Planning an around the world trip – where to start and which way to go?

Most people head East, and that was our initial plan – starting with India – until a colleague who has an Indian wife and is a frequent visitor said “Don’t – the culture shock will probably put you off the rest of your travels!”.  So, a re-think and Plan B to start with South America – but it just didn’t work with the weather and our timings, so back to plan A but with an ‘easier’ introduction to India starting with the tropical & (relatively) more relaxed South.  Many people miss this part of India off their itinerary, focussing solely on the Golden Triangle or highlights of Rajasthan in the North, but we are actually panning to spend 2/3rds of our time in India in the South, and even then I don’t expect that we’ll even scratch the surface.

So, the plan (for now) is:

Depart Gatwick on 8th January, fly with Qatar Airways via Doha to the new North Goa Airport, arriving in the middle of the night on 9th January
Depart Mumbai (back to UK to meet first grandchild) in the early hours of 30th March with Lufthansa via Munich to Birmingham – for a bargain price of £170 each.  Apparently this airline are notorious for being late or cancelling flights so we aren’t banking on arriving in Birmingham at the scheduled time of 10.10 on Sunday 30 March
So 78 days to get to know some of India…….

South India
– We are starting with a holiday – 2 weeks on the beaches of Goa
– Inland on our first Indian Railways journey to the ruins of the ancient city of Hampi, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, capital of the Vijayanagara Empire until 1565 and once the world’s 2nd largest city
– An overnight sleeper train to the city of Mysore, famous for its grand palace and yoga
– Onwards into the mountains towards the hill stations of ‘Snooty Ooty’ & Coonor, with a world-famous toy train connecting them
– Into Kerala – ex-Portuguese Fort Cochin & a houseboat trip on the backwaters
– More hill stations in the Western Ghat mountains – Munnar and Thekkady – famous for spice and tea plantations
– Down to the South of Kerala for another little beach break, probably in Varkala
– Inland into the state of Tamil Nadu and the City of Madurai
– Potentially a detour to the Chettinad region – lovely old palaces converted into hotels and fabulous food – let’s see how we are doing for time and budget at that point!
– More temples in Thanjavur and on to Puducherry & Mammallapuram on the East Coast
– Fly from Chennai, formerly Madras (not worth stopping to take a look apparently) to the North

Northern India – the order of things may change but the important date is the Holi festival on 14/15 March, and we want to be in either Jaipur or Udaipur for that, preferably Jaipur as they also have an Elephant Festival at the same time.  Most travel will be by train, and nowhere is as close as the maps suggest – India is VERY big!
– Delhi – the 2nd most populous city in the world and inevitably chaotic & overwhelming, but hopefully we’ll be a little used to things after 2 months in India already
– Bikaner – palaces & temples
– Jaisalmer and the Thar Desert
– Jodphur – the blue city
– Udaipur – regal lakeside city
– Pushkar – holy temple town, no alcohol so we won’t be staying long!
– Jaipur – the pink city
– Rathambore National Park – in the hope of spotting wild tigers
– Agra for the Taj Mahal but not much else
– Varanasi – Holy city on the Ganges, funeral pyres and beautiful sunrises
– Mumbai – for a bit of Bollywood and Slumdog Millionaire

A fairly packed itinerary, even if we do have 11 weeks to do it.  Wish us luck!