Indian Golden Triangle Tours

Hi All

I'm investigating various options for a week in India next
March. I fly into Delhi from Hong Kong in the wee small
hours at 2:15 am on a Saturday and out again at 6:20 am the
following Saturday to Jordan.

I've done some reading on IndiaMike's site, which has a lot
of good info, and I'm trying to decide between three
options:

1. Book my own hotels (4* or 5*, US$40-60) and use the train
(1st class aircon) to travel between Delhi, Jaipur and Agra.

2. Book my own hotels and hire a car and driver for $60-100
daily to do the trip.

3. Use a tour company to do the same as number 2, around
$600-800 depending on the car quality and tour company.

The third option can actually be cheaper than number 2, but
the hotels appear to be lower quality. The first option
attracts me, but I would lose the services of the driver who
can also act as an interpreter and helper.

Open to any advice, thoughts, suggestions, experiences.

TIA

Cheers, Alan, Australia
--
http://loraltravel.blogspot.com/
latest: Slovenia
http://loraltraveloz.blogspot.com/
latest: Mossman Gorge in the Daintree Rainforest

"Alan S" wrote in message
...
Hi All

I'm investigating various options for a week in India next
March. I fly into Delhi from Hong Kong in the wee small
hours at 2:15 am on a Saturday and out again at 6:20 am the
following Saturday to Jordan.

I've done some reading on IndiaMike's site, which has a lot
of good info, and I'm trying to decide between three
options:

1. Book my own hotels (4* or 5*, US$40-60) and use the train
(1st class aircon) to travel between Delhi, Jaipur and Agra.

2. Book my own hotels and hire a car and driver for $60-100
daily to do the trip.

3. Use a tour company to do the same as number 2, around
$600-800 depending on the car quality and tour company.

The third option can actually be cheaper than number 2, but
the hotels appear to be lower quality. The first option
attracts me, but I would lose the services of the driver who
can also act as an interpreter and helper.

Open to any advice, thoughts, suggestions, experiences.

What you could do is travel the long legs by train (1st A/C is a very nice
way to travel and the food is excellent) and hire a car/driver at each
destination.

On your first night book a hotel that has a courtesy car from the airport
and make sure they know your flight number.

Be aware that there'll be a crowd of drivers all dressed the same at the
airport door and all will be carrying a small piece of paper with a name
typed on it in ten point type.

If you've never been to India before you'll find hotel registration a bit
tedious, it takes about twenty minutes to register a foreigner.

I assume some has already done the 'Don't drink the water, check the seals
on any bottled water you buy, watch them cook anything you buy to eat at a
roadside stall & etc" routine.

It can be hot in March in India.

--
William Black


I've seen things you people wouldn't believe.
Barbeques on fire by the chalets past the castle headland
I watched the gift shops glitter in the darkness off the Newborough gate
All these moments will be lost in time, like icecream on the beach
Time for tea.

Do have a look at

www.indiamike.com

Have Fun,

Hans

On Wed, 24 Oct 2007 14:13:36 +0200, "hans"
wrote:

Do have a look at

www.indiamike.com

Have Fun,

Hans


I did. I joined, never got an answer to a similar question
on the "India Itinerary" forum.

Great site, but that was a little disappointing. However, I
have contacted some of the tour operators recommended there
which is how I worked out those prices. The pages on rail
travel were very useful too.




Cheers, Alan, Australia
--
http://loraltravel.blogspot.com/
latest: Slovenia
http://loraltraveloz.blogspot.com/
latest: Mossman Gorge in the Daintree Rainforest

On Wed, 24 Oct 2007 12:23:06 +0100, "William Black"
wrote:


"Alan S" wrote in message
.. .
Hi All

I'm investigating various options for a week in India next
March. I fly into Delhi from Hong Kong in the wee small
hours at 2:15 am on a Saturday and out again at 6:20 am the
following Saturday to Jordan.

I've done some reading on IndiaMike's site, which has a lot
of good info, and I'm trying to decide between three
options:

1. Book my own hotels (4* or 5*, US$40-60) and use the train
(1st class aircon) to travel between Delhi, Jaipur and Agra.

2. Book my own hotels and hire a car and driver for $60-100
daily to do the trip.

3. Use a tour company to do the same as number 2, around
$600-800 depending on the car quality and tour company.

The third option can actually be cheaper than number 2, but
the hotels appear to be lower quality. The first option
attracts me, but I would lose the services of the driver who
can also act as an interpreter and helper.

Open to any advice, thoughts, suggestions, experiences.

What you could do is travel the long legs by train (1st A/C is a very nice
way to travel and the food is excellent) and hire a car/driver at each
destination.

I'm considering that. The difficulty is choosing that
car/driver. For Delhi I have some recommendations via the
IndiaMike site, but I'm not so confident in Agra or Jaipur.
Any thoughts or advice on that?

On your first night book a hotel that has a courtesy car from the airport
and make sure they know your flight number.

Be aware that there'll be a crowd of drivers all dressed the same at the
airport door and all will be carrying a small piece of paper with a name
typed on it in ten point type.

So, how do you work it out? I've done it from the other side
years ago as a cabby in Melbourne, but I made sure I wrote
in very large letters.

If you've never been to India before you'll find hotel registration a bit
tedious, it takes about twenty minutes to register a foreigner.

I assume some has already done the 'Don't drink the water, check the seals
on any bottled water you buy, watch them cook anything you buy to eat at a
roadside stall & etc" routine.

Yep, but thanks anyway.

It can be hot in March in India.

I know, but it's a matter of blending a complex itinerary.
Much earlier and I'll be like a brass monkey in London and
NYC, much later and I'll fry in Delhi and Egypt and melt a
month later in Yucatan. The ticket is bought and the timing
is now set in concrete.


Cheers, Alan, Australia
--
http://loraltravel.blogspot.com/
latest: Slovenia
http://loraltraveloz.blogspot.com/
latest: Mossman Gorge in the Daintree Rainforest

"Alan S" wrote in message
...
On Wed, 24 Oct 2007 12:23:06 +0100, "William Black"
wrote:

Be aware that there'll be a crowd of drivers all dressed the same at the
airport door and all will be carrying a small piece of paper with a name
typed on it in ten point type.

So, how do you work it out? I've done it from the other side
years ago as a cabby in Melbourne, but I made sure I wrote
in very large letters.

In India they just print the name on a piece of paper.

However, and this is the clever bit, the hotel drivers get their names on
a piece of hotel notepaper with a printed hotel header on it.

As for the cars. If you enquire at your hotel they'll recommend someone.
Always make sure to ask for a driver who speaks good English. Just about
everyone you'll meet will speak some English, and most will read it better
than they write it, but many Indians are a bit shy about talking to a
'native' English speaker.

You'll be expected to buy your driver lunch if you employ him all day, and
give him a tip at the end of the day.

This is the text of a document I wrote for some friends going on the Golden
Triangle trip last year

================================================== ===
Driving Instructions for India



When you get the



Get a SIM card for your phone and fit it with a 'pay as you go' card from
Reliance or Hutch. Get your driver's mobile number. If he leaves you
somewhere arrange for him to pick you up there when you send him a 'blank'
or 'missed' call. Parking is hard work in India, many roads are VIP routes
and the cops arrest people parking on them for more than a few moments.



Get to a pharmacy. Buy Odomos insect repellent, a small box of talc (for
your sweaty bits. I use Johnson's baby talc) and 'Hit' insect killer in case
you get cockroaches in a room.



In your hotel room there'll be a thing like an electric air freshener
plugged into an electric socket. This is the mosquito killer. Switch it on
if you're in the room and half an hour before you go to bed. Leave it on
all night.



Speaking to people:



Indians lean English in what you'll find is an odd way.



When you speak, speak normally, if all you get is a puzzled smile try
putting a distinct gap between each word. If you listen carefully to
Indians speaking you'll see that this is what they do and it's how they're
taught in school.



Dealing with the authorities:



Indian cops come in a huge variety of types, dozens of them. As a rule they
all wear khaki and the traffic cops have white shirts. Some carry guns,
most carry big sticks called lathais and aren't afraid to use them on
anyone.



Cops are often crooked; I'm told that 50 to 100 rupees will make them go
away for something silly and 300 rupees will solve most problems, but it
should be your driver's problem to sort out the 'rate' ('rate' is the word
used in India when they mean 'price').



Cops wear khaki but soldiers wear 'jungle green'. If you're seeing soldiers
on the street then find somewhere safe and settle down for a couple of hours
because anything the cops can't handle is really bad news.



Food and drink.



About half the restaurants and cafes you will see will be vegetarian.



A bar or 'bar restaurant' is not a place any respectable woman would be
seen. However places marked 'family restaurant' or café are respectable.



Most places where the locals eat are open to the road and have simple
plastic chairs or benches and Formica topped tables. They're usually ok and
serve delicious and cheap food on steel plates. Don't expect china plates
unless you're going somewhere posh.



Indian beer has glycerine in it to make it flow down the side of the glass
nicely but it gives it an odd 'feel' in the mouth. Indian wine is so sweet
that Europeans can find it almost undrinkable. Indian whiskey and other
spirits are ok, I like a brand called 'Black Dog', but stay away from what's
called 'country liquor'.



Tea is usually drunk very strong and very sweet, ask for 'pot tea' or it'll
come with sugar and milk. Coffee is usually instant and drunk with hot milk
like it used to be served in the UK years ago. Decent coffee is called
'filter coffee' or 'pot coffee' Ask for it black with milk served cold and
separately. All coffee in India comes with chicory in it unless you buy
your own, in which case you want 'coffee pure'.



The usual mid-day vegetarian meal just about everywhere is a Thali; this is
a plate of rice usually served with six or seven little steel bowls with a
variety of stuff in them. Usually a raita and a vegetable curry and others.
One little bowl will have pudding of some sort in it :-)



There are regional differences but the word 'Thali' means a rice based
vegetarian dish.



Paneer is Indian cheese, a sort of compressed cottage cheese. It sounds odd
but is used as a meat substitute in many dishes and tastes good as it picks
up the flavour of the sauce.



Try drinking lassi, a sort of milky yoghurt drink that is very refreshing.



Indian 'ice cream' is kulfi which is hard and quite intense flavoured. Get
it from a reputable place though as some people aren't too careful about
their source of water when making it.



When you sit down the waiter will bring you a glass of water each. At a
cheap place wave it away with the words "Nai nai, Bislery water". 'Bislery
water' is the generic term for bottled water; you may not get that brand.
In a posher place ask if it is 'aqua guard' which is water filtered in bulk
for impurities by a small filter. When you buy bottled water try and do so
from a shop or a pharmacy and not from a stall, always check the seal is
intact



Every meal ends with you being presented with a little dish of seeds with
the bill. You take a few and chew them and swallow them to clear the
pallet. Put a tip, usually five or ten rupees, on the table or in the
folder the bill came in.



Your driver will expect his mid-day meal to be paid for. Offer him 50 rupees
and at the end of every day give him a tip of about 75 to 100 rupees if, and
only if, he's been useful to you. He should carry your bags, load the boot
('dicky' in India) and be generally attentive. Check the car and make sure
your stuff is all removed every time you leave it in the evening.



Food usually comes with a choice of rice or chapattis or puris, which are
like small fried chapattis. Aloo paratas are like thick chapattis and eaten
with the various curries rather than chapattis or rice. Chole Bhatura is
chickpeas and served with special flat breads.



Chicken tika is a regional speciality and very unlike the chicken tika you
get here.



Tandorui chicken, chicken ticka, shami kebabs, reshmai kebabs, tangadi
kebabs, harabara kebabs (which is vegetarian) are reasonably safe to eat and
can be eaten from the road side kebab stalls if the environment looks ok.



Try Kashmiri pillau, which is a rice dish, made with meat and fruit



Many meat dishes are served with a choice of rice or chapattis or nan bread
or paratas and a vegetable curry as a side dish.



When visiting temples or private houses you are expected to remove your
shoes on entry. Don't wear valuable jewellery on the street, ladies will be
expected to have their arms and heads covered if they enter as holy place so
carry a dupata (Indian ladies sash).



Don't wear valuable jewellery on the street.



Outside every temple there's usually a small cow, offer the cow's keeper a
rupee coin or two and she'll hand you a wad of grass to feed the cow with as
a form of blessing.



Petha is the sweet to bring back as a present and you should buy it in Agra
and it should be the 'dry' one and not the 'wet' one.



Carry sweets in your bag in case you feel a bit sick and need something to
suck. Buy them locally, UK made boiled sweets go to mush in about four days
unless kept in a fridge..



Stay out of the sun, wear a hat, drink water or soda with lime juice in it
(order 'lime soda, salt, no sugar') and not sweet fizzy drinks.



Have fun


--
William Black


I've seen things you people wouldn't believe.
Barbeques on fire by the chalets past the castle headland
I watched the gift shops glitter in the darkness off the Newborough gate
All these moments will be lost in time, like icecream on the beach
Time for tea.

On Wed, 24 Oct 2007 14:54:02 +0100, "William Black"
wrote:
excellent info snipped but read

Thanks William - lots of good info there and it's already
filed for future reference.

In re-reading that it looks like I'm going to lose a bit of
weight in that week. I'm a diabetic using a low-carb way of
eating for control. I'll probably have to buy two or three
serves of Thali and pick the meat and veges out of the
rice:-)


Cheers, Alan, Australia
--
http://loraltravel.blogspot.com/
latest: Slovenia
http://loraltraveloz.blogspot.com/
latest: Mossman Gorge in the Daintree Rainforest

"Alan S" wrote in message
...
On Wed, 24 Oct 2007 14:54:02 +0100, "William Black"
wrote:
excellent info snipped but read

Thanks William - lots of good info there and it's already
filed for future reference.

In re-reading that it looks like I'm going to lose a bit of
weight in that week. I'm a diabetic using a low-carb way of
eating for control. I'll probably have to buy two or three
serves of Thali and pick the meat and veges out of the
rice:-)

I'm a diabetic as well.

No meat in a Thali...

You'll find a lot of Indian food has ingredients that are also Aryuvedic
diabetic control agents.

So test your blood regularly, because you may not realise that your sugar
may be lower because of these.


--
William Black


I've seen things you people wouldn't believe.
Barbeques on fire by the chalets past the castle headland
I watched the gift shops glitter in the darkness off the Newborough gate
All these moments will be lost in time, like icecream on the beach
Time for tea.

"William Black" wrote in message
...

"Alan S" wrote in message
...
On Wed, 24 Oct 2007 14:54:02 +0100, "William Black"
wrote:
excellent info snipped but read

Thanks William - lots of good info there and it's already
filed for future reference.

In re-reading that it looks like I'm going to lose a bit of
weight in that week. I'm a diabetic using a low-carb way of
eating for control. I'll probably have to buy two or three
serves of Thali and pick the meat and veges out of the
rice:-)

I'm a diabetic as well.

No meat in a Thali...


Bah, William. A thali can be both veg or nonveg, at least down here. It just
means meal or lunch or plate or something. Ask for nonveg.

Alan, I haven't commented on your trip plans because I know next to nothing
about the north. (I'm a southern fan ... William is your northern expert).
However, Jaipur was OK but not pink ... a dirty brown. Go to Bundi in
Rajasthan. Blue town, super cool. Nice people.

I loathe Delhi except that the architectural legacy is superb and Lodi
Gardens is utter bliss ... makes Kensington Gardens or The Domain or Central
Park look ordinary. By all means send an email if you have questions about
southern India (and I'm more than happy to answer it in the group, as is
proper).

Cheers,

George W Russell
Bangalore

On Oct 24, 9:54 am, "William Black"
wrote:
Try drinking lassi, a sort of milky yoghurt drink that is very refreshing.


But avoid "Bhang Lassi"

Stay out of the sun, wear a hat, drink water or soda with lime juice in it
(order 'lime soda, salt, no sugar') and not sweet fizzy drinks.


And don't take pictures of cremations.