We caught an overnight bus to Dehra Dun, after an initial misunderstanding with the conductor the bus trip was pretty uneventful - we thought wow, this must be the first trip where nothing goes wrong, hmmm. The bus dropped us off at Dehra Dun at 5am, we teamed up with some other foreigners and from here it took us 20 minutes to find the bus station and another 15 minutes to find the bus to Rishikesh. The bus was suppose to leave at 6am, but 5 minutes before the depature time all bus drivers in Dehra Dun decided to go on strike, so at 5:55am in the morning we found ourselves stranded at the bus station.

A couple of the group went off in search of a taxi, after much negotiation we found ourselves 6 of us (incl. driver) crammed into a rickshaw with all our backpacks. For the next 45km (or 1.5 hours) I would find myself hanging on for dear life with my part of my body dangling outside the rickshaw, nervous as a cat in a room full of rocking chairs. The rickshaw was unable to take us the whole distance, so from the bus station in Rishikesh we all piled into an even smaller rickshaw for the remainder of the journey.

Rishikesh is a holy city on the Ganges and is a famous pilgrimage site, the town is also scattered with numerous ashrams where you can practice meditation or yoga. We are staying in Lakshman Jula where there are a mix of foreigners, Indian pilgrims, Sadhus and of course many cows. Its all pretty chaotic with hundreds of pilgrims passing through, it does make the place wonderfully colourful though with all the women wearing their beautiful saris. Finally after 6 weeks of traveling we feel like we are in India!

Accommodation options are limited to grubby guest houses with dirty rooms and expensive hotels with dirty rooms. We managed (after 2 hours) to find an clean enough room and for the first time in ages with a tv, Ant was very excited as he was able to watch the end of the Ashes.

Its ridiculously hot and humid here, we've even contemplated taking a swim in the Ganges though for now we've only dipped our feet in the holy water.

Today we visited Maharishi Mahesh Yogi Ashram where the Beatles visited in 1968. The place is now abandoned and although no one is suppose to enter "Government rules", we bribed the guard 100RS to let us walk around. The place is now totally overgrown with many derelict buildings, humans have been replaced with butterflies, birds and all types of insects. The Ashram was really atmospheric and a fascinating place to wander, the whole time there it was just Ant, I and the wildlife - though at times we felt like we were being watched, hermits and Sadhus are meant to come here to do their meditations. The guard told us that in the next few years they are going to renovate the ashram, I'm just pleased we got to see it in its current magical state.

We are leaving Rishikesh in a couple of days and heading for Bodh Gaya (it is the most important of 4 pilgrimage sites related to the life of Gautama Buddha). We're pretty excited, me for visiting Bodh Gaya and Ant for taking our first train trip in India - we love the trains journeys!