"No I don't want a prayer wheel or a carved wooden table but I will take a paper mache moon"

Well rested after a good nights sleep we had 2 days left on the boat to relax before we headed south to Agra.

As part of the "package" we booked the trek with we had a boat trip in a shikira boat around the Dal Lake and the surrounding lakes to see the area.Bashir had made us some lunch in a hamper to take with us so we set off thinking it would be a short ride around the lake to take in the scenery.The whole area around the lake is so peaceful it was very relaxing and with the shikiras having beds in them to lie back on we felt very rested.We meandered slowly around the lake and stopped occasionally for the guys to tell us something we only barely understood.We stopped for lunch and the guys paddling the boat stopped for a sleep before we cruised over to a paper mache factory in the village on the lake.As we were shown how they made the various items I sat there very sceptical as I knew the impeding hard sell was on its way - something we had experienced a lot on the houseboat.Anyway, after seeing the production of a couple of pieces we went in to the "showroom" and were surprised by how much was in there.A paper mache moon, a couple of baubles and 6 hours later, we were on our way back to the houseboat.

When we got back we sat down with Tom and Sarah.Tom and Sarah are travelling India for 5 weeks and had also been sent to Kashmir by the now quite famous "Shaffi".It seems anyone who has any encounter with Shaffi is sent to Kashmir.Tom and Sarah had already been at the boat for about 8 nights and like us were interested to find out how we got off the boat and also how we had been sent there despite the Foreign Office website stating "under no circumstances should British travellers go to Kashmir".

We decided that a good way to pass the time before we could leave would be to stitch each other up whenever someone wanted to come aboard to sell us some sort of product - generally ranging from trinkets to tat to really quite impressive antiques.The stitch ups generally went along the lines of "Tom, weren't you just saying how you wanted to buy a carved table lamp?" with Tom replying "why don't we all have a look together".We then had to sit there in a line with the salesman on the floor slowly pulling out numerous handicrafts from an 80's style briefcase.They were good salesmen though and generally left the one piece that Liz showed interest in until the end.When we explained every time we had no money they all said they accepted credit cards - not something I was prepared to hand over!

This was the run of events for the next 24 hours only broken up with Bashir bringing us more tea of cheese curry or watching the news and seeing that more protests were happening in Kashmir and the death toll was now up to 31 in the last 4 days.Our plan to leave was looking tricky to say the least.

Would we ever make it off the boat!

Sam