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A very long day today. We were up, had breakfast and were on the road at 7am, and even then it was hot and steamy as we drove out of Varanasi. It had rained during the night, so the drive today was pretty disgusting for the first part of the day.

As we drove north it got a little bit cooler. We stopped for lunch in the usual type of small town and had the usual samosas for lunch (although we found a kind of potato cake with chick pea sauce on top, delicious). Adam had been confident of getting to the border soon after lunch but as the afternoon wore on it became apparent that it was a bit further away than we had expected. We got into the town of Gorakhpur at about 4 - an hour and a half later we were still driving around it trying to get out of it to the north side. We drove on into the sunset and as it got dark it seemed that the countryside had more trees and looked a lot more green. We got to the border at about 9:30, and were through the Indian side quite quickly (considering how long it took us to get into India) and out the Nepali side before long as well. The Nepali visa was US$40 each.

Even the Nepali side of the border was cleaner and less crowded, and we felt better already. We drove on for a bit longer and finally stopped on the side of the road on a forest track at about 11:45. Some people stayed up in the hot steamy night to cook and eat dinner - Shane and I put the tent up and crashed.

Impressions of India since I haven't written any yet: We did it a disservice by visiting at the hottest time of year, which added an extra layer of stress onto an already stressful country. I quite enjoyed the time we spent there even though I was sick for a lot of it and didn't want to go out in the heat. The people are mostly out to get your money but they are friendly about it, and helpful as well. They are very inquisitive which gets a bit annoying at times. The cities and towns are really dirty and look quite poor but there are ads for mobile phones and blackberries all over. There are also ads for educational institutions absolutely everywhere, mostly tertiary qualifications and English lessons. Almost everyone speaks English, most people well, and they are quite polite, except when it comes to queuing. In all, it is an interesting country to visit but if I was to come back it would be better in February or something!