Ok, so to give you the short story, Mumbai is big, pretty western, and not as bad as we were expecting! We shopped, ate waaay too much Pizza Hut and saw a Bollywood film (My Name is Khan, very good as it goes!)

So then we lost a day and a half of our lives aboard a train untill we reached Varanasi 'The Holiest of Holies' forb Hindus. Sinceit lies on the Ganges the Hindus believe that if they die in Varanasi then they will end the cycle of rebirth and be free. Sounds nice in theory. However, this means they don't seem to value good karma anymore (since they won't be reborn) and it seems that they are in a great rush to finish their rebirth cycle. So they are, for the main, the most sleazy, generally rude and disgusting people in all of India, and they all seem to have a death wish! Probably the most polluted and crowded place we have been, with rivers of sewage running throung the cramped streets! Niiiice! Needless to say we were happy to leave!

Admittedly, however, Varanasi does have its saving graces. The first came in the form of our hostess who we simply called 'Auntie' and treated her as such! Secondly, we did a sunrise boat journey down the Ganges, which was wonderful! The third is the small area around 12k away called Surnath, where the Buddha apparently first preached his philosophy to the people. There is the ruins and a few small monestary, all set in a nice 'park-like' area.

That is, however, all we liked!

So after a few, very long, days we managed, after a very long que, to get aboard a train to Bodh Gaya. For those of you who aren't aware of Bodh Gaya and it's significance, it is the location that the Buddha is supposed to have attained enlightenment underneath the Bodhi tree. It turns out that King Ashoka's (presumably kinda nutty wife) chopped down the tree in around 500AD (I think) however, they took a cutting from the dying tree and grew it again, and now it is full size (I think...I mean it is BIG!)

The town of Bodh Gaya, along with pretty much all sacred places, is now teeming with oppertunists out to make a quick buck selling all kinds of tat. However, it was, in general, alot nicer that most others we have visited! The most wonderful thing about the small town of Bodh Gaya (after the Bodhi tree, of course) is that almost all countries where Buddhism is a key religion (read philosophy) have built a monestary in the style of their own country. This means there are around 30 monestaries in the traditional styles of Chinese, Burmese, Japanese, Thailand, etc etc.

So after a couple of days spend wandering the monestaries and sitting for a long while under the Bodhi tree (quite a serene experience, strangely, despite the hordes of tourists) we opted to take a rickshaw up to see the caves where the Buddha spent time meditating before moving to Bodh Gaya. The journey itself was quite the adventure, as it takes you through some o the most rural areas of the poorest state in India. But all we saw the whole way were smiling faces, children playing, and animals...chilling out. After a bumpy hour or so we ended up at the foot of a rather large hill. And the walking began. And continued. Up. And up...and at the top there was...a cave, a monk, and a monkey. I had many-a-grand image of the possible cavernous and expansive cave network where the Buddha spent his time. I found, however, a cave around 4ft in diameter and about 6ft high, with a small statue of the Buddha, and some wall writing. It was a nice place to catch your breath, but the lesson definately was that the journey sometimes bares more fruit than your destination.

After Bodh Gaya, and a missed train, we were on our way to Nepal overland. One train, 2 awfull bus journyes, a surprisingly swift border crossing, and a surprisingly lost taximan we arrived in Pokhara, Nepal.