Train travel in India

We started our journey south by train from the city of Hospet on the evening of 27th Jan. We had booked train tickets via travel agency, which are in every street corner in most cities (check commission before booking), and managed to get AC3 class to a sleeper wagon. It pays to book well in advance so you may get better and cheaper seats, prepare to book atleast 2-3 days in advance if you wish to travel at all by train. Otherwise you may need to settle for a bus or to a class with rock hard seats... Good tips for train travel in India can be found at A beginner's guide to train travel in India
Our wagon had 3 bunks on top of each other and another 3 opposite, and another 2 on the other side of the corridor. Bunks were quite comfortable altough way too short even for me who's only 174cm tall.Clean sheets and blankets were provided by Indian Railways.
I actually slept couple of hours, as the wagon was filled with business folk who all went to bed around 10PM, and arrived to Bengaluru reasonably fresh at 7AM.

Travelling light

I had booked a room from an Indian business hotel, Golden Residency for 1200Rs/night, so we were expecting to get a high-class hotel:) Indeed we had warm water, soap, wifi and roomservice breakfast. We never managed to get what we ordered from the roomservice, but it was included in the room rate. Also wifi didn't quite work, but hey you cannot ask for everything!

After 3 meatless and beerless days in Hampi we headed to Bengaluru's famous MG (Mahatma Gandhi) Road with high hopes to find a non-veg restaurant serving cold beer. As were were in India's beer capital we thought this would be an easy task but we actually found only couple of places and neither of them really inviting.
We had couple of frosties at Ruby Tuesday restaurant and our first Western meal of the trip! What a big mistake. I got terrible stomach cramps which i suffered even the next day. I will stick to Indian diet from now on as it has worked well so far. And if some wise-a says it could have been the beer that made my stomach upset, then I say you don't know me:)




30.1.2011
As I mentioned earlier it is worthwhile to book train tickets in advance. I wish i would have followed my own advice when we took the last tickets for 2nd class day train. Superfast train leaving at 6.15AM to Ernakulam (528km) meant 11h trip on "church bench" with sometimes 4 people on a bench orinally designed for 3 small Indians. Experience was somewhat painful. My back was complitely shot when we arrived to Ernakulam on the afternoon. This means that I might need to recover couple of days on the beach, I reckon.

All seats are booked by name. You may find the list outside your wagon.

Blue fans in a white ceiling.

 

Hampi

25.-27.1.2011 

We bought tickets to sleeper bus via Paulo Travels. The brochure promised a/c super luxury, Volvo deluxe bus with sleeping compartments. We got icy cold, small, no-sleep bunks. You were bouncing up and down in your bunk as the luxury Volvo's suspencion was totally nonexistent. 
In the middle of the night we had a fight with a Russian tourist claiming he had reserved exactly our spots for himself. That is basically impossible as there are no numbers in the bunks and the drivers don't know them either; first-come, first-served. Another rule of thumb; if you don't know what to do, follow the example of locals.

Trip from Margao to Hampi took approximately 9 hours (instead of estimated 7) and once arriving to bus station we were attacked by several tuk-tuk drivers. After the sleepless night the most pleasant way arriving to a new city. I made a deal with driver who promised not to bug me with unnecessary sightseeing offers and got to our guesthouse with 10Rs. Smart man made a silent offer to drive us also later so we booked him also for the temple tour:))

Virupaksha temple at sunrise - view from Vicky's rooftop restaurant

Problem?

Lotus Mahal

Tuk-tuk driver Mr.Smile feeding monkeys on Malyavantha.

26th Jan is the republic day of India, just a day before 2-day Hampi festival begins.
The drumming started on the hills and after couple of hours the parade reached Virupaksha temple with elephants and dancers wearing masks and colourful outfits. The ear-popping drumming was nearly hypnotizing and one couldn't help but just follow the crowd. 

Lakshmi

Sometimes you felt like you were a tourist attraction yourself as the locals were snapping "secretly" pictures of the palefaces with their mobilephones. Or they wanted to take a picture with you. Probably should begin to charge money for that...

Hampi Bazaar

Chillies drying in the sun

Lounging in a tibetian restaurant - Herman

Rocky-Rocky Singh learning the secrets of Rubik's cube

Reggae restaurants's dj booth / laundry service / jewellery shop / ??

Hampi is most impressive at sunrise and sunset when sun paints the temples and ruins to beautiful colors. Midday is dusty, hot and you get the feeling like you've stranded to a desert. You're also likely to get sunburned.
I can totally recommend a trip to Hampi if you have couple of days to spare from the beach. Rent a motorbike from Goa and you'll be there in no-time.
  
If you wish to have a deeper body&soul cleansing, spend a week, but I think 2-3 days will do fine. After all Hampi is not a big place, and bear in mind that restaurants do not serve any alcohol or any kind of meat/poultry. Even fish is rarely in the menu. 
I think I've lost couple of kilos...Yeah:)

Calangute and Baga beach

22.1.2011 Calangute and Baga beach

Decided it was time for some serious shopping and real tourism so we made a deal with General Manager Warner’s taxi friend and headed towards Calangute. We made a short stop via Baga beach in order to speed up my neighbors’ table order to Finland. I’m not quite sure how well I succeeded in discussions with the Kashmir traders so I’m hoping they’ll measure up to their word…

Casandre restaurant in Calangute makes extremely good Pina Coladas (nr 1 on my top ten list currently), and it was fun to do some people watching from the terrace. I also had a lousy haircut in Diana’s Parlour but it cost only 80 Rs. I cannot really mention anything else positive about the place:( 

It was noisy, dusty and filled with all sorts of schacks.  Ingo’s Saturday Night Bazaar in nearby Arpora is maybe the best place for shopping if you don’t mind the crowd. One day was enough for me.

The many faces of coconut

19th January

I have always known that you may use coconut for various purposes, mainly in kitchen and bar, but I’ve learned a few new neat tricks here in Goa!

After a day in the blistering sun you may ask a friendly local to climb up to the tree and pick up a tender coconut for you. After opening it with a big kitchen knife or machete you may zip the coconut water in the shade. The water tastes kind of like a salted cucumber with a coconut flavor. 

Then slice up the coconut and make yourself “a spoon” and you may carve the flesh from inside.

Dry the shell in the sun and you may use it later in the evening for smoking out the mosquitoes. This really works! 

Here are also pics of my new buddy; a cute little puppy called Tiger aka Gilbert. As he is so unbelievably goofy I renamed the dog first day I met him to Gilbert, which name has now stuck to this poor fellow. If I could take him home I would do it in a heartbeat!

As I cannot do that I have promised to sponsor him with flea collars from Finland:D

17-18th January

Knife sharpener

General Manager relaxing with Aloe "frog" mask

Sunrise at Majorda beach

Morning walk

Margao - Colva

14.1.2011 Margao – Colva

After nice siesta in the Boomerang bar on Colva beach we headed back to the main street. We had found out that there is one place where we could finally get the mobile broadband. Naturally it was not that easy… Salesman from the neighbor shack shop went and woke up our “IT specialist” from his flat behind the internet café (where you can only buy water and soda). As Ville (viltsuintiassa.blogspot.com) had extra photos with him we cut corners and took a prepaid sim card for me with his details, photo and passport copy. And finally the long waited mobile internet (Tata Photon) with same procedures than with the sim (Airtel), and required seven signaturesJ We reached our hotel just before the dark after 6PM just to notice that the connection didn’t work there at all. 

Next day success at the Majorda beach (my new tourist's office) and first Skype call to my lovely family back in Finland! 

15.1.2011

Hotel’s general manager took us to a sightseeing trip to Varna village which is located approximately 7 kilometers from Utorda. We drove past beautiful villas and a big lake to reach a spring famous among locals. We jumped over rocks to reach a small waterfall where we dipped our feet to the water in order to get an Indian pedicure (small fishes will eat the dead skin from your feet). This was a very pleasant if somewhat tickling experience.

On our way back we stopped for some snacks and drinks with our friend. We ended up buying two liters of “ale”; local ginger liquor brewed at the restaurant. This drink is said to be good for digestion and joints, and warms you up quickly on cold winter nights. It also goes to your head quickly…

In the evening we had dinner in Zeebob, a fish restaurant recommended in the Lonely Planet guide book. I have to agree that the food was extremely good but expensive.  And the personnel kept swiping the sand smooth every time someone stepped on it. I couldn’t really see any point in that as I wasn’t trying to escape anyone by hiding my tracks…

Finally here!

But let me tell you first how I got here...

I took first a bus to Helsinki 11th January at 8AM from Turku, after which a (delayed) flight to Istanbul. With only 1 hour to spare in the schedule it was obvious that I would need to run to catch my next flight! I cannot find anything bad to say about the service with Turkish airlines; food was excellent and you could even choose which main course you wished to have. Upon arrival there was a person who escorted us through the airport directly to the next flight to Mumbai.

Flight to Mumbai was again with Turkish Airlines with continually exceptional service and free gifts! You gotta love those:) I arrived to Mumbai 4.15AM the next day, tired but happy to have reached my connection. I must have looked a bit dazed as I was interviewed for 15 minutes at immigration. Rest of the Europeans sailed through without any efforts. To my huge surprise I received my luggage also, another thumbs up to Turkish. Then the painful 8 hour waiting time at Mumbai airport. My best tip for surviving in there is to follow the crowds, prepare for atleast 4 security checks; before and after flights and after changing terminals. Note that you cannot use credit card at the airport cafes, they only accept cash. Remember to add an address tag to your handluggage without writing an address to it, this is only for security purposes and will be stambed before entering the plane.
After the staggering wait it was only 55 mins flight to Goa with Jet Airlines. Once again with your preferred meal choise.

Dom Pedro's

Goa airport is small and very easy to navigate, you cannot really get lost there even if you wanted. The weather was promising/ hot 34C and Viltsu was there to greet me with our hotel's "General Manager" who is a walking information office along with other various duties around the Dom Pedro's hotel. Prices seem to be higher than ever earlier in Goa as our small apt with a/c cost 1500 rupees/night. We will move Saturday for a cheaper accommodation without a/C which will cost 800 rupees, fair price for high season when you can divide it between two persons.

Indian mosquitos are slightly sneakier as their Finnish relatives. You cannot hear them coming and you will only notice the bite after it's already too late. Luckily also the repellants seem to be more efficient, most probably consisting of chemicals not allowed within EU. I will stock my suitcase with this stuff when I head home...

Majorda beach is only 500 meters away from the hotel, and it has a long strech of restaurants open all day and probably all night long. The sunset is absolutely beautiful, especially accompanied by Pina Colada which has become my absolute favourite here. It is made with fresh coconut milk and pineapple with a generous amount of rum. No need to take many.
We have made friends with one of the restaurant owners who is also trying to be our real estate agent. We had the most lovely tandoori red snapper dinner in his restaurant yesterday evening, and are definately going there again.

14.1.2011 Margao – Colva

Today was the most horrific day since arrival; we rented a motorcycle and drove to Margao city in search of a internet connection and sim card. Everyone can imagine the Indian traffic, so I was mildly said scared but happy that Viltsu had previous experience from his Nepal tour. Main trick is not to show mercy and just drive as grazy as everyone else. Try to keep to the left side of the road, if that is not possible you may choose whatever lane!
We also witnessed an apparent road rage fight on Colva's main street which blogged the traffic for atleast 15 minutes.

Jesus bike

Kimi Raikkonen

I am writing this now at Colva beach, half way to the hotel. We are waiting for the "siesta" to end so we may continue the hunt for wifi connection. tbc...

Susegad!
(Goan word meaning simply easy living:))