on the road to Delhi

Udaipur, Jaipur, Agra, Mathura, Faridabad – 880km

Friday 3rd April to Thursday 9th April 2009

Before we boarded the bus for our overnight trip to Jaipur we had the pleasure of a Rajastani all you can eat thali at Natraj restaurant.  Adrian did not stop eating until the waiters decided to avoided our table.

Jaipur market - pink city

Jaipur market 1 - pink city

Jaipur Market 2 - pink city

Jaipur- pink city

We took an overnight bus from Udaipur to Jaipur and experienced another example of how things are sometimes done in India.  Two children who should have been at asleep for school the  next morning were working the overnight bus because of this Adrian had to climb on top of the bus to load the bikes onto the roof with no ropes.  Luckily we had a few extra bungy cords and we arrived in Jaipur with the bikes intact.  We had agreed to meet up with Sanjay in the afternoon, but the bus was early and we had an easier time than expected time navigating the city so we arrived at his house that morning.  With no big itinerary so we had breakfast and agreed to meet Sanjay at his place of business for a tea break.  Like many families in Jaipur he is in the jewelry business and supplies many European and UK customers. 

Jaipur 2 - pink city

Taj

It took us two days and we cycled at least 138km to reach Agra by 3:30pm.  We arrived a few days earlier than planned so we contacted  Raj to see if he was around. We agreed to meet at his place of business and visit a restaurant he frequents with a rooftop view of the Taj Mahal.  Adrian was having stomach issues and couldn’t think straight so we missed the sunset and decided to go there for sunrise instead.   We were pretty much touristed out by then, and couldn’t bring ourselves to visit a monument that had no real purpose except for the obligatory tourist shot, but after hearing that foreigners are charged 750rs to visit the Taj this confirmed our decision to just get the photo.  We spent one night in Agra and hit the road the next morning.  Many times during the day we were besieged by dust storms I had to use the scarf I was using to protect my neck from the mid-day sun to cover my face.  After making hotel inquires on the way and being quoted ridiculous prices we got to Mathura and ended up camping in an open field where they were making cow patties.  Raj had offered to book us a hotel and we should have taken him up on his offer. All of a sudden 20 children showed up.  No one spoke any English, but kept speaking to us in Hindi.  Then a dust  storm started, but it didn’t rain and we finally got some sleep without the beeping of trucks.

April 8th 2009, Packed up the tent again to an audience and to some wise ass English speakers who I completely ignored, but Adrian had to engage with.  Only did about 60km as it rained twice and we had to duck out of the rain and into a railway crossing office.  We hung  out with three men who spoke to us at length shame we couldn’t understand a word they were saying.  Adrian took some video of the passing train and then fixed his flat tire which they were riveted by.  That night we camped in a contrete storage room, 1 of a row of 4.  It looked like a food storage unit even though a guy was living in one of them.  Again the friendly locals persisted in having a long conversation with us in Hindi brought us coffee and a rope bed, which we put the tent on top of.  Periodically the guy on the end would come over to give us more things from his ‘house’ to make us more comfortable.

Rode onto Delhi through Farindabad.  During the almost three months in India we have taken pleasure in reading the english language papers whenever we can get one.  The front page is dominated by election news, but what we find really entertaining is India’s obsession with record breaking, although not  a sporting nation – cricket and badminton aside they excel in Guiness Records.  There’s a guy who holds 33 records including one for being kicked in the testicles 44 times.  An Indian housewife ate 51 of the worlds hottest chillies and then proceeded to rub them into her eyes.  Then the existing record of stuffing 250 drinking straws in ones mouth was broken by a man who first went to a dentist to have nearly all his teeth removed, he also rode a scooter in shifts continusly around a park in Pune completing 7,400 laps in 100o hours.  Wah hoo! Incredible !ndia