| ABOUT THIS TRAVEL Northern India- Kashmir
21 days, august- sept 2005
INDIA INTRO
Kind of travel: me and
a sweet girl through an independent travel
When: 13rd august-
4th sept 2005
How I moved: bus,
train and one flight
Where I slept: houseboat
(Srinagar), hotel, guesthouse, on the train and on the bus
What I liked: the
amazing variety of religions, cultures, languages and environments. The huge but efficient
railway system. The kindness of the people. The easiness in the comunication by English.
The A/C room in Kolkata
What I disliked: .The
endless horning everywhere. The food sucks and I hope you like chicken. The permanent
headache due to the altitude in Ladak. Getting robbed on the night train to Varanasi.
The 101% humidity in Kolkata. The continuos blackouts.
How much daily: India is
cheap, anyway travelling in two people, the daily budget has been 17euro each. Because of
the hotness we travelled on the A/C train class and (sometimes) slept in A/C rooms, at the
end the train became the main expense (read
the prices). Anyway with some sacrifices you can keep a lower budget, left alone the
trips by jeep in Ladak that are very expensive.
Freezing or baking?: In Kashmir, Ladak and Manali there was a nice temperature
(a sweter in the evening without sleeping bags for the night). In New Delhi it was hot,
but in Kolkata it was like an unbearable sticky sauna.
Dangers/ hassles: watch out your stuff on the train around Varanasi expecially in
the night; my camera and most of the pics had gone. Don't underrate the altitude in Ladak,
even a 3 day acclimatation in Leh might not be enough for the 5000m.. Driver riscio' in
Varanasi and Agra bring you where they want regardless what you say. Keep away from the
control line with Pakistan in Kashmir.
What you do need: a good
flash lamp and stomach good as well! :-)
THE
TRAVEL
From Milan stopover in Frankfurt and New Delhi to
get to Srinagar (N. Delhi- Srinagar, 130 euro, one way). In Srinagar the temperature was
perfect and we stayed in a cute houseboat on the river (1200 rp/day 2 people, full board).
I’ve an extremely nice memory of the days we spent there. We walked around the desert
town really seized by the Indian army being the following day the Indian independence
anniversary. We enjoyed a boat trip on the wonderful Dal Lake visiting the gardens, the
mosque, and the floating cultivation.
Beside we had a day trip to the winter ski resort of Gulmarg,
where we took a cable car to get over the 3300m and then riding horses we reached a tongue
of snow of a glacier. Here I had a short but bumpy sledge ride driven by a funny
Pakistan-like man.
We would have stayed longer in Srinagar,
but we had to proceed towards Leh. It took two days by bus,
staying overnight in Kargil. It had been a tiring journey but
really worthwhile: first of all for the variety of environments
this narrow twisting dirty road passes through: from the very
green valley near Srinagar to the desert like mountains approaching
Leh. In addition for the radical cultural change: the long beards
of the Muslims were swapped with the rounded faces of the Tibetans,
while the mosque with their minarets turned in the Buddhist
monasteries called "gompas".
Leh is over 3200 m, so the altitude began to have his effect..
In Leh every movement costs energies, a lot of energies I mean. Here you can find several
different proposals of trekking by 4X4 and day trips to the gompas in the region by taxi.
No way to bargain since all the itineraries and their relative prices are officially laid
down. You have to gather a bunch of people if you don’t want to leave there all your
money doing the trip alone.
The area around Leh is breathless, but after 3 days we had seen
enough gompas for the whole our life. Besides Leh, relatively to his size and location,
turned out to be quite touristy. After a while we were a little fed up of souvenir shops
and 4x4 filled with Italians, Israelians and Germans.
Then we had the longest and toughest journey of the trip: Leh-
Manali in 2 days by bus throught the over 5000 m passes. Amazing landscapes, surreal
atmospheres but I would have skipped it with pleasure, since it’s hard to enjoy a
trip when at best you are dizzy for the whole time.
Manali is a heaven to rest in: super cheap guesthouses, green
environment, fresh temperature and being below the 3000m the altitude was harmless. Anyway
to me appeared a kind of soften India; I wanted to see the striking one, hence we settled
off to the 2000 km far Kolkata.
17 hours by bus and 20 by train led us to the hot damp but
charming capital of Bengala. Here we spent 3 days enjoying the riscị rides around the
town and the shower in our A\C room to survive the 100% humidity rate.
Despite of the climate I really liked Kolkata!
12 unforgettable hours by train led us to the hindu holy town
of Varanasi; in fact during the night travel we got robbed of our small backbags, hence
camera and pictures gone :-( (read the tips)
Varanasi is crossed by the holy Ganga river and the hindu here
dip and throw their dead bodies, burnt or not (read the story). Definitely it’s
an impressive place, but generally speaking, locals and riscio’ drivers are the most
dodgy we have found in India: at the end I didn’t fall in love with the town.
Another night on the train led us to Agra to visit the famous
Taj Mahal. Althought of my expectations to be an ugly touristy town, it was not. Tourists
were concentrated in few places and locals turned out to be far better than in Varanasi,
besides there’s much more to see than just the Taj Mahal.
4 hours by train separated us to New Delhi from where we
finally flew back to "our world".
Alby
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| IMPRESSIONS ABOUT KASHMIR Kashmir
is wonderful and safe (at least when I visited it (08/2005)).
It’s a Muslim area so obviously this is the culture you
will face with, although any covering is mandatory for females you have to respect their
sensitivity to it.
I found people extremely hospitable, not pushy at all, and
especially the soldiers (plenty of) were so nice to us. It’s true that considering
the militaries around it seems to be in a war status, but at the end your risk is minimal.
Temperature in Srinagar turned out ok, being hot but dry and
sleeping in the houseboat was so relaxing.
Srinagar lies under 3000m so you won’t feel any altitude
effect, and tourism is just from Indians; from both of these points of view it’s
quite far from Leh.
The 2 days journey from Srinagar to Leh is amazing and still
not too tiring, unlike Leh- Manali that is more similar to a pilgrimage.
In short, Go There!
Alby
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| IMPRESSIONS ABOUT INDIA India,
namely New Delhi, Varanasi, Kolkata are quite shocking realities.
However it’s not just dirt and smell around you, but a
philosophy of life that comes from the Hindu religion. I think a Western can hardly
understand their perception of the cycle of death and life without looking just the
appearances.
People are nice, and apart from the pushy riscio’ drivers
and some sucker hotelkeeper, they want to speak to you because of their curiosity. I had
fun in exchanging points of view on the Indian habits concerning the engagement for the
couples. On the other hand it’s true that after a while this curiosity can be quite
tiring and you'll long to stay alone.
The last but not the least, the humidity and the hotness got a
big slice of the amount of energies I needed to travel in the low lands. The same travel
one month later would have meant half of the efforts.
Alby
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