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Kingreno
17-07-2004, 21:06
Yeah!

Me and My girlfriend will travel to India this Monday the 19th of Juli and will stay there for almost 5 weeks![cool]

We have prepared quite well actually and I hope I will bring back some very nice memories and pictures. For those of you who are interested, I inserted a map with the route we intend to take on it. Since the only pre-arranged thingie are the planetickets we may end up taking some detours but this is the "red line".



http://www.civ3duelzone.com/forum/uploaded/Kingreno/2004717194619_india-political-map-reis.GIF
121.19KB

We arrive in New Delhi and will attempt to get accustomed to Indian habits there. Delhi has some magnificent museums and Bazaars as well as the dominating Red Fortress. Delhi is also the fastest growing and most poluted city in this part of the world...
After Delhi we will hop off a train in Agra, home of the Taj Mahal and probably the worst place for tourists, as even the most hardy of travelers get scammed there. "Agra-fobia" is a word in India; we will stay there not too long.
After this, we will head for the Pink city of Jaipur. One of the most magnificent cities in India, it's Pink Fortress should be dazzling.
Here we will see what we do, we will have some time and depending on wheather and other things we will get to Udaipur (the romantic city) or take up some time in the countryside.
Jaisalmer is in the Thar desert, it is very touristy so we will have to see whether it is not too bad there. We want to take at least two days for a camelsafari there, which indeed may be on every visitors' book but rumors are all very positive about it. [hmm]
After this and the soaring heat of another desertpearl, Bikaner, we will look for the Cooling effects of the Himalaya in Kashmir! In Manali we will take the mountainroute to Leh. This route is only open 3 months per year and has some of the highest mountain passes in the world, with the highest at 5200 meters, about 16k Feet. The safety situation is according to the Government here not optimal but it is acceptable. Leh ( and the road to it ) are far away from the Pakistani border, as it is in the southeast of Kashmir.
In this relatively "off the road" part of the world there are many Tibettan refugees who escaped from Chinese "occupation". It is also one off the quieter parts of india, populationwise.

That is it, I will post the stories when I get back! In the meantime have some great Holidays everyone and Kick some serious ass in the ISDG. When I get back I will try to get more involved!

[party][party][party]

Banzai
17-07-2004, 21:19
Wow! That looks great!
Take care and have a lot of fun!

Banzai!

Aggie
17-07-2004, 21:41
Have fun! What happened with Sri Lanka on that map?

ERIKK
18-07-2004, 20:05
Hehe, been there last year!

I have visited the "desertpearl Bikaner", Agra and Jaipur. We went east from there on towards
varanasi and then north to Nepal.

The Jaipur forts rule, the architecture in Agra is wunderbar, only Bikaner was not that cool.
In Bikaner the touts were horrific. Be aware, these guys follow you everywhere!!!

If you want to hear more on those towns I can email you my logs. I wont spoil anymore as you
might want to explore everything yourself, like a good civ player! :)

One more tip on Bikaner: watch out for the swamp! ;)

anarres
18-07-2004, 20:29
I went to India for 3 weeks, and what caught me by suprise was how big it really is! At least you get to go by plane between area, because without that it would probably take you 5 weeks to travel the red line. [lol]

You are brave for going to Kashmir, it's meant to be fairly dangerous for tourists! [:o]

Kingreno
29-07-2004, 08:03
From India!

Hi all,

India is truely amazing. We arrived in Delhi in the middle of the night and the hotel we selected and emailed arranged for a pick up at the airport. A very old car brought us to the center of huge Delhi, going through streets that were literaly lined with sleeping people on the sidewalks. These homeless "having only what they wear" were an impressive sight. A bit saddening though. The Hotel was good but the polution terrible, there are no litterboxes anywhere and the sewers are often open...Also we got to know the worst part of India quickly, being commission. Everyone wants to talk in Delhi but we met no-one who did not have a commercial drive behind the talking. We ended up in wrong offices/shops/restaurants a lot. After three days we could not wait to get out of it, only the Ghandi museum and memorial were much worth it. I had some laughs when I thought of this guy and the guy in civ3 (the backstabber #1)[crazyeye]
We went by train to Jaipur, skipping Agra for terrible wheather and thus no sun on the Taj, we may do it at the end of the trip. In Jaipur We both got very ill. I especially spent 3 days on tyhe room, and then mainly the little room in the room.[cry]. We went to a doctor after it would not stop with our own medicine and I was diagnosed (very proffesional!) with an infection in my stomach and one in the belly. I am now slowly getting better on anti-biotics! I only went to the fort in Jaipur so I missed most highlights...
We took the nighttrain to Udaipur, having lost 3 precious days in ill-ness. Udaipur is breathtaking. It is small and very friendly and the palaces are amazing. The Hotel is brilliant as we have a palaceview and rooftop restaurant. It is also said to be the most romantic city, which is why I spend some time in this cybercafe [hmm].
I hope you all are doing okay, be back in 3 weeks![thumbsup]

Shabbaman
29-07-2004, 10:08
quote:Originally posted by Kingreno

It is also said to be the most romantic city, which is why I spend some time in this cybercafe [hmm]


[lol]

Getting ill abroad is never a good thing. If you both got ill it was probably something with the food, wasn't it? Not. Good. Have fun! (I doubt if you read this, but oh well..)

ProPain
29-07-2004, 11:41
One positive side to being ill at the beginning, you'll probably be ok the rest of the holiday. Have fun and keep healthy (both of you!)

Cya in a few weeks!

ERIKK
29-07-2004, 19:44
Darn, I guess you missed Amber Fort/Palace outside Jaipur... [eek]

anarres
30-07-2004, 00:50
Wow, it sounds like an amazing time!

Kingreno
01-08-2004, 13:42
Hi all,

Back on Track!

Now in Jodhpur and going to Jaisalmer tomorow.

India is marvelous. The great colors, the warm people, the plethora of culture, the smell of raw sewage in the morning. Great!!

will post more later!

ERIKK
01-08-2004, 15:04
Gotta love that smell of raw sewage & heavy air pollution!!! ;)

Beam
01-08-2004, 15:54
quote:the smell of raw sewage in the morning

Still having problems with your rectum? [lol]

Kingreno
12-08-2004, 15:55
To Beam: LOL, me and the rest of India by the smell of Bikaner.[hmm]

So, we went to Jaissalmer, now more then a week ago. It is a deserttown near the Pakistani border, tourism accounts for 90% of the income. The trainride to the place was nice, till 2 hours before arrival where dozens of touts boarded the train. These Mofo's just go and sit next to you and while reading (me) and sleeping (gf) they start to tell about the hotel that is the "best". I and some italians got realy pissed at them and we nearly had a good'ol trainbrawl. The weaklings left because of my great posture (and some 300 kilo of sicilian brute force[lol]).
In Jaissalmer the one thing to do is to take a camelsafari. We took one with an English couple and 3 guides for 3 days. It is VERY heavy, we did 70 kilometers in 3 days with temperatures seerig to 44 Celcius. My Camel was nice however and we realy got to know eachother. By the second day I got used to its farting (trust me, these babies fart like there was no tomorrow.). We slept under the desert stars and that is great! There is also more life in the desert then I thought. At night we were surrounded by desertdogs, lizards, lots of birds and a throng of mice. After this all, we went to Bikaner, very tired.
Bikaner is a weird city. Less tourism means some friendlier people, but less english, but more poverty means more desperate touts, thus more annoyance. 42 Celcius means the "swamp" of Bikaner vents out a terrible smell, the worst I ever smelled. The Swamp is actually a "pond" size of 4 footballfields where swans and flowers would provide a nice scene. In reality it is the place where Bikaneri drop all their Garbage and is also the main sewage collect reservoir. Terrible.
Near Bikaner we also visited the Rat-temple where 100.000 rats roam freely and are honored. Also smelly to say the least, but also bizarre. We saw the very rare white (albino) rat and that should mean luck. They were wrong.
The heat of Bikaner was compensated in other parts of the country. Delhi and northern India were sufering very heavy rains, with some plces claiming 300MM in 12 hours (Holland has 700MM in a year). It was therefor impossible to travel North from Bikaner. We had only to go to Delhi and try our luck on getting to the mountains there. WE took a nighttrain to Delhi, which was doable but sucked sleepwise. I got to meet a group of Indian officers in the army and they were nice (and rough!!). We had some great chats about military (though the Pakistani point of view on this may differ...). Back in Delhi we opted for a nightbus to Shimla, in the mountains, recommended by our also recommended hotel. The bus was sadly a minibus with zealous drivers who needed it full whatever the waitingtime...aaaaarggh. The ride was awful and I slept zero hours. [aargh]
So In shimla, we were rained upon by water as well as 40 touts (yes, just for us 2 tourist disembarking a minbus). We got to a closeby hotel, without touthelp naturaly, which was nice at first glance but heavily sucked later. As the toilet smelled, the blankets provided stank and the matrasses were too thin. To make it worse we both ate something wrong again. I had minor trouble but the gf some more...stuck here in Shimla we hope to catch a bus to Manali day after tomorrow. Leh is alas off the list as it will not allow us return to Delhi in time...[cry]
On the bright side, this survival is very much a lesson, and a wise one indeed. Hope you all enjoy the holiday season as well and see you in 8 days or so.

For those who wonder, I will be back in time to go to The stratumseind on next Friday the 20th.[goodjob]

Schip
12-08-2004, 16:35
He KR, nice job serviving those Indian horrors . Looks like you're having a great time. Me jeaulous. I experienced that going to work everyday makes you long for free time!

Anyway, I won't be joining at stratumseind that friday because i'm going to LOW-LANDS! (not as cool as India, but no doubt a lot of fun)

Schip

Shabbaman
12-08-2004, 17:06
I hope you can spare the time to confirm our cup match for next week KR!

ERIKK
12-08-2004, 19:42
Hehe, Shabba, business first right? ;)

Anyway, compared to your trip, my 5 weeks in India and Nepal were a walk through the park! I told you about the swamp. We walked along it the day we arrived and were jumped upon by 50 touts (only the 3 of us (tourists) disembard the train)! At that time moral dropped ultralow but after our visit to the rat temple and our lovely cheap non commercial hotel + owner + our safari with Veejay the kemal-man, I guess we liked the Bikaner experience!

Please tell us how many kilo's you left behind when you get back to Holland! ;)

Kingreno
20-08-2004, 21:11
Erikk: Only 6! Well, that says it all. I got ill again in the last days and after some tests a doctor in Manali diagnosed a Parasite![aargh]
I got pretty heavy medication, and worse, I could not eat Meat/Fish/eggs/Dairyproducts or drink alcohol. That makes it very hard to keep up weight! I had to adjust my trousers with safetypins to prevent them from going down!

We had some pretty heavy experiences in the mountains though. 40 Miles from Manali a bus had crashed into a valley killing 50. We passed it the next day and it was chaotic. The bodies were gone but bloodstained chairs were all over the place.
On the same day we were 300 meters behind a truck also taking a 40 meter-dive. The driver was catapulted out of the cabin and lay dead in plain view. The other passengers were alive but won't walk ever again (at least that is what it looked like...). Pretty heavy. The roads in the area were very bad due to monsoonrains. Our 4-wheel-drive made me feel a little safer...

It is good to be back in Holland! [cool]