India

Left Chennai at 10:45pm and arrived in Kochi at 11:30am Friday. The atmosphere here is completely different. The station was calm. Not too many people. And we found a Pizza Hut. Very sad but after our experiences of pizza in Havelock we needed it. Went to the Women Changing India photography exhibition in Kochi which Matt had spotted in a photography magazine. It was interesting to see how things are changing here. Women training and working in “men’s” jobs such as security guards and setting up an independent bank which lends money to women for small business ventures. It was refreshing to get a view of women working in this way as you hardly see any women in business such as restaurants and hotels. The majority seem to be run by men. ...

Flight from Port Blair to Chennai was faultless. Kingfisher airlines were excellent. The flight was on time. The bus at Chennai from the plane to the terminal had armchairs & sofas to sit on. I am not kidding. Here I am trying to take a photo of both of us sat in one of the armchairs quickly before anyone sees me and arrests me for breaching airport security. This was embarrassingly the best one out of four attempts! ...

Sun is shining yay! Spent most of Monday on our lovely little bit of secluded beach. Matt in the hammock hiding from the sun and me in as much sun as poss. Had bar-b-q fish again for dinner at Pellicon. This time we had the biggest chunk of tuna fillet I’ve ever seen and a delicious Silverfish marinated in tandoori sauce. Delish. Tuesday we decided to get up for sunrise. Alarm set for 5am, we dragged ourselves out at 5.15. Mr Sun was already half up but it was still pretty. The tide was out which reveals lots of old coral rocks and leaves lots of sealife behind like bigger rock-camouflaged crabs and teeny blue fishes swimming through the coral tunnels. ...

Happy 1st Anniversary to John & Kelly Wass! Can’t believe it’s been a whole year since your wedding. Time has flown. Miss you guys lots! Our last day of diving today. It rained all night long heaviest we’d heard and was still raining at 6am when the alarm went off. But by the time we boarded Hammerhead the blue sky was winning and Matt has his first sunburn of the Andaman Islands. ...

8am I woke up looked out the window saw blue sky and was like a small child on Christmas morning jumping around over-excitedly. Sunbathing here we come! I rushed over to order to brekkie whilst Matt dragged himself sleepily out of bed and into the shower. Just as he came out of the hut the black clouds swallowed up the blue and the rains descended. And it’s rained and rained and rained and rained. All day. ...

Happy Anniversary to Steve & Anne-Marie! It’s bonfire night in the UK and you’d be forgiven for thinking they have the same tradition over here as kids are running round with sparklers and setting off fireworks and the loudest firecrackers I’ve ever heard giving this old woman many mini heart attacks. It’s the Diwali festival of lights today. Such a shame it’s hardly stopped raining. We have been in the hut most of the day. I ventured to the beach to do a quick weather check earlier today only to see the storm coming once again across the sea towards me and by the time I’d run the 100m back to the hut I was drenched! We’ve heard the edge of a cyclone is hitting the island and it’s expected to stay for another few days. Just our luck! I’m glad we had a few days of sun. We met a couple at dinner who arrived on Tuesday and have had rain everyday. Ferries were cancelled for some of Wednesday and all of Thursday due to rough seas. They’d heard from a guy who arrived on the last ferry that only about 5% of the passengers managed to survive without being sick. Ugh. ...

For the past week we have been in the Indian Ocean between the Bay of Bengal and the Andaman Sea on the tropical Havelock Island. We landed in Port Blair on South Andaman Thursday afternoon and jumped in a taxi 15 mins before the last ferry was due to leave for Havelock. We were under no illusion that we’d get that ferry when we landed. But the information desk woman at the airport plus the taxi driver assured us we could make it. At 13:58 we were running across the jetty towards the 14:00 ferry laden down with backpacks waving at a large ferry in the dock. They were just about to leave. As we got to the door (knackered) the guys asked for our ticket. Hmmm didn’t have one of those. So no ferry til next morning at 6am. I was pretty peed off as we’d run for it and there was no way we could have got that ferry. Especially now knowing that it takes at least 45mins to get tickets due to the once again faff of a system of getting forms off one guy who only hands them out when he feels like it, deciphering what needs to be filled in, then queuing forever whilst the staff take hours to do the one and only job they need to do. Book a ferry ticket. ...

Kolkata (previously known as Calcutta although may still be known as Calcutta as many people still say they’re from Bombay even though its now Mumbai – must check this out) was a pleasant surprise for a large city. We arrived late Tuesday night as our train took 2hrs longer than it needed to. Somehow Uli, the German trainee architect who is studying in Vienna, had wangled us a lift to our hotel with a lovely Kolkatan couple whose driver met them at the station in their new Jeep wagon thing that had room for a family of 10 and still had the bubble wrap on the spare wheel. They were happy to go out of their way to take us to central Kolkata before they went to their home in South Kolkata as it was gone 1am and they knew the taxis would rip us off. Uli has also managed to wangle himself a free chicken sandwich which the driver picked up from Subway on his way to the station. ...

Last day in Darjeeling and weather today is lovely. Khangchendzonga is clearly visible on above the skyline. It’s beautiful. We stopped at our regular egg roll lady and acquired two on the way to Observatory Hill North East of centre to sit and admire the view of the mountain. Not quite as impressive a view as the one from Sandakphu but still not bad. Stopped for tea tasting where the guy let us smell about 20 different samples of tea which he warmed in his palms first to release the aroma. We then tried 2 types with more Cake Lady cake! ...

I thought I would try and update the blog as haven’t written for over a week. What better time to do it than whilst Matt has his first shave in 6 weeks. I could be writing a novel here :) Short version: The trek was amazing. There were bad points, there always are with us two. But the result at the end was phenomenal. The views at sunrise across the Himalaya mountain range spectacular, breathtaking. ...