Unfortunately the weeks of extreme air pollution and different diet badly affected Craig, Mike and I while at Nainital. Jen got a cold/sinus infection but was otherwise fine thankfully as she had to sort out the rest of us.  Craig was pretty unwell for a couple of days with diarrhoea and ended up going down […]

We set off after breakfast to the airport for our flight to Varanasi. Bhagi is very excited about this part of our trip. It is a very spiritual place for Hindus and he clearly loves it. We got to the airport in plenty of time, carrying only what we needed for the 2 nights in […]

After a very light breakfast we headed to the Red Fort in Agra. It is another world heritage site and is laid out similarly to the Amber Fort in Jaipur. It is the last palace of the Murghal kings and where the builder of the Taj Mahal ended his days under house arrest at the […]

It was up early for a quick breakfast and then off to zone 4. It was perishing cold in the open top vehicle and we were glad of the rugs from the hotel. No hot water bottles on Indian safaris. We stopped quite close to the entrance as there was a samba deer alarm call […]

After a good sleep on a nice firm bed and a cold wash we got packed up for breakfast at 7.45 and then in the bus to Ranthambore National Park. Bhagi gives us story time on the bus. Different topics each day. Today it was the caste system. He picks topics that we ask questions […]

It was up at 5am for a 5.30 pick up to go for our balloon ride. I will freely admit that I was a bit anxious about this family Christmas present from Santa. I haven’t noticed any health and safety precautions in India so far but figured the tour company wouldn’t recommend it if it […]

After breakfast the bus took us to the Amber Fort, which is on the city edge. We stopped to take photos of the Palace of Winds on the way. Striking architecture by day also. The Amber fort is a series of fortified palaces on top of a hill with a lake with moat and formal […]

We managed to get ourselves ready to depart the hotel by 5 am and set off with a packed breakfast for the New Delhi train station. New Delhi is a suburb of Delhi. The breakfasts were a sandwich, banana, some pastries and a small juice all in this enormous cardboard cake box. The streets were […]

We had a plan to rise in time for breakfast, which ends at 10.30, then do presents and maybe get a taxi into the centre for a look around. However at 8.30am we got a call from our tour leader wanting to meet at 9 in order to record our details (passport and visa numbers […]

Arrived at 5.30am and had a reasonably straightforward passage through immigration. Our bags were where they were supposed to be and the man was there to greet us with a sign for our tour (Peregrine- which begins tomorrow). We realised Craig wouldn’t recognise the sign so described him to the young man ( Jen having […]