriendly welcome. T’s no problem that you have no vacancies, but could you please tell in a friendly way (and let me use the toilet). Some other observations about the Aurovillains. They have not taken over Pondicherry (fortunately), but do put a distinctive stamp on it. We don’t really like it / them. Unfriendly or uninterested behaviour in their shops. They try to take on a ‘Fair Trade’ image, but when asked they are just working for themselves. Bit negative, yeah maybe, but that’s the impression they left.
Now we got that out of the way; Pondicherry is a friendly place and fun to spent a couple of days. We ended up in the Executive inn, a lovely small suite-hotel at 1-A Perumal Koi Street
Pondicherry – 605001 (www.executiveinn.biz). It’s situated about 400 metres from the sea to the north of the boulevard. The suites are not very big, but are well appointed and very clean. You get two rooms and four beds. An absolute bargain at rs 1200 + tax. Staff are friendly and helpful. It has a small restaurant in the cellar, good breakfast, but not a joyous location for a nice dinner. After checking in we have lunch at the newly opened Pizza Hut on Lal Bahabur street. Staff needs a bit more training on their tea-making but the pizzas are good. In the afternoon we visit the botanical gardens, just like so many Indian families. The park has a train ride, a playground and attempt at a Japanese garden and lots of shady trees. It also has a couple of stands that inspire Frank and Marit to sing songs for a growing Indian audience and their somewhat perplexed parents. Frank has a lot of success with the Dutch version of Prince’s “Seastar and coffee’. Later on some Indian kids also do a performance of their own, so it is an afternoon well spent and great for Indo/Dutch cultural relations.
At night the Boulevard is closed of for traffic and we walk the length of it with literally tens of thousands Indians celebrating the new year. We try to eat at Satsanga’s, but the atmosphere is spoilt by some rowdy drunk western and Indian guests that started celebrating new year early afternoon (or late last night). We have to move to the Rendez Vous restaurant, because all the other candidates around are closed for the new-year. It wasn’t so good nine years ago and it is still a bit of a tourist trap. Nothing wrong with the French Fries, but try to avoid it. We take a Rickshaw through the masses back to our lovely hotel where we decide to stay and not do another move until our last day in India.
(020106) Breakfast at the hotel and a breakthrough. Frank drinks Indian Chai and loves it. He also likes the Puri, as long as he does not have to eat the curries that come with it. We cover everybody in factor 30 and 60 and drive South to Paradise beach. After having paid an entry fee to something (carpark?, government boat departure tax? Whatever), we find out that you need a boat to reach the beach. As it is a Monday there are no other tourists, so we have to rent a whole boat for a price that is ridiculous by Indian and western standards, We drive back North to find another beach. After having been sent away from two places run by (how amazing) the Aurovillains, we finally find Quiet beach. We walk through a beach resort to get to the beach that has no facilities, but the kids are having a good time. After a couple of hours soaking up the sun we have lunch at the resort and leisurely head back to Pondi. In the afternoon we visit the paper-factory run by you know who, where the head of production gives us a short tour, and where the shopkeepers are not unfriendly (just uninterested).
At 1800 hours we walk down to the new Promenade hotel, near Gandhi’s statue, right on the boulevard. It is part of the ‘Hidesign’ group and under German management, so everything is whole, functioning and clean and they have excellent draft beer. Meal service only starts at half past seven, but the snackmenu is extensive, and easily makes up for a real meal. We read the kids from the comic books we bought in Ooty and they draw some pictures for the staff . We love the food, we love the cocktails, the friendly personnel and the atmosphere.
(030106)Another day at the beach somewhere north of Pondicherry. This time the beach has a coconut-vendor for facilities. We open the first Lost Sandal Beach Museum in India and are able to get quite a collection together in a short period. Lunch (well cake) is at a French bakery on Ambour Salai (near Higginbottams). After a siesta we do some souvenir shopping and we go back to the Botanical Gardens for a couple of hours playing and another train ride. Dinner at the Promenade is once again very good, but we have to wait a long time to get our last item, an order of spicy chicken. In the end we cancel it and ask for the bill. Within one minutes the manager and the chief cook turn up to offer their excuses, free drinks and four pieces of mouth-watering chocolate cake. What a good way to make up for a small mistake; we love the place even more.
Pondicherry to Chennai
(040106) After breakfast and packing up we drive in the direction of Chennai. As we fly back in the very early morning of the middle of the night we booked a room in the Hotel Mars, a couple of Kilometres from Chennai Airport. It’s average but the room is adequate for 1199 rs, the food is lousy. The kids get some sleep, the parents don’t. the flight back is uneventful, Lufthansa got my email and got everything right this time.
On the way to Chennai we stop at Mahabalipuram. We have one more thali at the Mammalla Heritage hotel. We walk around the sights and it’s great to see how free the kids move around compared to their explainable timid behaviour 3,5 weeks before. Walking around the place with our kids once more sort of finishes up not only the circle we made through South India, but also one we started almost ten years before during our honeymoon. It was absolutely fabulous to be back in India. It was great to have the kids with us. We all loved it. We cannot wait to go back .
Practicalities
Preparation
Any trip to Asia will be much more fun with some preparation done, but this certainly is the case when taking kids. This was to be our fifth (Hans) and third (Mirjam) trip to India, so we knew a bit what to expect. We started preparing with the Lonely Planet (LP) ’Travel with Children’. As a guidebook we used the 2005 edition of the LP ‘South India’. We got a lot of information from www.lonelyplanet.com , www.roughguides.com , the rec.travel.asia newsgroup and www.indiamike.com. For up to date information we especially recommend the latter site. In general there is not a lot of specific information on travel with small children in India available, but we got some useful contacts and tips via Indiamike.com. We posted scans of our passports and visa to our hotmail address.
Transport
At first we thought we would go backpacking again, but after consultation on the web we decided to do it a bit more luxurious this time. We did a bit of a websearch, sent out some emails and got in contact with Mrs. Faith Pandian from Window to the World. (www.tourism-southindia.com No 4, Annai Avenue, Vasanth Nagar Extn, Kollidakarai, Srirangam Trichy - 620 006, Tamil Nadu (INDIA) Tel No. :+(91)-(431)-2433372/2437183/2435219 email : info@tourism-southindia.com). Faith reacted very promptly to our emails and did not need any payment up-front. She arranged a brand new ambassador car with AC and driver for us. We paid 875 euros for 25 days unlimited mileage (and unlimited service) which is a bit more than you would probably pay if you arrange it in India.
Our driver Gandhi was absolutely brilliant. Being a father himself he took extremely good care of us and especially of the children. Gandhi is very friendly and speaks good English. He was always on time, the car was clean inside and outside whenever he called in for duty in the morning or when we showed during the day. This is quiet a feat if you imagine our children putting their dirty shoes automatically against the back of the front seats. Gandhi was also a very useful source of information on sights, hotels and restaurants, without being pushy about anything. In the end he even managed to sing along to some of the Dutch songs we sang during the longer car rides. We highly recommend him (and Faiths travel agency).
Money and costs
India is a cheap country by any standard, but travelling with the kids certainly made it a bit more costly. For comparison; in 1997 we spent about 35 Euros a day during our seven week honeymoon in India and in 1998 we spent 25 euros a day during a trip to Nepal and Sikkim. Now our daily budget averaged 120 euros. From this amount we spent about half on accommodation, a bit over 25 % on the car plus driver and the remainder on food, drinks, entrance fees, souvenirs, tips etc. . Especially the accommodation cost a lot compared to what we used to spent, but we were with four now, we spent more time in the hotelroom and wanted cleaner and more spacious accommodation. We used our creditcard for paying the car and some hotels. We used our normal banking cards to get cash from ATM’s, that are now abundant. Prices we mention are always including tax. Like almost anywhere in Asia (and the world), tourists are overcharged in India. Two simple rules apply: ask prices before you order anything and bargain for everything. It will make your stay a lot cheaper.
Weather
The monsoon had been very heavy this year, washed away lots of houses and roads in Tamil Nadu and tens of thousands of people were rendered homeless. We arrived during the tail end of the monsoon, so we decided to do our trip anti-clockwise and travel west as soon as possible. After the first three days we had excellent weather with temperatures between 25 and 35 degrees Celsius.
Friendliness, dangers and annoyances
In general we think people in the South are a lot more friendly and relaxed than in the North. This was one of the reasons to choose (again) for the south. The more relaxed you are yourself, the more friendly responses you'll get, in the north as well as in the south. If someone wants to take you to his shop (hotel, sister, wedding, festival, home) and you don't want to join him, be firm in keeping the direction you were going in. Try to talk to them about other things; even touts can be fun to chat to.
Travel with two young blond children attracts a lot of attention. This is in general not meant in an unfriendly way, but at times it would get a bit annoying for the kids. What was really a nuisance is everybody trying to pinch the kids in the cheek. “NO PINCHING” were English words Frank and Marit learned really quickly. Mum and dad would support this by warning of the attacks and by pinching back if necessary. The kids also didn’t like posing for photographs.
This may be annoying; the real danger lies in the traffic. There is no way you can let go of your kids once you are in the streets. Temples are great for some physical exercise and the locals did not seem to mind our kids running around temples shouting Ayappa (we’ll come back to that later). Another annoyance is the air-pollution; a car with air-conditioning is absolutely necessary to keep most of the dirty air out.
Health
This was our main concern this time. We thought that the hazards were manageable (otherwise we would not have gone). Everybody was inoculated for Diphtheria, Tetanus, Polio, Typhus, Hepatitis A and B. As malaria prophylaxis we used Proguanil hydrochloride (Paludrine) during our stay. As a general precaution we took multivitamins every day. We trained our kids to wash their hands a lot more than we normally do (yeah we know you should always etc…, but sometimes these things just don’t happen). We even started brushing teeth out of a bottle before the last few weeks for the holiday.
In India we tried to keep a leisurely pace, building in a couple of hours of relaxing in the hotel room at teatime. Although we travelled quite a distance (about 2500 kilometres) we have the feeling that we took it easy. With the exception of Frank who was ill for a day, we were lucky as for the rest we didn't get ill. Some simple tips that worked for us:
• Drink bottled water (available everywhere).
• Use suntan Lotion (factors 30 and 15 (and sometimes 60))
• Keep your hands clean and don’t pick your nose (brings the bacteria straight into your system). Do not pick up stuff from the streets.
• Wash your hands before eating (or use disinfecting wet tissues; also good for cleaning feet after temple-visits).
• Keep nails short.
• Always put on hasty and sunglasses.
• Wear long or three quarter trousers (keeps knees whole)
• Wear long sleeves
• Wear sturdy shoes, no sandals. Check feet on cuts after temple visits and disinfect if necessary.
• Disinfect any cut or scratch as soon as possible
• Never eat anything from a stall / cooked in the streets. Stay away from buffet-style meals. Eat in busy restaurants.
• Donate small amounts of money to a Temple once in while and pray to the gods on a regular basis. Have Imodium ready anytime.
• Use mosquito repellent. For hotel rooms we bought and used the Bayer electrical mosquito coils.
Medical kit
During the day we always had suntan lotion (Vichy SPF 15 and 30; good stuff!!) and a medical kit in our day pack. The First Aid Kit was in a soft pack (‘Care plus’ brand from ‘tropenzorg’) with some additions of our own and contained:
• Hydrophilic bandages 300*8 cm and 400*8 cm
• Burn dressing
• Sterile compresses
• Antiseptic wipes
• Adhesive tape
• Protection gloves
• Emergency bandages
• Tweezers
• Safety pins
• Wound plaster
• Emergency shears
• Shatterproof thermometer
• Emergency blanket
• Support bandage
• Triangular sling
• Tick out tick remover
• Chloorhexidine 0,2 % antibacterial spray
In our luggage we had the following medicines available:
• Paracetamol with caffeine 500 mg (adults); the modern aspirin; helps against all kinds of pains (and hangovers)
• Paracetamol 160 mg (perdolan); chewing tablets for children
• Tripelennamine HCL (Azaron) relieves itches from mosquito bites etc.
• Multivitamins for adults and children
• Proguanil hydrochloride (Paludrine) Malaria prophylaxis
• Amoxicillin ; broad-spectrum antibiotic (Flemoxin : tablets solvable in water)
• Ciprofloxacin 500 mg (another antibiotic especially against heavy diarrhoea)
• Oral Rehydration Solution (adult and children; basically the same stuff, but the child variety has an added taste (still lousy)
• (Miconazoli nitras 2,5 mg zinc oxydium 150 mg pro gram) Anti fungal cream
• Loperamide HCL (Imodium)
• Xylometazolin (nasal spray; 0.1% for adults, 0,05 % for kids; opens up all cavities in your head; good against pressure differences in planes)
• Fluconazol 50 mg (against slime in the airways)
Luggage
We checked 2 soft backpacks weighing 21 kilograms in total. They contained more or less:
Parents (each)
• 2 Zip off pants
• 1 pair of shorts
• 2 shirts (1 safari style; ideal for stuffing tickets, passports etc. on the plane)
• 2 polo shirts
• 2 T-shirts (also for sleeping)
• Sturdy walking boots
• Flip-flops
• 5 Underpants (2 bra’s for mum)
• 4 pairs of socks
• 5 pocketbooks for dad
• Saturday papers and magazines
• Toiletries
• Copies of our passports and some emergency cash
Kids (each)
• 4 pairs of pants (covering the knees)
• 6 shirts / t-shirts
• 6 pair of socks
• 3 singlets
• 6 underpants
• Night nappies (that we did not really need: both our kids decided that India was a good place to be “night toilet trained”)
• 1 pyjama
• Jungle boots (Frank; not available in Marits size, so she had sports hoes with a zipper)
• Teva sandals
In our hand luggage on the flight (two daypacks, one Samsonite carry-on and 1 shoulder bag) we had:
• Raincoats (the foldaway type)
• Sunhats
• Sunglasses
• Travel survival kit South India
• Camera (Canon digital IXUS 750)
• Mobile phone (triple band; it worked almost everywhere in the cities in India)
• Copies of our passports and some emergency cash
• All the medical stuff including contact lens necessities
• Mosquito repellent(with DEET for the parents, without for the kids)
• Suntan lotion and after sun lotion
• A sweater each
• Cuddly toy for the kids
• Colouring books, pencils, soft tip pens, some small cars, Lego, small Playmobil puppets.
• Water, softdrinks, nibbles, cookies (if you’ve ever spent 6 hours on an Egypt Air plane on the tarmac in Hurghada without drinks, you bring your own).
In our moneybelts: Passports, credit cards, ATM cards, some cash (Euros).
| | Sentimental journey: Honeymoon India 1997 | | For those sentimental minds: how was it in India (more then)10 years ago. We visited India on our Honeymoon from 30 November 1997 till 15 January 1998. We made a 7 week tour and visited Delhi, Rajasthan, Agra, Varanasi, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Karnataka, Goa and Bombay. In this report we describe some of our experiences and things we've noticed during our trip.
Hans en Mirjam Damen
General
Weather
Having been in India twice before, the weather wasn't exactly what we expected, at least in the North. In the North we had daytime temperatures up to 20 degrees centigrade when the sun was shining. If not, temperatures stopped at 12-13 degrees. For us (from Holland) this was still T-shirt-weather, but the papers spoke of an actual coldwave. People were dying because night-time temperatures dropped to 8 degrees. We had a few rain showers and in Pushkar even a hailstorm. In the South we experienced the last two days of the monsoon, but for the rest in was excellent weather with temperatures between 25 en 35 degrees Celsius.
Friendliness and annoyances
In general we think people in the South are a lot more friendly and relaxed than in the North. If we say in general it's just that. In the north we met very friendly people and were even invited to weddings. In the south not everybody was nice. The more relaxed you are yourself, the more friendly responses you'll get, in the north as well as in the south. If someone wants to take you to his shop (hotel, sister, wedding, festival, home.) and you don't want to join him, be firm in keeping the direction you were going in. Try to talk to them about other things; even touts can be fun to chat to.
Our top two of annoyances: 1. Babe-bumping; grownup youths walking up against western females (more than once in a while also using their hands). After 10 days Mirjam found the answer; she turned around and smacked them. This is especially effective if their friends are watching; they lose a lot of face being hit by a woman. 2. Urinating on monuments. This is another thing that really annoyed us. Any slightly dark corner of virtually all the monuments, palaces and even temples you visit smells of ammoniac. OK, it's not always possible to find a public toilet in the streets (quiet difficult to be honest), but could you please stop pissing all over your national heritage?
Trains
Way to go in India. Although quite slow they are reasonably reliable and relatively safe. Travelling by train has the added advantage that you meet lots of people, whose first interest in you isn't purely commercial. As with everything in India, you get what you pay for and in this case even without haggling. Problem is not the trains (they are running) but getting the reservations. As most trains are full, if you want tickets on short notice you need to get into some kind of quota. There are heaps of quota (VIP, emergency, military, sport, handicapped etc.), the trick is to find the guy (or girl) who is handing them out. In big cities this is not a problem; there are special reservation bureau's that deal with foreigners. In smaller places it is often necessary to use your imagination and social skills. Basically the procedure is: buy your ticket first, find out that you are waitlisted, find the manager in charge of quota's, fill in a form and get your reservation next day or so. Shortcut: find the manager of the reservationoffice, present your business card, explain your problem, drink tea and have some smalltalk, pay for your ticket and reservation.
Like we said; you get what you pay for. Price difference between unreserved second class seat and first class air-conditioning sleeper is enormous. For long distances there are five classes to choose from; First class AC sleeper, Second class AC sleeper, first class sleeper, sleeper class and second class seater. Most times we opted for first class without AC or second class with AC. In both classes there are two berths above each other; the difference is the aircon and you get bedding in second class, but there is more space in first class and it's about 30 percent cheaper. On occasion we also travelled in sleeperclass. There you find three berths above each other and although it gets a bit cramped and full it's also a feasible option. In any class: lock your luggage with a steel wire to the train.
Busses
As we wanted to get some sleep we didn't travel on nightbusses. We heard from other travellers that they can be OK, but most of the times aren't. Same goes for day busses though. Once in a while you might get a good one, but the best material of private buscompanies is used during the night.
A bus in India is never to old and never full. Don't be amazed to find yourself in a bus with more than 200 passengers, not counting the ones hanging on the outside (we are definitely not exaggerating). Fortunately we didn't have any accidents; small donations to various temples may have helped. The good thing about the busses were conductors. Almost always friendly, helpful and we were never overcharged.
Health
Both of us were quite tired the moment we started our holiday. In order to keep healthy and sane we started our trip very quiet and slept far into the day almost every day during the first week. We are not very good at avoiding the hottest part of the day (logically if you're up late), but most days we relaxed a couple of hours with a beer and potato-chips at teatime. Although we travelled quite a distance (about 6500 kilometres) we have the feeling that we took a leisurely pace.
We were extremely lucky as we didn't get ill once. Some simple tips: drink bottled water (unlike the last time we visited (1992) it's now available everywhere). Wash your hands before eating (or use disinfecting wet tissues; also good for cleaning feet after temple-visits). Never eat anything bought on the streets. Stay away from buffet-style meals. Eat in busy restaurants. It might be worth to eat in more expensive restaurants in the beginning of your stay, but on the other hand: who knows what happens in the kitchen. Donate small amounts of money to a Temple once in while and pray to the gods on a regular basis. Have Immodium ready anytime. Take it easy!!!
Cities and sights
Delhi
We arrived at night (1 AM) 0n 30 November at Indira Gandhi Airport. Immigration and customs were fast and efficient. We were well warned of all dangers and nasty things taxi-drivers may do to you. We followed the advice and booked a taxi at the Delhi Police Prepaid Taxi booth. It's one of a lot of booths in a hall just behind customs, look around for the sign and don't believe what people in other booths are yelling at you. The ticket to our hotel cost Rs 250 and the licenceplate number was written down on the ticket. Once outside we walked 50 metres to the right and waited for our taxi. Of course there were loads of 'helpful' people who wanted to see our ticket, wanted to change our ticket, wanted to put us in another taxi etc. We just ignored them, waited for about 10 minutes until our taxi came down the ramp and left for our hotel.
The atmosphere in Delhi was spooky. The smog and the scarce public lighting gave everything a gloomy appearance. Breathing was a bit difficult because of the smog, but this improved two days later after a couple of nightly rain-showers.
We booked a room by mail from Holland at the YWCA International Guesthouse in Sansad Marg. We paid Rs 990 For a double (hot water, paper in the morning) including breakfast.
Our holiday had a good start on the first day: the government fell and we narrowly escaped a terrorist bombattack. Two bombs exploded in . less than an hour after we visited the market. We were lucky as more than 60 people were killed and 200 were injured. So we found another reason to donate to temples on a regular base.
At night we ate at Kwality on Sansad Marg and Embassador at Connaught Place. Both are not cheap (by Indian standards of course), but they are both very good, expect to pay 250-300 rupees for a full meal including beers. For lunch we snacked at Nirula's (Indian Fast-Food at Connaught Place), bought delicious cakes at Wengers and had croissants at 'Croissants etcetera' (Outer circle of Connaught Place). Maybe a bit to western, but a good way to acclimatise.
The computer at Delhi station had been down for a couple of hours, so a substantial queue had formed at the tourist booking office. It took over two hours to get to the front, but the service was efficient. While you are waiting study the timetable that is being sold in the booths in the ,main hall. There is also time to fill in reservationforms. Also fill in some alternative forms (only the general information; not the trainnumber) if the train you want is not available. There is a large tourist-quota available, so it should be possible to collect all the tickets you need. We got all the reservations we wanted, but we had to be a bit flexible in our schedule (day earlier, day later, other train, other class). The staff was very helpful.
Because of India's 50th anniversary there was a special exhibition in the national museum courtesy of the British Museum and British Airways. It was wonderful, but also the standard collection in the museum is well worth a visit.
On Tuesday 02 December we took the Mandor Express to Jodhpur. It left from the Old Delhi Railway Station at 2100 hours and cost Rs 868 in 2nd class AC. It's wonderful how the railway-reservations work out. You'll find your name, sex, age and status (FT; foreign tourist) on a form on the platform and on the train.
Jodphur
Jodphur was fresh and crisp compared to Delhi. After arrival at the station we went by autorikshaw to the Madho Nivas hotel. It's a friendly and clean place about 30 minutes walking from the city centre. We paid Rs 500 for a large clean double. They have cheaper (Rs 300) and more expensive rooms (Rs 800 with aircon).
It seems that all Rajasthani towns heave a red fort and so does Jodphur. It towers on a hill above the city. You can get there by car, but it's more fun to walk through the small streets leading up to it. It's a bit confusing, but just walk in the general direction and loads of kids will point you in the right direction. Entry to the fort is Rs 50 and you pay Rs 50 for a camera. Once you've reached it, it's even more impressive than from down below. A band is welcoming you at the entrance of the palace and in one of the rooms inside there are artists painting miniatures; all very scenic.
Back down, the market around the belltower is a friendly spot to relax, sip a coke and watch the people.
We had snacks (pakora and papad) at the rooftop café of the Govind hotel . Walking back to our hotel we stumbled on a wedding procession. The groom was taken by horse to the house of his wife-to-be. He is accompanied by all his relatives and an extremely loud and disharmonious brassband. On both sides of the procession walk boys with gaslamps. This was the first of lots of weddings we would come across during our honeymoon. Fun to see so many weddings just after you got married yourself. We were walking in the same direction; the man started talking to Hans, the women to Mirjam and inevitably we were invited to join the party. Quite an experience; we got garlands, drinks and sweets and were not allowed to leave until we had eaten.
The next day we went to Osiman by bus. En route we drove by fields full of red peppers. Osiman is a small village with a relaxed atmosphere. There is a nice Jain-temple on a hill and scattered around the village are the remains of much more temples. In one of the temples we met an American lady who had studied Astrology for over three years . She was still studying, but had an uncanny accuracy in guessing (knowing?) our backgrounds after she heard our birthdays. She also explained the reason for all the marriages we saw. As Jupiter and Venus were both travelling the skies in a positive direction, it was an auspicious time for weddings.
For a very peppery snack try the bakery near the corner of Nal Sarak and High Court Road. On the opposite side of the road you can buy sweets to cool off again.
Ajmer
On Friday-afternoon we took a bus to Ajmer, where we spent a night at the freshly painted Nagpal Tourist Hotel in a nice double for Rs 400. We ate in the Honeydew restaurant. The waiters have class and the food is better than average. The moment we were ready for bed, there was once again a lot of noise in the streets and in the hotel next door, so we went to another wedding. This time we even had to dance to ward of evil spirits. Dancing on our heavy walking booths we may have looked like hose spirits ourselves. Next day we took the bus to Pushkar for Rs 4.
Pushkar
Yes, they still exist. Real life hippies time-warped straight from the sixties. They can be visited without covercharge during your visit to the little pilgrimage-village of Pushkar. Nothing is allowed around the lake. No meat, no eggs, no sex, no nothing except for little things like bhang-lassi' s (a hash milkshake). Step anywhere near the lake and obtrusive boys (alleged priests, who is fooling who?) besiege you with flowers to 'show respect' and give them a donation. A potentially peaceful place is thoroughly spoilt by this behaviour.
Fun thing to do around Pushkar is walking in the desert. Walk out of the village in any direction. You'll find nice wadi's (the desert lives) to walk through to the Northeast of the village. We got soaking wet after a rain- and hailstorm, but still had good fun walking.
It's easy to find rooms for less than Rs 100 in Pushkar. The VK-hotel has standard rooms for Rs 200. We stayed in a very large room (the honeymoon-suite (?)(8 by 4 metres)) at this hotel for Rs 300 a night. The German bakery is great for breakfast and cakes (don't be to amazed is a cow or a horse comes walking by your table. At night good food is available at the Tibetan run Moondance café. It has a nice garden, where they built a fire once it gets chilly. Try the orange-chocolate cake! Avoid the Pushkar-buffet-meals; guaranteed to give you the runs!
Ajmer
It's half an hour from Pushkar to Ajmer by bus. We dropped our luggage at the depot in the station. Ignored the 26 rikshaw drivers and walked into town. We walked to the Darggah, the tomb of an old Sufi Saint. The whole atmosphere at the tomb and the surrounding mosques was a bit unfriendly. We weren't allowed to sit anywhere (the locals sat everywhere) and beggars were constantly harassing us. The narrow streets around the tomb are fun to walk through though. We continued to the remains of the Adhia-mosque. A much friendlier place and we spent about an hour in the sun doing nothing, only once in a while disturbed by a request to pose with day-trippers and transvestites. We had some trouble finding the Jain-temple, but fortunately we did. Not very impressive from the outside, it's a jewel within. Inside you find a gigantic gold model depicting the central mountain of Jainism and all the Jain-temples in India. About 1600 kilograms of gold were used to build the model. Non-Jains are allowed to walk on the second floor of the temple and view the interior from there. We got a tour by one of the painters who is restoring the murals in the temple. He told us that the temple is private property of a diamond-trader, who also owns 25 % of the city of Ajmer. A place not to be missed!
In the afternoon we took the Shatabdi-express to Jaipur. At Rs 240 it's a bit expensive, but it is air-conditioned, takes only two hours and high tea is served en route.
Jaipur
In Jaipur we stayed at the Aangan Travellers Home in a double (hot water and TV) for Rs 350. The hotel has a very small restaurant in front, that does good breakfasts.
Jaipur has a strong regional function, so there are lots of shops and other businesses. In spite of all the activity, Jaipur still gave us a friendly impression. During our stay we saw some demonstrations, but they were calm and peaceful. At least they were at the time we saw them. Two days later we read in the papers that police had fired at the demonstrators, killed six of them and wounded a lot more.
Cameras are a cashcow in Jaipur. Entree to the Palace for foreigners is Rs 70, a camera is Rs 50 extra. Same with the Hawa Mahal (palace of the winds); entree only two rupees, a camera is 35. We were more than a week in India, so prices at this level started to feel far to high. On the other hand; they reason that if you can afford to come to India, you can also afford one or two dollars camera-charge. Not counting the utmost shoestring-travellers they are probably right.
As we wanted to go to the cinema, we had an early dinner at Natraj; good food, but too expensive. Yes, like all westerners we went to the one cinema not to be missed; Raj Mandir. An enormous queue had formed in front of the ticket-windows, but luckily we spotted some fellow countryman to the front of the queue and bribed them with a cola. This was better than the first time I was in India (1984). At that time we had to bribe the management of the theatre to get tickets. So we got our tickets real fast and had time to admire the wonderful hall of the cinema with it's fifties colours and Hollywood kitsch decor. The movie we saw was 'DIL TO PAGAL HI'. Completely by chance we had stumbled on the biggest hit of the year. We now knew what music we had heard in all the buses during our first one and a half week in India. During the rest of our holiday we had instant success once we started singing along with the tapes in the busses, restaurants, stations etc..
From Jaipur we made a daytrip to Amber. The bus leaves from opposite the Jawa Mahal and costs Rs 5. Entree to the palace is Rs 4 with an additional Rs 50 for the camera. It's a great palace, the inside is like a maze with narrow passageways, chambers and stairs were it is possible to get completely lost. We climbed to the top of the maharaja's palace and found ourselves a 'personal' balcony on top of one of towers. The sun was shining, the temperature was comforting table and we spent a great time relaxing and watching the great view and the outside world. We even slept for some time. (By the way: we slept in the maharaja's palace...). At night we had a good meal at the Copper Chimney.
The bustrip from Jaipur to Agra takes about 5 hours. Private busses leave 100 metres from the Aangan hotel. We paid 80 rupees, for a ticket bought at maharaja travels. Reserve a seat one day in advance and persevere in getting your assigned seat (the seats in the middle are better than in the back).
Agra
Major Bakthi died last year, and as one of the consequences his guesthouse is no longer in operation. We walked 300 metres further down the road and stayed at the Basera-hotel,19 ajmer road (0562-363641) for 325 rupees. The room was good value (hot water, Sat-TV), but if you want your laundry clean and dry, take it somewhere else. Also find your own taxi's (we will come back to that later). In Agra we found ourselves a personal rikshaw-driver: Papud. First we paid every trip, later by the day. We paid around Rs 10 for each trip.
The Taj Mahal is unbelievable. Normally once you get to any object you know from pictures, it's always less impressive. On photographs the Eiffel Tower is golden, in reality it's rusty, those kind of things. The Taj is different. It's possible to spend hours looking at it. The colour changes all the time and although there are loads of tourists it's surrounded by a quiet atmosphere. We visited the Taj twice, once just after our arrival at sunset on Friday (free entry on that day). As there wasn't a sunset, but only fog, there weren't many visitors. The Taj rose up from the fog, looking like a castle straight from heaven. A very special experience. On Sunday we visited the Taj in daylight. We had to stand in line this time, with about 500 people in front of us waiting for the security-check. It took about half an hour. Not so bad though, as we left some hours later there were more than 2000 people waiting.
The red Fort cannot be missed, but try to visit Dayal Bagh also. It's a new Hindu temple that is being built in the North of the city. They started building it in 1904. I visited it 15 years ago and compared with that time I didn't have the impression that much progress is made. Visit the marble-workshops next door; there will be someone to show you around for some bakshees.
We had excellent south-Indian thali's at Dasaprakesh in the Meher theatre complex on Gwalior road. Kwality on Taj road was equally good. Buy some cakes and pastry to take away and eat them on the train.
We booked a train to Varanasi. It departs from the station of Tundla some 12 kilometres from Agra. We asked the hotel for a taxi and were taken to a small booking office a couple of blocks away. There we couldn't book a taxi (later, later) but some guy started talking about how much money you could earn by importing gemstones in your homecountry. Most people will recognise the story and we also didn't fall for it. It ended very quickly when I suggested that I would take the stones to Europe and that some weeks later a friend who would come to India would bring the proceeds to him. This was not the scenario the con man had in mind. So he left very quickly. We still had no taxi, and we got the feeling that they tried to put us in a tight timeframe in order to get a ridiculous price for the ride. So we just left, collected our bags at the hotel, took a tuk-tuk to the busstation and took a bus to Tundla.
The train was only two hours late and we killed the time on the platform drinking chai from disposable clay cups. Lots of tea, because it was pretty cold (even by Dutch standards). The ticket cost Rs 816 in 2-tier AC. Next day we arrived in Mughal Sarai Junction, a station some 10 kilometres from Varanasi and took a minibus into town.
Varanasi
Varanasi; that magical holy city! Take a boatride in the morning and see the worshippers take their bath in the Ganges. Well, forget it; not in December! 8 degrees Celsius is definitely to cold for the average Indian. Instead of bathing the Indians were dressed in blankets and bonnets and shivering around little fires in the middle of the streets. The cremations at the burning ghats were business as usual. Death is a more natural part of life in India than it is in the west; it's still striking to see dead bodies being transported in a rikshaw or on top of a taxi. By the way and as a guideline; rikshaws are Rs 10 from the centre to the railwaystation.
It's fun to walk in the very narrow streets in the oldest part of town. People built there houses so close together to be able to help each other in case of an attack. The doorways are very low, so that an attacker had to bend down if he wanted to enter the house. This left him very vulnerable.
We stayed at the hotel Barahdari in a very clean double with hot water, ayurvedic soap and fluffy towels (yes) for Rs 385. An amazing variety of food and huge portions are available in the Temple restaurant in Dashaswamedh Road. Everything on the menu was available at very reasonable prices.
We made a day-trip to Sarnath to visit the Buddhist ruins about 10 kilometres from Varanasi. Board a bus for Rs 4 in front of the Varanasi Railway station; it takes about 45 minutes. Sarnath is very peacefull and it 's pleasant to spent a couple of hours there. The restoration of the ruins hasn't always been performed brilliantly, but the green surroundings make up for it. The western girl meditating amidst the ruins attracted a lot of attention of the locals. It's not very obvious how the museum selects items for its collection. The ruined statues that are inside look much the same as the statues lying in the dirt outside.
On 17 December at 1800 we took the Ganga Kaveri express to Chennai. 40 hours in the train cost us Rs 1684 in 2-tier AC. The breakfast (toast omelette) isn't bad, but take food to nibble. Also buy some books, 40 hours is long.
Madras / Chennai
Chennai (the locals still call it Madras)is 2140 kilometres away from and 25 degrees warmer than Varanasi. We walked from the main railway station through a drizzle looking for a hotel in the vicinity of Egmore station. After two days in the train we opted for a bit of luxury and stayed at the New Victoria hotel in Kennet Lane opposite the Egmore railway station for Rs 1400. There is also a lot of choice in the budget category round this neighbourhood.
We took a bath and the rest of the day we walked at random around the city, collected mail at American Express and had an excellent lunch at Aravanaas restaurant in the Shanti theatre complex. Great dosa's and other vegetarian goodies.
At night the monsoon unleashed its final showers. The street in front of the hotel practically changed into a river so we stayed inside and had an excellent meal (one of our best in India) in the restaurant of the hotel. Great Marco Polo Lager on draught too!
After an equally good breakfast we took a auto-rikshaw to the (submerged) busstation. Jumping from dry spot to dry spot and guided by a five-year old entrepreneur we find the bus to Mahabalipuram.
Mahabalipuram
The road to Mahabalipuram follows the coast. It's a nice one hour trip from Chennai. The village is small and friendly. In the streets we see the first chalk-paintings in front of houses. They are graphic designs reminding you of Esscher and are put there to welcome guests. We feel at home right away.
We stayed at Vinayak cottages in a simple room (but with hot water) for Rs 200. At five in the morning we were woken up by a terrible noise. It sounded as if the local kids had gotten hold of the village soundsystem and were having a go at it before their parents found out. Quick reconnaissance proved that the noise was not coming from the rooms next to us, nor from anywhere else around the hotel. A couple of hours later we found out that we were extremely lucky. The din came from the temple opposite our hotel. This was the special annual festival to guarantee the safe return of the most important temple statue that would go on a journey to Karnataka. Not to worry; the noise would only last another two days, and it would only last from 2 till 4 AM next night. Another experience, another story to tell.
It was Ayappa-time in the south. Ayappa devotees are male, dressed in black and they travel around the countryside in fully packed white cars. The cars are adorned with religious symbols and pictures of saints combined with orange flowers. Ayappa-devotees are running while visiting temples and they yell 'Ayappa' lots of times. They only stop to have their pictures taken. As they are on a holy mission, they don't seem to take the highway code to serious. Every second day there are reports in the papers about ayappa-cars being involved in accidents. Indian Highway Code: if it's bigger it has right of way.
In the evening we ate at the Golden Palate in the Mamalla Bhavan Annexe. They have an outdoor eating area (and aircon inside), nice vegetarian food and very cold Kingfisher. The seaside restaurants are goods for a beer, but for food had to many flies to our liking.
We took a bus to Pondicherry. It doesn't run to its schedule so just turn up and wait. We did for two hours.
Pondicherry
Pondicherry didn't do much to us. It's a town. The architecture still shows that it used to be French. It has a post-office. palace hotel (opposite Amala lodge) rented us a room for Rs 400 and then turned off the Air-conditioning and demanded extra money. Fortunately the only (relatively) bad experience we had we hotels in India. We lectured the owner on the subject of doing honest business. It probably doesn't help, but it makes you feel better and we scared of some other tourists in the process. We went for dinner in the Rendez-Vous and made the mistake to order French Food. On the bill we found the most hypocrite name for beer we have ever come across: 'liquid bread'.
Ok, not the most brilliant of days, so we decided to leave the next day for Thanjavur.
Thanjavur
After one auto-rikshaw, three busses and four busstations we arrived after five hours in Thanjavur. This was the method: we took a bus to Cuddalore for Rs 4. From there we went to Chidambaran for Rs 15 and then on to Thanjavur for Rs 20,5.
In Thanjavur we stayed at the Hotel Valli for a reasonable Rs 265 (hot water in the mornings). Definitely don't eat your breakfast here; it was lousy. We had dinner in the hotel Parisutham. Bland Indian food aimed at westerners; a pity.
The palace certainly has had its best times, but it has a special charm. The small museum is touching in its simplicity and the library is really interesting. The library has a small exhibition of palm-leave books and an interesting collection of prints and pictures. There is an interesting print of humans being compared to animals. Ganesh could have done much worse.
The Brihadishwara temple is very impressive. It's still in use, but was very quiet when we visited. We were there at the height of the day (mad dogs and dutchmen.) and the stones were scalding hot, so the Indians probably visit it on a more sensible hour. You can also visit the inside of the temple. While you cannot visit the inner sanctum, everything that is happening there can be viewed from the entrance. Don't forget to take (buy)the blessings of the resident elephant.
The bus to Trichy takes 1,5 hours and costs Rs 10.
Tiruchirappalli / Trichy
The Aanand hotel is situated next to the bus station and is good. A double room (hot water, Sat TV and a paper) cost Rs 265. We celebrated Christmas Eve with beer bought opposite the hotel and a very nice and cheap meal in the garden in front of the hotel. It's a pity you cannot take the beer to the vegetarian restaurant, but for the rest the evening was perfect. The restaurant inside does cheap and filling Indian breakfasts; good idli!
On Christmas morning we visited the Srirangam temple. It's an enormous complex with seven walls. As a non-Hindu you are not allowed inside the four inner walls, but there is still enough to see. You cannot miss the booth were they sell tickets to the roof of the temple. Forget about a guide, buy the guidebook at the booth; it is very informative. We were lucky the temple was still standing there, as Hindu-extremists had threatened to blow it up. There was some police about, but security wasn't very tight.
The Rock fort temple isn't much of a temple, but its location on top of (yes) the rock can't be beaten. You have to climb the 437 (they are numbered) steps on your bare feet. Our friends the Ayappa's did it running. You are now allowed into the small temple at the top. Down below is Chinna Bazaar. Buy your (silk) saris and salwar kameezes here; we didn't find them cheaper anywhere else in India.
Except for obligatory 'Seasons greetings' in hotels. Not much reminded us of X-mas. St Johns church was different as it had a bigger than life X-mas-group in its courtyard. Madurai
After an amazingly fast (3 hours) and amazingly bumpy busride (Rs 36) we arrived in Madurai. There are a lot of hotels on west perunal maistry street near the bus station. We took a look at most of them and chose the Prem Nivas; Rs 300 for a double with hot water, TV and 24 hours checkout. The restaurant does enormous 'rocket' paper massala dosa's.
Another thing that is enormous is the amount of people that visit the Sri Meenakshi temple. It looks just the way an Indian temple should look with its white and red walls and huge goparams (towers combined with doors). It's a pity that non-Hindu's are not allowed in a large part of the temple, but there is still enough left to see. It's special to see people bombarding a statue of Kali with butterballs. Women, not disturbed by thousands of people around them perform little ceremonies in front of this statue. It's supposed to help in case of family-problems. The temple museum in the 1000-pillar hall is in bit of a mess, but there is enough to see to warrant a visit.
The Gandhi museum gives a good patriotic version of India's history. More cute and more fun to visit is the government museum next door. You cannot miss it as it has a 7 metre high dinosaur guarding it. Inside it has an amazing variety of valuable artefacts and junk. On the way to the Gandhi museum we visited the annual domestic fair. We left with all kinds of coupons for all kinds of discounts on various goods as food, tractors and electric appliances.
The Tirumalai palace is under restoration; it will look much better once it' s finished.
Booking a train to Varkala took some time. There was a direct train, but also a long waiting-list. We bought tickets, applied for an emergency-quotum (only sleeper-class was available) in the Regional Commissioners Office at the other side of the tracks and got our reservations the next day. Top bunks in Sleeper class are not for the claustrophobic! The ticket cost only Rs 58.
Varkala
We arrived early in the morning of 28 December in Varkala and took a auto-rikshaw to the beach and booked a room in the Varkala Marine Palace for Rs 300. A bit steep for a room with cold water and fan, but logical given the fact that most hotels were full between X-mas and New Year. We spent two days lazing, reading and eating fish and fruit-salad. Varkala is a 'dry' village, with only one alcohol-shop near the railway station. Restaurants are not allowed to serve it, so they disguise it in cocktails.
Backwater trip
We took the early morning train to Kollam. It arrives at about nine o'clock so there is enough time before the boat leaves at 10.30. The ATDC charges Rs 150 or Rs 100 for students. As with busses a boat is never full. The blockage in the canal has been removed, so you travel now straight from Kollam to Allappuzha. Seven hours is long enough if you are packed solid. Bring some food and sunblock.
Having arrived in Allappuzha we had to fight a bit to get into the bus to Ernakulam. It takes 2 hours to get there.
Ernakulam
The Grand hotel is in the top category but good value at Rs 690 for a spacious carpeted room with aircon, roomservice and everything else you might need. It is amazing to find a hotelroom in India with all appliances in working order.
The last day of the year we visited Cochi and had a great day. The short boattrip to the Peninsula is fun and Cochi has a very relaxed feel over it. Just wander around and soak up the colonial atmosphere. The fishermen with there Chinese fishing nets don't seem to bother if they only catch one small fish each time the raise their nets. St Francis church is cool and peacefull. Even the flowers on the Dutch cemetery are a nice sight, allthough it is a pity that they are basically weeds, totally overgrowing the graves. The flowers smell good and this attracts lots of butterflies. Malabar House is a heritage-hotel with a colonial feel about it. Excellent for a lemon-soda or a snack on its veranda and it might have the finest bathroom in India.
We wander on through Cochi and spent some time in the garden of the Cathedral were men are preparing a float for the Maria-procession that evening. We walk on to the Dutch palace (steamy wallpaintings in the sultans sleeping quarters) and the Jewish quarter. No prizes for guessing the cliché name of one of the lawyers who is living there (Cohen). The Synagogue is another tranquil place. The caretaker is eager to show you around and explain what is what. Via a mess outside the Cathedral we walk back to the ferry and take the boat to Ernakulam. We are pretty tired, miss all the new years eve parties and are in bed well before 2400 hours. This doesn't mean we miss the New Year; fire-works wake us up at the right moment.
We visited the Kathakali performance at the See India Foundation. The dancing is fun and just short enough not to get boring. After the performance Devan, the owner of the business takes his time to 'explain' what is happening. It is amazing how much philosophical nonsense a human being can relate in under half an hour. Still good amusement though.
Mysore
We took the train to Bangalore on the first of January 1998. Getting a reservation took some visits to the reservations' office and the office of the regional manager next door. We got VIP-quota in first class. The ticket costs Rs 566.
We arrived around six o'clock in Bangalore and as we walked out of the station we ran into the bus to Mysore. It takes three hours to get there. We stayed at the VCDS on Sri Harsha road in a double with TV, hot water and balcony for Rs 350. We ate a good thali lunch in the Akshaya Vegetarian Restaurant in the Dasaprakesh hotel (be a daredevil and have an ice-cream). At night we ate in the garden of the Parkhotel (drink, dine, dwell). Very relaxed, nice music, an equal mix of westerners and Indians and good food; try the garlic naan.
Public servants in Karnataka were on strike in order to get a 35 % payrise. Therefor the Mysore palace was closed. So we took a bus to Somnathpur to visit the Hoysalla temple. We almost had it exclusively for ourselves as there weren't many visitors. It is beautifully sculptured and has a 'fractal ' feel over it. Next day we walked up Chamundi hill. The enourmous Nandi-bull half way up the hill looks so friendly the Disney might have put it there. On top of the hill are a lot of shops and a simple temple. Who would like to climb a hill without a temple, just for the view?
The strike had ended with a compromise (the civil servants got 28 % more salary) so on our last morning in Mysore we could visit the palace. It is a unique, most amazing place. Once you are inside it looks like a gigantic bright coloured merry-go-round. They put in all styles as long as the style was colourful enough. If you arrive during a strike in Mysore, sit it out, because this is a sight not to be missed!
It's a bit difficult to get information about busses to Sravanabelagola. We went to the busstation and took a bus to channarayapatna and wait there for a bus to sravana etc.. It took us about 2 hours.
Sravanabelagola
Sravanabelagola is a nice little organised Jain-enclave. Almost all accommodation is rented out by the local 'managing committee'. Although this is a monopoly, this is a good thing because the rooms in the 20-something guest houses are clean and cheap. We stayed at their top-guest house (fan, hot water and real mattresses) for Rs 135.
Remove your shoes for the climb to the only attraction of the Village: the Naked Man temple. From outside you can only see his upper body, but once you 've entered you get the Full Monty. Sravanabelagola is worth the detour.
Basic vegetarian restaurants at the foot of the hill provide you with your massala dosa or veg thali at night.
Belur and Halebid
At 7.30 we took the eight o'clock bus to Belur, which took about two hours. We booked into the Mayura Velapuri hotel in the new wing (double Rs 200, hot water).
As in Somnathpur there is a Hoysala temple in both Belur and Halebid. All three of them are well worth a visit. It takes quite some bus-travel, but don't miss out of the other two after you visited the first one. Intricately carved they all deserve a couple of hours.
The busstand in Belur is chaotic and there isn't much English spoken. The bus from Belur to Halebid takes half an hour. If you want to go further afield it's difficult to get information. It's a long way and a long day to Hospet. Skip breakfast in the hotel (it was lousy) and turn up early at the busstand. On 98 January we went to Hospet with changes of bus in Shimoga and Davangere. In total it took us about 9 hours.
Hospet and Hampi
The hotels in the LP guide were dirty (Vishwa) or full so we had to find the brand-new superclean Karthik Hotel. Its location is Pampa villa, lV ward D no 252 ands 253; follow the signs from Station road. Excellent value at Rs 300 (double, sat TV, bath).
Early next morning we took a auto-rikshaw to Hampi for Rs 60. Hampi has great ruins and certainly deserves a day of sight-seeing. Just wander around and discover amazing remains of old temples and palaces. (We're beginning to sound as a tourist brochure, but is was really good). Take lots of water if it's hot.
The bus back to Hospet costs Rs 3.
Goa
We went to GOA via Hubli. We took the train. It's not possible to get reservations, but they aren't necessary either. Buy a ticket (Rs 34, second class) and get an upgrade if necessary (sleeper class; Rs 44). It takes three and a half hours to Hubli. It's about 2 Km walking from the trainstation to the busstation in Hubli. The five hour bustrip to Panjim in Goa costs Rs 50.
We stayed at the Manvin hotel in Panjim, The room was to small and noisy for Rs 350 so we left next day for the beach. The Sher-E-Punjab restaurant at Cunha Rivera road is definitely upmarket and serves great food. For an excellent lunchtime thali eat at the restaurant in the Kamat hotel south of the municipal garden.
Next day we took the bus to Margao and an auto-rikshaw on to Benaulim. You have to take a ferry and change busses at one of the rivers as the bridge they built a couple of years ago is already not able to carry trucks and busses. Fortunately both busses had co-ordinated their musicchoice, so we could sing along with 'Dil To Pagal Hai' all the way.
We liked the relaxed atmosphere in Benaulim. New Year was over, a lot of tourists had left and so accommodation was no problem. We stayed at Caphina Cottages for Rs 200 (hot water, double). We relaxed, watched the sun set, ate, drank and enjoyed.
It's an easy 40 minutes walk from Benaulim to Colva. In Colva there is a bookstore near the roundabout next to the beach that sells, buys and trades second hand books.
After a couple of days of beach-life we went back to Panjim where we stayed at the hotel Aroma. Big room for Rs 400, but the hot water was off, so we got buckets. From Panjim we took the bus to Old Goa which is as Portuguese as it can get. No problem imagining you are at the Coste Verde near Lisboa. As a nice variation on donating to temples: burn a candle in the Bom Jezus church in honour of St Francis (he has been dead for ages, but is still in an amazingly good condition).
As the new railway wasn't operating yet (it started two weeks later) we took the catamaran of Frank shipping lines from Panjim to Bombay. It costs Rs 1600 in business-class and 1500 economy (the difference? You get your luggage earlier in Bombay, so you have a head start looking for accommodation.) The trip takes 8 hours, an extremely light meal is served and pirated video's are shown on board. We arrived at 1800 hours in Bombay.
Mumbai - Bombay
Arriving late in Bombay we had some difficulties finding a hotel. We stayed at the Ascot on Colaba for a hefty Rs 1600 a night (aircon and everything else you can think of).
The centre of Mumbai is amazingly clean and organised. Since the last time I visited the local government seems to have succeeded in getting rid of slums, people sleeping in the streets and most of the hawkers and beggars. This is only cosmetically though. Once you venture a little bit outside the centre the slums are still abundant. The difference with the exceptional luxury of the Taj Mahal hotel couldn't be bigger. Try to look at both parts of the city for a balanced opinion.
Most times we ate at Kamat hotel on Colaba Causeway. A full meal with soup, large thali and fruit salad costs Rs 50. Leopold and Mondegar café's are a bit of a scene, but good for a beer in the afternoon.
The paintings in the Prince of Wales museum all deserve the addition 'by night', because they are all very dirty. We liked the rest of the museum.
For serious shopping head for Crawford market and Kalbadevi. It's a huge shopping district where we walked around for half a day (and got thoroughly lost). It's great for unusual souvenirs.
The last day we visit Elephanta Island. Back at the Gateway to India we are interviewed by a local TV-crew. They don't like our answers to their questions about the gateway. We think it's European; the interviewer says it 's typically Indian and tells us that should be our opinion as well. Well it 's not.
It wasn't difficult to leave the Gateway of India. Leaving India hurt a little bit. | | Travel with kids in India; practicalities | | Here you'll find all the praticalities about our trip to India in December 2005 - Januari 2006
Hans, Mirjam, Frank and Marit
Preparation
Any trip to Asia will be much more fun with some preparation done, but this certainly is the case when taking kids. This was to be our fifth (Hans) and third (Mirjam) trip to India, so we knew a bit what to expect. We started preparing with the Lonely Planet (LP) ’Travel with Children’. As a guidebook we used the 2005 edition of the LP ‘South India’. We got a lot of information from www.lonelyplanet.com , www.roughguides.com , the rec.travel.asia newsgroup and www.indiamike.com. For up to date information we especially recommend the latter site. In general there is not a lot of specific information on travel with small children in India available, but we got some usefull contacts and tips via Indiamike.com. We posted scans of our passports and visa to our hotmail address.
Transport
At first we thought we would go backpacking again, but after consultation on the web we decided to do it a bit more luxurious this time. We did a bit of a websearch, sent out some emails and got in contact with Mrs. Faith Pandian from Window to the World. (www.tourism-southindia.com No 4, Annai Avenue, Vasanth Nagar Extn, Kollidakarai, Srirangam Trichy - 620 006, Tamil Nadu (INDIA) Tel No. :+(91)-(431)-2433372/2437183/2435219 email : info@tourism-southindia.com). Faith reacted very promptly to our emails and did not need any payment up-front. She arranged a brand new ambassador car with AC and driver for us. We paid 875 euro’s for 25 days unlimited mileage (and unlimited service) which is a bit more than you would probably pay if you arrange it in India.
Our driver Gandhi was absolutely brilliant. Being a father himself he took extremely good care of us and especially of the children. Gandhi is very friendly and speaks good English. He was always on time, the car was clean inside and outside whenever he called in for duty in the morning or when we showed during the day. This is quiet a feat if you imagine our children putting their dirty shoes automatically against the back of the front seats. Gandhi was also a very useful source of information on sights, hotels and restaurants, without being pushy about anything. In the end he even managed to sing along to some of the Dutch songs we sang during the longer car rides. We highly recommend him (and Faiths travel agency).
Money and costs
India is a cheap country by any standard, but travelling with the kids certainly raised our spending. For comparison in 1997 we spent about 35 Euros a day during our seven week honeymoon in India and in 1998 we spent 25 euros a day during a trip to Nepal and Sikkim. Now our daily budget averaged 120 euros. From this amount we spent about half on accommodation, a bit over 25 % on the car plus driver and the remainder on food, drinks, entrance fees, souvenirs, tips etc. . Especially the accommodation cost a lot compared to what we used to spent, but we were with four now, we spent more time in the hotelroom and wanted cleaner and more spacious accommodation. We used our creditcard for paying the car and some hotels. We used our normal banking cards to get cash from ATM’s, that are now abundant. Prices we mention are always including tax. Like almost anywhere in Asia (and the world), tourists are overcharged in India. Two simple rules apply: ask prices before you order anything and bargain for everything. It will make your stay a lot cheaper.
Weather
The monsoon had been very heavy this year, washed away lots of houses and roads in Tamil Nadu and tens of thousands of people were rendered homeless. We arrived during the tail end of the monsoon, so we decided to do our trip anti-clockwise and travel west as soon as possible. After the first three days we had excellent weather with temperatures between 25 and 35 degrees Celsius.
Friendliness, dangers and annoyances
In general we think people in the South are a lot more friendly and relaxed than in the North. This was one of the reasons to choose (again) for the south. The more relaxed you are yourself, the more friendly responses you'll get, in the north as well as in the south. If someone wants to take you to his shop (hotel, sister, wedding, festival, home) and you don't want to join him, be firm in keeping the direction you were going in. Try to talk to them about other things; even touts can be fun to chat to.
Travel with two young blond children attracts a lot of attention. This is in general not meant in an unfriendly way, but at times it would get a bit annoying for the kids. What was really a nuisance is everybody trying to pinch the kids in the cheek. “NO PINCHING” were English words Frank and Marit learned really quickly. Mum and dad would support this by warning of the attacks and by pinching back if necessary. The kids also didn’t like posing for photographs.
This may be annoying; the real danger lies in the traffic. There is no way you can let go of your kids once you are in the streets. Temples are great for some physical exercise and the locals did not seem to mind our kids running around temples shouting Ayappa (we’ll come back to that later). Another annoyance is the air-pollution; a car with air-conditioning is absolutely necessary to keep most of the dirty air out.
Health
This was our main concern this time. We thought that the hazards were manageable (otherwise we would not have gone). Everybody was inoculated for Diphtheria, Tetanus, Polio, Typhus, Hepatitis A and B. As malaria prophylaxis we used Proguanil hydrochloride (Paludrine) during our stay. As a general precaution we took multivitamins every day. We trained our kids to wash their hands a lot more than we normally do (yeah we know you should always etc…, but sometimes these things just don’t happen). We even started brushing teeth out of a bottle before the last few weeks for the holiday.
In India we tried to keep a leisurely pace, building in a couple of hours of relaxing in the hotel room at teatime. Although we travelled quite a distance (about 2500 kilometres) we have the feeling that we took it easy. With the exception of Frank who was ill for a day, we were lucky as for the rest we didn't get ill. Some simple tips that worked for us:
• Drink bottled water (available everywhere).
• Use suntan Lotion (factors 30 and 15 (and sometimes 60))
• Keep your hands clean and don’t pick your nose (brings the bacteria straight into your system). Do not pick up stuff form the streets.
• Wash your hands before eating (or use disinfecting wet tissues; also good for cleaning feet after temple-visits).
• Keep nails short.
• Always put on hasty and sunglasses.
• Wear long or three quarter trousers (keeps knees whole)
• Wear long sleeves
• Wear sturdy shoes, no sandals. Check feet on cuts after temple visits and disinfect if necessary.
• Desinfect any cut or scratch as soon as possible
• Never eat anything form a stall / cooked in the streets. Stay away from buffet-style meals. Eat in busy restaurants.
• Donate small amounts of money to a Temple once in while and pray to the gods on a regular basis. Have Immodium ready anytime.
• Use mosquito repellent. For hotel rooms we bought and used the Bayer electrical mosquito coils.
Medical kit
During the day we always had suntan lotion (Vichy SPF 15 and 30; good stuff!!) and a medical kit in our day pack. The First Aid Kit was in a soft pack (‘Care plus’ branfd from ‘tropenzorg’) with some additions of our own and contained:
Hydrophilic bandages 300*8 cm and 400*8 cm
Burn dressing
Sterile compresses
Antiseptic wipes
Adhesive tape
Protection gloves
Emergency bandages
Tweezers
Safety pins
Wound plaster
Emergency shears
Shatterproof thermometer
Emergency blanket
Support bandage
Triangular sling
Tick out tick remover
Chloorhexidine 0,2 % antibacterial spray
In our luggage we had the following medicines available:
Paracetamol with caffeine 500 mg (adults); the modern aspirin; helps against all kinds of pains (and hangovers)
Paracetamol 160 mg (perdolan); chewing tablets for children
Tripelennamine HCL (Azaron) relieves itches from mosquito bites etc.
Multivitamins for adults and children
Proguanil hydrochloride (Paludrine) Malaria prophylaxis
Amoxicillin ; broad-spectrum antibiotic (Flemoxin : tablets solvable in water)
Ciprofloxacin 500 mg (another antibiotic especially against heavy diarrhoea)
Oral Rehydration Solution (adult and children; basically the same stuff, but the child variety has an added taste (still lousy)
(Miconazoli nitras 2,5 mg zinc oxydium 150 mg pro gram)Anti fungal cream
Loperamide HCL (Immodium)
Xylometazolin (nasal spray; 0.1% for adults, 0,05 % for kids; opens up all cavities in your head; good against pressure differences in planes)
Fluconazol 50 mg (against slime in the airways)
Luggage
We checked 2 soft backpacks weighing 21 kilograms in total. They contained more or less:
Parents (each)
• 2 Zipoff pants
• 1 pair of shorts
• 2 shirts (1 safari style; ideal for stuffing tickets, passports etc. on the plane)
• 2 polo shirts
• 2 T-shirts (also for sleeping)
• Sturdy walking boots
• Flipflops
• 5 Underpants (2 bra’s for mum)
• 4 pairs of socks
• 5 pocketbooks for dad
• Saturday papers and magazines
• Toiletries
• Copies of our passports and some emergency cash
Kids (each)
• 4 pairs of pants (covering the knees)
• 6 shirts / t-shirts
• 6 pair of socks
• 3 singlets
• 6 underpants
• Night nappies (that we did not really need: both our kids decided that India was a good place to be “night toilet trained”)
• 1 pyama
• Jungleboots (Frank; not available in Marits size, so she had sportshoes with a zipper)
• Teva sandals
In our hand luggage on the flight (two daypacks, one Samsonite carry-on and 1 shoulder bag) we had:
• Raincoats (the foldaway type)
• Sunhats
• Sunglasses
• Travel survival kit South India
• Camera (Canon digital IXUS 750)
• Mobile phone (triple band; it worked almost everywhere in the cities in India)
• Copies of our passports and some emergency cash
• All the medical stuff including contact lens necessities
• Mosquito repellent(with Deet for the parents, without for the kids)
• Suntan lotion and after sun lotion
• A sweater each
• Cuddly toy for the kids
• Colouring books, pencils, softtip pens, some small cars, lego, small playmobil puppets.
• Water, softdrinks, nibbles, cookies (if you’ve ever spent 6 hours on an Egypt Air plane on the tarmac in Hurghada without drinks, you bring your own).
In our moneybelts: Passports, credit cards, ATM cards, some cash (Euro’s). | |
