As promised in my Goa 2 post I have written a review of certain aspects of our travels and the first to get the review treatment is transportation. It is essential to making a journey like this possible and India's range of travel options can conjure almost every emotion possible. I will go through our thoughts on each individually .
Trains
I am not sure whether I should approach Indian trains in a positive or negative light. On one hand you have this rail network that is the largest in the world criss-crossing the entire country and taking you almost anywhere in relative comfort surprisingly quickly and efficiently. On the other hand getting a ticket can be a nightmare, train stations are chaotic and dirty, your fellow passengers are sometimes not the most pleasant and cockroaches and mice can be travel companions in the cabins.
Getting a ticket for your desired train is the first problem that you will encounter. If you can remember our first experience with getting the ticket at new Delhi Station in my Delhi 2 post proved to be extremely frustrating. However we got wise to those scams fairly quickly and then encountered our next problem; booked out trains. Unsurprisingly in a country with over a billion people the trains book out months in advance. However a few tickets are held in reserve and become available a few days before hand which are the Foreign-tourist and the Tikal (urgent) tickets that you pay extra for. These are the tickets that we are generally chasing and usually at a ticket window that is being queue jumped by the locals. If and when you eventually get the tickets the next obstacle is the train station. To be fair some stations aren't too bad but others are so bad they if they were operated as land fill in the west they get a closure notice. Easily the worst has been Mughalsari in Varanasi and Old Delhi Train Station. At Mughalsari our train was late and we got a full view of what life there is really like, rats and rubbish everywhere, people living in the station, waiting passengers urinating of the platform all accompanied by the putrid smell of all these things combined.
Once you get on the train though things generally start to improve, this can depend a lot on your travel companions. Indian manners and hygiene habits can be somewhat different to western standards. A number of gentlemen with extremely long and dirty toe nails have felt the need to put their feet on our seat while we were sitting on it. We have also heard of children going for a pee in the cabin and the urine going everywhere. And of course there are also thefts on the train, we haven't suffered from this but one lady we met today had her money stolen while she was sleeping, they took the money out of her bag which was behind her head.
Generally the trains keep decent time, the latest we have been is 3 hours, which in the wet season on an overcrowded rail network isn't bad. In comparison I remember being on a train between Bulawayo and Harare in Zimbabwe and being 12 hours late. Sleeping is another benefit of the trains, not only does it wile away the boredom of hours travelling but it can also off-set the cost of a night's accommodation. As I mentioned some of the passengers have had dubious habits, but you can have an interesting conversation with them and they will be able to fill you in on quite a bit about the country. Let's also not forget the little narrow gauge trains still running on steam up to the hill stations which are wonderfully nostalgic operational antiques with wonderful views of the mountains (when its not raining).
Overall I am going to give a thumbs up to Indian Railways because without them our trip would be a lot more difficult and their efficiency is excellent compared to other countries as under-developed as India. So despite the experiences the railways have forced us to endure, I think we can put a lot of it down to "an experience" and it serves as a reminder as to how lucky we have it in the West.
Bus
Generally Buses are the poor man's option when the train is not available, usually due to the train being booked out or a lack of a railway network. The most intriguing thing about the Indian buses is a sleeper compartment that exists on longer distance buses. The bus will be set up the same as a standard bus with two rows of two seats and and aisle down the middle. However above these seats is a row of sleeping compartments, each is a small cupboard into which you can climb into, lie down, stretch out and allegedly rest your head for a few hours. We have heard that they are absolutely horrible with sleep unsurprisingly, a near impossibility. Jolting suspension, the driver's choice of music, (usually some sort of Bollywood rave that he plays at full blast) or the stifling heat inside the compartment all combine to make sure sleep is not going to happen. In fairness the seats below aren't a lot better but at least you get a back to your seat don't you? Well yes, but sometimes the reclining seat doesn't work so well and the seat back just falls back if you lean on it, not ideal. The roads sometimes can also deteriorate quite badly or disappear into a mud track which makes life very difficult for passengers. With that said the road conditions that we have experienced are generally very good in comparison to a lot of other countries. Other advantages to the bus is that you can turn up last minute and usually get one, its cheaper than the train and while usually not as fast as trains they get you to your destination fairly quickly.
Auto Rickshaws (Autos/Tuktuks)
Ahh the Auto where would be without it? The Auto-rickshaws ferry passengers short distances of a few kilometers but they can also take you for larger distances and you can hire them for a full day. An auto is a three wheeled device steered via handle bars on a single front wheel, with the small squealing engine providing power via a spindly looking drive-shaft to the rear wheels. The whole thing is built on a flimsy steel chassis with passenger seats in the back, the driver sits up front and there is a cloth roof to keep the rain out. Two additional passengers can sit by the driver and anything up to 5 people (maybe more!) can sit in the back, although two seems quite snug to us! They are small and maneuverable around the crazy Indian traffic and the first few rides in one are an experience similar to dodgems, but as time goes on it just becomes normal and what would have appeared as crazy driving before then becomes the standard. I have tried to examine the workings of these small machines and the more I investigated the more worried I became about the safety aspect of these things so I decided to stop, otherwise I would be doing a lot of walking in India! For a start the chassis is as flimsy as a biscuit tin so any collision with almost any other road vehicle and the auto would almost certain come off worse...way worse. Ah, but they can turn very quickly to get out of trouble, which is true but this feature combined with a bit of speed means they could quite easily topple over and with a cloth roof, not much protection for anyone inside. As I said I better stop because we would be lost without them. The other feature of the Auto is the driver, they come with a wide range of personalities but they have one thing in common, charge foreigners 7 times (minimum!) the Indian price. Any fare has to be negotiated hard in advance, passive rather than aggressive negotiating usually works best. If your chosen auto driver is playing hard ball with the fare, walking away usually makes them see sense, as only a few metres away there are hordes of other drivers keen to get the fare. Tips are regularly asked for at the end but they always receive only a glaring look from myself. They drivers are also in on every local tourist scam as they receive a commission for taking tourists to gem, clothes and tour operators shops, which they are always keen to avail of. With all that said if your nerves are good and you don't mind a bit of bartering they are the way to go for short distance around cities.
Cycle-Rickshaws
Rickshaws are 3 wheeled leg-powered machines which are basically a bicycle with a carriage on the back for passengers to perch themselves. The driver known as a rickshaw-wallah has a hard job, not only does he have to cycle around plump passengers and their shopping but he has to breathe in the air of some of the world's most polluted cities. We only took a cycle rickshaw twice in Old Delhi, but it takes so bloody long that we never really bothered again. Watching the effort that one small skinny man goes into pulling the two of us around in the rain while we sat under cover in his rickshaw is a painful experience that also influenced our decision.
Taxis
Taxis are much the same as the West, a hired car that charges to take you to your destination, they usually are more expensive than Autos but are faster, safer and cleaner then their three wheeled counterparts. They are almost exclusively painted black and yellow and are Hindustan Ambassadors, which are based on the same design as a Morris Oxford, one of the cars my father used to drive many years ago. The taxi drivers are never involved in any scams and you can sit happily in silence free from the stress and noise outside. Overall they are more civilised and orderly than the Autos. Their exclusive use of the roads in Mumbai probably explain a certain calmness that exists there like in no other city in India. We only usually take them when travelling long distances such as to and from airports or when we need a bit of relief from the road outside. However our enjoyment of a thrill and our money mean that if available, the Autos are our short range transport of choice.
Jeep
Jeep travel involves travel in a jeep, same as in the West! Except they squeeze 10 other people into the jeep and drive on extremely poor quality roads. The only time we traveled by Jeep was to and from Darjeeling and the jeeps were a necessity to get there as the road conditions are quite poor in parts and constantly changing due to landslides. I had no problem with travelling like this as the tightly packed seats meant that when we shifted around the haripin bends there was no movement of the passengers as our hips and shoulders were all wedges against each others. My wife though does not like heights so a lot of the trip was heart in the mouth for her. The jeep drivers I also found to be very accommodating chaps, our driver from Darjeeling even arranged an Auto rickshaw with Indian fare!
Plane
I pretty much already wrote a review of Indian carriers in my Mumbai post and that is they and the airports are on a par with anything in Europe apart from the leg room. In fact I would say the carrier was ahead of Ryanair, no additional charges for luggage or checking in, no annoying CEO constantly telling us if you don't like it go to someone else and no trumpets for landing before the grossly over estimated arrival time.
Hopefully I will be able to do a review of other aspects of our travels such as people, accommodation and food in the coming weeks, but I will keep you posted.
Trains
I am not sure whether I should approach Indian trains in a positive or negative light. On one hand you have this rail network that is the largest in the world criss-crossing the entire country and taking you almost anywhere in relative comfort surprisingly quickly and efficiently. On the other hand getting a ticket can be a nightmare, train stations are chaotic and dirty, your fellow passengers are sometimes not the most pleasant and cockroaches and mice can be travel companions in the cabins.
Getting a ticket for your desired train is the first problem that you will encounter. If you can remember our first experience with getting the ticket at new Delhi Station in my Delhi 2 post proved to be extremely frustrating. However we got wise to those scams fairly quickly and then encountered our next problem; booked out trains. Unsurprisingly in a country with over a billion people the trains book out months in advance. However a few tickets are held in reserve and become available a few days before hand which are the Foreign-tourist and the Tikal (urgent) tickets that you pay extra for. These are the tickets that we are generally chasing and usually at a ticket window that is being queue jumped by the locals. If and when you eventually get the tickets the next obstacle is the train station. To be fair some stations aren't too bad but others are so bad they if they were operated as land fill in the west they get a closure notice. Easily the worst has been Mughalsari in Varanasi and Old Delhi Train Station. At Mughalsari our train was late and we got a full view of what life there is really like, rats and rubbish everywhere, people living in the station, waiting passengers urinating of the platform all accompanied by the putrid smell of all these things combined.
Once you get on the train though things generally start to improve, this can depend a lot on your travel companions. Indian manners and hygiene habits can be somewhat different to western standards. A number of gentlemen with extremely long and dirty toe nails have felt the need to put their feet on our seat while we were sitting on it. We have also heard of children going for a pee in the cabin and the urine going everywhere. And of course there are also thefts on the train, we haven't suffered from this but one lady we met today had her money stolen while she was sleeping, they took the money out of her bag which was behind her head.
Generally the trains keep decent time, the latest we have been is 3 hours, which in the wet season on an overcrowded rail network isn't bad. In comparison I remember being on a train between Bulawayo and Harare in Zimbabwe and being 12 hours late. Sleeping is another benefit of the trains, not only does it wile away the boredom of hours travelling but it can also off-set the cost of a night's accommodation. As I mentioned some of the passengers have had dubious habits, but you can have an interesting conversation with them and they will be able to fill you in on quite a bit about the country. Let's also not forget the little narrow gauge trains still running on steam up to the hill stations which are wonderfully nostalgic operational antiques with wonderful views of the mountains (when its not raining).
Overall I am going to give a thumbs up to Indian Railways because without them our trip would be a lot more difficult and their efficiency is excellent compared to other countries as under-developed as India. So despite the experiences the railways have forced us to endure, I think we can put a lot of it down to "an experience" and it serves as a reminder as to how lucky we have it in the West.
Bus
Generally Buses are the poor man's option when the train is not available, usually due to the train being booked out or a lack of a railway network. The most intriguing thing about the Indian buses is a sleeper compartment that exists on longer distance buses. The bus will be set up the same as a standard bus with two rows of two seats and and aisle down the middle. However above these seats is a row of sleeping compartments, each is a small cupboard into which you can climb into, lie down, stretch out and allegedly rest your head for a few hours. We have heard that they are absolutely horrible with sleep unsurprisingly, a near impossibility. Jolting suspension, the driver's choice of music, (usually some sort of Bollywood rave that he plays at full blast) or the stifling heat inside the compartment all combine to make sure sleep is not going to happen. In fairness the seats below aren't a lot better but at least you get a back to your seat don't you? Well yes, but sometimes the reclining seat doesn't work so well and the seat back just falls back if you lean on it, not ideal. The roads sometimes can also deteriorate quite badly or disappear into a mud track which makes life very difficult for passengers. With that said the road conditions that we have experienced are generally very good in comparison to a lot of other countries. Other advantages to the bus is that you can turn up last minute and usually get one, its cheaper than the train and while usually not as fast as trains they get you to your destination fairly quickly.
Auto Rickshaws (Autos/Tuktuks)
Ahh the Auto where would be without it? The Auto-rickshaws ferry passengers short distances of a few kilometers but they can also take you for larger distances and you can hire them for a full day. An auto is a three wheeled device steered via handle bars on a single front wheel, with the small squealing engine providing power via a spindly looking drive-shaft to the rear wheels. The whole thing is built on a flimsy steel chassis with passenger seats in the back, the driver sits up front and there is a cloth roof to keep the rain out. Two additional passengers can sit by the driver and anything up to 5 people (maybe more!) can sit in the back, although two seems quite snug to us! They are small and maneuverable around the crazy Indian traffic and the first few rides in one are an experience similar to dodgems, but as time goes on it just becomes normal and what would have appeared as crazy driving before then becomes the standard. I have tried to examine the workings of these small machines and the more I investigated the more worried I became about the safety aspect of these things so I decided to stop, otherwise I would be doing a lot of walking in India! For a start the chassis is as flimsy as a biscuit tin so any collision with almost any other road vehicle and the auto would almost certain come off worse...way worse. Ah, but they can turn very quickly to get out of trouble, which is true but this feature combined with a bit of speed means they could quite easily topple over and with a cloth roof, not much protection for anyone inside. As I said I better stop because we would be lost without them. The other feature of the Auto is the driver, they come with a wide range of personalities but they have one thing in common, charge foreigners 7 times (minimum!) the Indian price. Any fare has to be negotiated hard in advance, passive rather than aggressive negotiating usually works best. If your chosen auto driver is playing hard ball with the fare, walking away usually makes them see sense, as only a few metres away there are hordes of other drivers keen to get the fare. Tips are regularly asked for at the end but they always receive only a glaring look from myself. They drivers are also in on every local tourist scam as they receive a commission for taking tourists to gem, clothes and tour operators shops, which they are always keen to avail of. With all that said if your nerves are good and you don't mind a bit of bartering they are the way to go for short distance around cities.
Cycle-Rickshaws
Rickshaws are 3 wheeled leg-powered machines which are basically a bicycle with a carriage on the back for passengers to perch themselves. The driver known as a rickshaw-wallah has a hard job, not only does he have to cycle around plump passengers and their shopping but he has to breathe in the air of some of the world's most polluted cities. We only took a cycle rickshaw twice in Old Delhi, but it takes so bloody long that we never really bothered again. Watching the effort that one small skinny man goes into pulling the two of us around in the rain while we sat under cover in his rickshaw is a painful experience that also influenced our decision.
Taxis
Taxis are much the same as the West, a hired car that charges to take you to your destination, they usually are more expensive than Autos but are faster, safer and cleaner then their three wheeled counterparts. They are almost exclusively painted black and yellow and are Hindustan Ambassadors, which are based on the same design as a Morris Oxford, one of the cars my father used to drive many years ago. The taxi drivers are never involved in any scams and you can sit happily in silence free from the stress and noise outside. Overall they are more civilised and orderly than the Autos. Their exclusive use of the roads in Mumbai probably explain a certain calmness that exists there like in no other city in India. We only usually take them when travelling long distances such as to and from airports or when we need a bit of relief from the road outside. However our enjoyment of a thrill and our money mean that if available, the Autos are our short range transport of choice.
Jeep
Jeep travel involves travel in a jeep, same as in the West! Except they squeeze 10 other people into the jeep and drive on extremely poor quality roads. The only time we traveled by Jeep was to and from Darjeeling and the jeeps were a necessity to get there as the road conditions are quite poor in parts and constantly changing due to landslides. I had no problem with travelling like this as the tightly packed seats meant that when we shifted around the haripin bends there was no movement of the passengers as our hips and shoulders were all wedges against each others. My wife though does not like heights so a lot of the trip was heart in the mouth for her. The jeep drivers I also found to be very accommodating chaps, our driver from Darjeeling even arranged an Auto rickshaw with Indian fare!
Plane
I pretty much already wrote a review of Indian carriers in my Mumbai post and that is they and the airports are on a par with anything in Europe apart from the leg room. In fact I would say the carrier was ahead of Ryanair, no additional charges for luggage or checking in, no annoying CEO constantly telling us if you don't like it go to someone else and no trumpets for landing before the grossly over estimated arrival time.
Hopefully I will be able to do a review of other aspects of our travels such as people, accommodation and food in the coming weeks, but I will keep you posted.
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