Getting to Shekhawati

Thanks guys! I unfortunately am not able to book using www.irctc.co.in, seeing I don't have an Indian cellphone.

I might try getting tickets over there, although I have tried contacting cleartrip, but they are rather slow to respond.

Foreigners currently have to book using http://www.cleartrip.com/. IRCTC (the Indian Railways) doesn't currently allow for foreign bookings.

Some report sometimes not getting through there, chances are the IRCTC servers that they need to tap into are now overloaded or offline. Persist at different hours.

(But then editing: I see now you're having trouble with some train they don't list. Well, all bets are off then, except for trying on the ground, indeed.)

I recently phoned Cleartrip to enquire about booking a train that they don't list. They told me that if it isn't on their system they won't deal with it.

www.irctc.co won't help you wiith FTQ tickets. They have to be booked in person at one of the foreign tourist desks.

It seems that trains from Churu have been removed from the timetable once again. jaisinghrathore, do you have any more information on this? Or anyone else for that matter?

Trains from Churu to where?

The Delhi (DEE) to Churu (CUR) train seems to have disappeared from the official website again.

I got this from the IR site just now (20.20 GMT).

http://www.indianrail.gov.in/cgi_bin...ccavl_cgi1.cgi

There is currently availability in General Sleeper and 3AC for every day in January. General is available in 3AC for most dates between now and the end of December apart from 12/23/24/25 December.
Looks like you have a reasonable chance of General Quota berths on this train, even leaving it until you get to India to book.

There are also 6 Sleeper berths in FTQ available for every date throughout January which give you a pretty solid fallback.

Thanks for your help Dave. Unfortunately when i query, it tells me that 'no matching trains were found'. I don't understand what I am doing wrong, because it showed-up on my queries until recently.

I see that the link I sent you is no longer directly showing the results.
If you look down the left side of what the link is showing chose Train Berth Availability.

In the From Box type in Delhi and choose Delhi S Rohilla from the drop down.

In the To box type Churu and confirm from drop down. Enter the date you want to look at and you can choose All Classes from the drop down. Click "Get Details" and you will see the available trains.

Choose the one you want by clicking the Radio Button next to it then click "Get Availability"

This train does not look to be getting fully booked more than a day or too in advance so try for tickets as soon as you can after arriving in India.

Thanks for your help once again, Dave. I typed the date as 11-01 before, but it should have been 11-1, that seemed to be the problem.

I am first going to try to book it online. I am currently trying the work-around for registration on the official indian rail website.

Always best to use the drop down calendar on this sort of site.

Which work round is that? I don't think anybody has found one that doesn't involve having an Indian debit/credit card or bank account.

According to Seat61, they do take intl credit cards once again, but you need an indian mobile phone number now. The work-around is to send them a scan of your passport and then they will activate it for you.

It should work, but they keep mailing me back they can not find the attachment in my emails .

Let us know if you get this method to work.

Just checking in back here. I finally got my train booked. It took IRCTC customer service around two weeks to finally send me my mobile activation code, but now it does work. The only catch left is that you as a foreigner can only use AMEX to pay for your tickets. Luckily, I happen to own one of those.

Christus

That's really good to hear. Have you got time to post a quick summary of what you had to do and who you had to e-mail. If so you could start a new thread something like "Solved - How to Book with IRCTC from outside India" It would be a great help for current and future travellers.