5th - 8th June 2012
So rising at 4:30am earns you the right to be first into a wonder of the world - well it did for these two Irish eejits who were a good 20 minutes in the queue waiting for the gates of the Taj Mahal to open before any other tourists came along and queued behind us! Still all worth it as they opened the gates we go through and get the first photo like image of the marble giant peering out through the entry archway. Being first in allowed us to get an unblemished view of this magnificent image (that gets 3million+ visitors a year). Nicole also got the opportunity to perfect the infamous Princess Di pose on the bench leading up the tree lined pool avenue that provides a mirror reflection of the Taj - and even though we were in an oasis of calm, very rare in this chaotic country, I could hear an Indian voice in my head say "see Sir I do you good price, two Taj for the price of one" as the Taj reflected back at us.
Nicole was "overwhelmed" by the whole experience and the Taj has entered straight in at number one on her all time favourite sights - how it beats the Pyramids I can't understand but she put my "appropriately whelmed" feelings on the morning's visit down to me contracting the obligatory dickey Indian tummy (affectionately known as Delhi Belly) the day before!!
You got to hand it to the guy who commissioned the building of the Taj in honour of his 3rd wife's death - but as Karl Pilkington (An Idiot Abroad) said - I'd wonder if her was as nice to her before her death or was this down to some form of guilt...
We spent the rest of the day in Agra waiting to leave Agra - it's very much a one sight town, or maybe it's just the the Taj Mahal paves all the City's other offerings into insignificance. Given that it was 46 degrees of piercing sun we sought solitude in a local (westernised style) coffee shop offering the best AC we could find - on settling in we were joined by a Canadian couple who had the same idea and were also awaiting their late evening exodus from Agra!! 3 hours in, and after watching all Jurassic Park subtitled, I felt we were "cheating" as tourists and much to Nicole's disapproval I said we should go visit the Fort (must see sight number 2 of Agra). All I can say is Nicole was of course right and we were better off where we were! So picture this, a large square courtyard with high dilapidating walls, hawkers coming at us from all angles trying to sell all matter of junk and us looking angrily at each other while we sweated faster than we could replenish with water... So after a power visit where we hogged whatever shade was available off we set with a chancer of rickshaw driver - Bring on my first argument with a local as he obviously never met a melting Irish man being blinded by the suncream running off his forehead before - long and short even he knew it was in no ones interest that we visit his 'brothers' shop where he could get us a 'special price'!
Off we set that night for our 10 hour road transfer to our next stop - Varanasi, or as we renamed it 'the Knock of India'. The place was wedged with pilgrimages worshipping all varieties of gods. The Knock reference came as our boat guide on the Ganges said that pilgrims always bring a bottle of the Ganges water back home to those that couldn't come - sure this could only conjure up the image of the reservoirs of holy water sitting in presses up and down the country back home - Though why anyone would bring a bottle of this stuff home is beyond me. We rowed (well we were rowed) up by the cremation area of the river and it was surreal, the scene that confronted us could have been any time in history and by looking at the evenings events you couldn't tell if it was 2012 or 1812. Our guide then went on to tell us that the bodies of pregnant women and children who died couldn't be burned and were weighed down with stones and thrown into the centre of the river - just another reason that baffled me as to how they washed, swam and even drank from the river!
Following the cremation site we stopped off, parked up our boat and sat to watch 'mass'. Every evening at 8 there's an hour long praying ceremony - but 20 minutes in, following much bell ringing and chanting that would put 20 decades of the rosary to shame, I was fit to pass out with the heat that was being added to by the thousands there praying - so we set off on our boat again and head back to base.
Our second night in Varanasi we head out for a walk around the craziness that the streets of India had to offer as it was our last night before we head for Nepal - and my God we were immersed in the chaoticness of it all as our wandering caused us to get lost and go round in circles but always seeing something bizarre along the way! India is truely a fascinating, colourful and busy country and the thoughts of ever escaping a crowd looked like they would never come - but than came Nepal...
P.S - Nicole wanted to delete half this entry - but lets be honest when she said 'Ronan you do the blog on our last few days in India' who expected any less??
R
So rising at 4:30am earns you the right to be first into a wonder of the world - well it did for these two Irish eejits who were a good 20 minutes in the queue waiting for the gates of the Taj Mahal to open before any other tourists came along and queued behind us! Still all worth it as they opened the gates we go through and get the first photo like image of the marble giant peering out through the entry archway. Being first in allowed us to get an unblemished view of this magnificent image (that gets 3million+ visitors a year). Nicole also got the opportunity to perfect the infamous Princess Di pose on the bench leading up the tree lined pool avenue that provides a mirror reflection of the Taj - and even though we were in an oasis of calm, very rare in this chaotic country, I could hear an Indian voice in my head say "see Sir I do you good price, two Taj for the price of one" as the Taj reflected back at us.
Nicole was "overwhelmed" by the whole experience and the Taj has entered straight in at number one on her all time favourite sights - how it beats the Pyramids I can't understand but she put my "appropriately whelmed" feelings on the morning's visit down to me contracting the obligatory dickey Indian tummy (affectionately known as Delhi Belly) the day before!!
You got to hand it to the guy who commissioned the building of the Taj in honour of his 3rd wife's death - but as Karl Pilkington (An Idiot Abroad) said - I'd wonder if her was as nice to her before her death or was this down to some form of guilt...
We spent the rest of the day in Agra waiting to leave Agra - it's very much a one sight town, or maybe it's just the the Taj Mahal paves all the City's other offerings into insignificance. Given that it was 46 degrees of piercing sun we sought solitude in a local (westernised style) coffee shop offering the best AC we could find - on settling in we were joined by a Canadian couple who had the same idea and were also awaiting their late evening exodus from Agra!! 3 hours in, and after watching all Jurassic Park subtitled, I felt we were "cheating" as tourists and much to Nicole's disapproval I said we should go visit the Fort (must see sight number 2 of Agra). All I can say is Nicole was of course right and we were better off where we were! So picture this, a large square courtyard with high dilapidating walls, hawkers coming at us from all angles trying to sell all matter of junk and us looking angrily at each other while we sweated faster than we could replenish with water... So after a power visit where we hogged whatever shade was available off we set with a chancer of rickshaw driver - Bring on my first argument with a local as he obviously never met a melting Irish man being blinded by the suncream running off his forehead before - long and short even he knew it was in no ones interest that we visit his 'brothers' shop where he could get us a 'special price'!
Off we set that night for our 10 hour road transfer to our next stop - Varanasi, or as we renamed it 'the Knock of India'. The place was wedged with pilgrimages worshipping all varieties of gods. The Knock reference came as our boat guide on the Ganges said that pilgrims always bring a bottle of the Ganges water back home to those that couldn't come - sure this could only conjure up the image of the reservoirs of holy water sitting in presses up and down the country back home - Though why anyone would bring a bottle of this stuff home is beyond me. We rowed (well we were rowed) up by the cremation area of the river and it was surreal, the scene that confronted us could have been any time in history and by looking at the evenings events you couldn't tell if it was 2012 or 1812. Our guide then went on to tell us that the bodies of pregnant women and children who died couldn't be burned and were weighed down with stones and thrown into the centre of the river - just another reason that baffled me as to how they washed, swam and even drank from the river!
Following the cremation site we stopped off, parked up our boat and sat to watch 'mass'. Every evening at 8 there's an hour long praying ceremony - but 20 minutes in, following much bell ringing and chanting that would put 20 decades of the rosary to shame, I was fit to pass out with the heat that was being added to by the thousands there praying - so we set off on our boat again and head back to base.
Our second night in Varanasi we head out for a walk around the craziness that the streets of India had to offer as it was our last night before we head for Nepal - and my God we were immersed in the chaoticness of it all as our wandering caused us to get lost and go round in circles but always seeing something bizarre along the way! India is truely a fascinating, colourful and busy country and the thoughts of ever escaping a crowd looked like they would never come - but than came Nepal...
P.S - Nicole wanted to delete half this entry - but lets be honest when she said 'Ronan you do the blog on our last few days in India' who expected any less??
R
Why would you delete that? The more the better. It all sounds a bit crazy!
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