The End of the Road Trip

3000 kilometers - that's how far we've travelled in India in the past 16 days and we're knackered! From Udaipur we headed Jaipur - The Pink City where we saw the luxurious Maharaja Palace and the monolithic Amber Fort and then on to Ranthanbore National Park for a little tiger hunting safari (cameras only, no worries). The town is tiny and the amenities are few but we get a ratty little room for 450 rupee - aprox. $15.00 and take a canter (jeep-like vehicle that holds 26 people) and head into the park. It's so not the India that we have come to know. Lush, green with a towering fort overhead, there are monkeys and spotted deer and what look like mule deer and parakeets and parrots and vultures and humming birds and herons and mongoose and all manner of wildlife running and scampering and flying around us. The peacocks are magnificent and the crocodiles are lazing about the banks with gobs hanging open waiting for prey, but no tigers today so we head back to the hotel grubby, dusty but relaxed.

Later in the evening there's fireworks and music blaring from next door as there is a wedding in progress. We're already in the sack but can't sleep for noise, and, as one of my goals on this trip is to see an Indian wedding, we decide to crash it. Up we get and put on some respectable duds and head next door. When we get to the gate of the lavish outdoor ceremony, several boys (pissed to the gills), drag us in and immediately push us onto the dance floor where we are surrounded by probably 7o or more men urging us to dance, pushing, shoving and gyrating around us. I'm really not comfortable with this scene so Ivan boogies with the boys and I go sit with the lovely sari clad ladies. We are treated as honoured guests here rather than crashers and they bring us sweets and coffee and offer us dinner. The bride and groom look woeful and miserable perched on thrones under hot glaring camera lights, this ceremonial atmosphere is not for them but the guests. The bride is shaking like a leaf and the groom looks as though his best friend died. The marriages here are arranged through the parents and perhaps he has a love he had to sever with and perhaps she just wishes she had more time. Who's to say, but a more dismal couple I have yet to see at a such a celebration. Later, the father of the groom asks us to come up and take pictures with the "happy couple" and there we are under the lights with video cameras rolling looking like proud aunty and uncle. It was a great experience. Since, on the road and here in Agra, we have seen wedding after wedding and were invited to another last night, but tired as we were, decided to opt for sleep instead.

The next morning 6 a.m. ugh - we head out again in the canter in the company of an amiable group of Irish folks to see the tigers. 2 hours go by and all we see are deer - had this been a deer spotting trip we surely had our money's worth! Then another jeep comes by who had just seen tigers so our driver throws it in high gear and we go throttling through the bush, over rocks and bumps with branches slapping our faces as we grip the rails for dear life. And there she is! A magnificent female tiger slowly making her way through the bush, posing for photos and then she is gone. It was a thrill and rare; there are only 26 tigers in this 1300 square kilometer park and we got lucky. Yay.

We spend the night and head for Bharatpur as it puts us closer to Agra. The roads are horrible and bumpy and every 100 meters or so there's a vehicle of any given description heading straight for us and lurching out of the way in only the nick of time. I am tired of this as it's nerve wracking and stressful and can't wait for it to be over. Heading into Bharatpur our driver points out the squalid shacks along the road where the prostitutes are plying their trade and waiting for drivers who, having made it there alive, celebrate with beer and ladies of the night. We meet up again with the Irish and sit in the garden drinking Kingfisher beers, swapping stories and singing songs. There is another wedding across the road and we all decide to crash this time, so myself and the Irish girls, who bought saris along the way, get dressed up like Indian aunties replete with makeup and jewellry, but by the time we are dressed, the wedding is over so we sit in our saris and get pickled in the garden. They were great folk and they have invited us to Ireland and we've said yes, so another stop is added to the itinerary.

Yesterday we got into Agra early, checked into a hotel and said farewell to our driver, none too soon. Then we headed out in the afternoon to see the Taj Mahal. What can be said about this that hasn't been said already by great writers? I won't even try, suffice to say, it's all it's cracked up to be. We met many Indian people who wanted their pix taken with us (we are that photogenic, you know) and sat in the afternoon sun gazing at this marble marvel.

Tonight we take a 12 hour train to Varanasi to see the Ganges and the ghats where cremations take place. Varanasi is the most holy of holy cities in India and if you are cremated here, you are released from reincarnation for eternity so it's very good to die and be cremated here. We hear it's frenetic and crazy there and are looking forward to it, but we are India thrashed now and in another week will head to Turkey for the beaches and cheap food. While we like Indian food, after nearly a month of it, we are ready for some serious meat. Eating beef here is illegal and there is no pork to be had, only chicken and mutton and sometimes not even chicken as bird flu has many places worried, and mutton is not my thing. So, we are craving hamburgers and bacon, and being the carnivores that we are, McDonalds is going to look like the gates of heaven when we head out of this country. We are vegetarian hostages here and I'd kill for a nice glass of wine. Where's the beef???