Dan's Adventure

Over the next few days I’m going to be posting rough itineraries for my trip. I have an idea of where I’d like to go and what I’d like to do up to New Zealand which is almost 8 months in. Throughout the trip I will be staying in cheap accommodation (hostels, beach bungalows, camping, guest houses) and will be travelling by train, bus, boat and whatever other forms of transport present themselves along the way.

India is a huge country and the distances between cities is massive. I didn’t really appreciate this until I plotted the destinations on google maps and checked the journey times between them over at Seat Sixty-One. To start with I had included a lot of southern destinations such as Goa and Kerala but I just don’t have time for them. I’ll be spending a total of 4 weeks in India starting in Mumbai and ending in Delhi so I will be sticking to northern areas this time round. Between almost every destination I will be taking the sleeper train, but in a lot of cases the journey will include a large part of the previous/following day as well.

After a few days exploring Mumbai, perhaps visiting Elephanta Island, I will be heading east towards Aurangabad which I will be using as a base to visit the Ellora and Ajanta caves.

North east of Aurangabad is Varanasi, the religious capital of India. It lies on the banks of the river Ganges which is considered a holy river. The city has over 100 ghats (a set of steps leading down to water) along the river, each with a specific purpose from bathing to cremation which allows the ashes to be washed away by the river. Observing life along the ghats from a boat would be fascinating.

Agra is the first of the cities in India’s Golden Triangle that I will visit, Delhi and Jaipur being the other two. Agra is home to perhaps the most recognisable structure in India, Taj Mahal. The white marble and semi-precious stones on the dome make Taj Mahal change colour with different lighting. Sunrise and sunset would be perfect times to witness this happening. Agra Fort, the most important fort in India, is another impressive site. Several Mughals ruled from here.

Whilst in India I would love to see a tiger in the wild. For that reason, a trip to Ranthambore National Park is a must. Two safaris a day are operated, one in the early morning and one late afternoon. The chances of seeing a tiger are increased by going on multiple safaris, hopefully I’ll be able to go on a few.

As I continue west towards Jaisalmer, a couple of days in Udaipur could make for an interesting stop. Udaipur is famous for its lakes and palaces, the Lake Palace actually featured as the floating palace in Octopussy. My main reason for wanting to visit Jaisalmer is to go on a camel safari into the Thar Desert, riding camels by day and sleeping under the stars at night.

Jaipur is another city famous for its forts palaces. It is also home to the Jantar Mantar Observatory which consists of 14 major geometric devices for measuring time, predicting eclipses, tracking stars in their orbits, ascertaining the declinations of planets, and determining the celestial altitudes.

My time in India comes to an end on October 22nd when I fly from Delhi to Hong Kong, which will be the last scheduled flight until I reach Singapore in February. In Delhi I am hoping to visit my aunt and uncle who have recently moved to New Delhi.