A good selection of food has been experienced in our first week, along with a little bit of exercise in the form of dancing. A giant 1kg seabass, a kilo of tiger prawns, fish and chips and lots of chicken tikka massala, butter chicken, mutton rogan josh, vegetable pakora, tandoori chicken skewers and nan breads, all devoured at sunset before boogying the night away.
The bill shown is £25 in the UK !!! Cheap as chips!!
And, Graham befriended a couple on their honeymoon who introduced him to a sheesha pipe 😁😁
A young Indian driver who spoke very little English was despatched to take us on a pre-booked whistle-stop tour of the city, visiting as many sights as we could in 5 hours, but sadly, due to delays in unloading the excessive luggage on our flight (no, not ours), our trip ended up being a shorter 3 hours.
The fun started when the driver took us to a 5 seater car and a small boot, despite 4 months of emails asking for a large vehicle to take large suitcases!! That’s India for you. No worries, with a typical head shake, the cases were wedged into a roof rack and off we went.
We wanted to give Graham and Diane a view of real India and that’s what we did.
We left the airport suburbs and drive Indian style, 5 cars and 3 scooters abreast on a 4 lane road, non existent lane control where everyone toots their horn as they pass a scooter or pushbike. We went through the poor areas of town where lower classes sleep on matting on pavements with plastic sheeting for protection, secured on railings to form a roof. That will be their sleeping, cooking and living area, some are fed by co-operatives locally, some do daily work but they are happy.
First stop, Qutub Minar, a red sandstone tower 72.5 metres high, making it the tallest brick built minaret in the world, started in 1192 and completed in 1368, surrounded by royal tombs and Mosque.
David queued to purchase entry tickets, £5 each and immediately the cashier started bowing to him. Every time David said anything, the man put his hands together in prayer form and bowed his head.
We only had about 20 minutes to quickly admire the Tower and remains, we should have spent a few hours there but were on a tight schedule, but those few minutes there opened our eyes to the fact that we were White Westerners that stuck out a mile!! Diane and I spent our time being stared at, videoed, photographed and being smiled at, everyone saying hello, and several asking for Selfies with us, which we agreed to but moved on quickly before the next family or group asked for one!
We then drove around the city, viewing the affluent Embassy area, where every country in the World has an Embassy in a huge plush mansion with massive manicured gardens; the Government offices and Parliament, which were preparing for an upcoming Voting day and finally India Gate and its gardens before heading back to the airport for our final leg of the flight.
Departure No 1 started on Wednesday 11th January at 8am with a drive to the airport, leaving behind an unusually cold and grey Alicante. Our smooth flight went well and we arrived into a freezing Gatwick Airport early afternoon.
Diane and Graham’s travel adventures began at 7am with a 7 hour hour coach trip from Hull to Heathrow via Nottingham, Milton Keynes and other midland cities to end at Heathrow’s Terminal 3, Virgin Media’s check in desk.
Arrival No 1 at Gatwick, our flight from Alicante to Gatwick went smoothly then our pre-booked taxi transfer driver from Gatwick to Heathrow was a Romanian chap who had a big chip on his shoulder about immigrants coming into the UK (yes, really!!). Thankfully our M25 journey was pre office-turnout time so quick and uneventful and we were at Virgin ‘s check in desk in ample time.
For Departure No 2, Heathrow to New Delhi, our chatty check-in lady Francine ran a sweepstake on who’s bags were heavier, the loser having to buy the first drink in the bar later – if we were buying champagne, she promised to join us…….. Diane, 15kg, Juliet 22.7kg, David 23.3kg, Graham’s 23kg exactly!! 😀 Needless to say a few drinks were quaffed alongside dinner, but sadly Francine never appeared, she seemed so genuine…..
The only downside to being one of the first in the queue was that our bags were first on and last off at the other end but waiting for baggage in Delhi gave us time to change into cooler clothes and freshen up.
The overnight flight from Heathrow to New Delhi was jam packed, lots of students and youngsters heading off to work at schools and missions and lots of Brits “doing the tour” of the tourist sites in Northern India as well as Indians returning home. By the time dinner was served at about 9.30pm, because we were in row 56 (out of 82) the meat option for the hot meal had just about run out. The stewardess said “I have 2 portions of chicken tikka massala left so one of you can have a paneer (tofu like cheese) curry” and duly dished out……one paneer curry, one English breakfast with sausage, bacon, potatoes, tomato and eggs and one lasagne!! Talk about confused and amused, but as we had eaten earlier in the evening so weren’t really starving, just picked at bits. I certainly enjoyed my paneer curry, poppadoms and chutney but rejected the chocolate orange mousse dessert. It just didn’t quite go with curry……🤔
Sleep evaded us, bums became numb, legs and ankles swelled and at 3am body clock time, fast forward to 8.30am Indian time, we were served breakfast – a warmed nan bread filled with curried potato and lentils and side pots of yoghurt and fruit. The cries of “I’m not eating THAT!” came from all the British filled seats, except ours.
Since I had Covid in May 2023, my taste buds have been non-existent and I am constantly craving strong tastes and flavours, a sensation that was well and truly satisfied by this scrummy breakfast snack, yum! I hear you all cringe…..
Arrival no 2 was into New Delhi airport, a hustling bustling airport, and an even busier exit area, where we eventually located our driver. Bags were loaded onto a roof rack and we were bundled into a car before being taken on a whistle-stop tour of a few main sights in the city for the next few hours. (More to come on that!)
Back to New Delhi Airport for Departure No 3, to Goa. Late afternoon departure meant we had seen a sunset and sunrise in one day but on different planes. The last time we exited Goa’s Dabolim airport it was August 2020 and we were shepherded into a tiny hot room, bags scanned, body scanned, paperwork examined and passports quickly stamped by the military before leaving to head to the UK via New Delhi. At Delhi there was more chaos in sweltering heat with airport staff not knowing what to do. BUT that was Covid times.
Arrival no 3, in Dabolim Goa this time, we found a sparkling new cool airport, clear signage, cheerful passport officers, food outlets and a duty free shop and ample taxis outside willing to barter for our business to take us to our accommodation.
Finally, Arrival no 4 on Thursday evening was at our resort accommodation 31 hours later on 8pm Goa time, 3pm uk time! Time for dinner then bed!!
Happy New Year to all our friends and family! We are very much looking forward to a new year of travel, exploration and fun!! We’ve had a disastrous summer last year, travel wise….after leaving Spain to head to cooler climes in Northern Europe, our travels were quite quickly halted by a series of issues. Benny (Kia Sorento) developed a noisy, expensive sounding “clonk” at every bump and the boot developed a mind of it’s own, shutting when open. Bessy was also groaning after having spent half a year in 50 degree sun drying out her internal mechanics, one day the water pump stopped working, the next day the toilet pump died then utter disaster!!! the fridge stopped chilling the beers, so we dashed from Southern France to Bilbao, got on the next boat back to the UK to locate an available repair shop. We did try very hard to locate one in France and Spain but they took one look at Bessy and said “No! Eengleesh. No parts in Spain” and so we limped back……
Fast forward a few months….. Benny has been upgraded to a shining newer Kia Sorento with 6 years warranty remaining, hopefully alleviating any excessive bills for the next few years. Bessy has been fully winterised and is very happy in her new home in storage in East Yorkshire, covered in a centrally heated fleecy blanket, surrounded by lots of other lovely caravans. We were able to take Bessy (and a friend) out to the Yorkshire Dales in August for a week’s testing and made sure all the mechanics were up and running and we CAN CONFIRM that beer and wines were chilling to perfection, toilet was flushing and water was flowing!! She’s a happy Bessy again!!
This month, our passports are being flexed, opened and stamped again – we are heading off to Goa, the first time since lockdown in March 2020!! We left a few suitcases with a friend we met there – hoping to return to collect them the next year, but that hasn’t happened until now, when some 3 years later the Indian government allowed British citizens to reapply for travel visas. In December, I was so excited to learn that our suitcases contain a hair dryer and lots of clothing, I only hope they still fit us!! Only a few days before we find out!!!
Our plan is to return to Spain in March and maybe spend a month abroad somewhere else, yet undecided. We plan to return to the UK in June, collect Bessy and head to Bavaria for a few weeks, before heading back to Spain. Maybe, later in the year, we may travel to Malaysia, New Zealand or Africa…..it’s an option, the world is our oyster! Watch this space!!
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