Indian Express!!

Ok, so you remember us telling you all that we had a 22 hour journey to contend with - well, actually it turned out to be ok but with a major twist!!

So, we departed Udaipur at 6pm on Tues 30th March - we got a tuk tuk to the train station and somehow fitted ourselves and 2 mega rucksacks into the little tuk tuk which was fine! At the train station we found out train no probs - so all was going well! Found our cabin on the train which resembled a cell from alcatraz - it was v small and we had the two top bunks - but we got settled in with our supplies of lays crisps and water and thought it wasn't too bad (plus we had paid for air con!!) then we realised we had to share with an old indian couple who were very grumpy and had the bottom bunks!!

At 7.30pm we departed - after 10 mins the grumpy man switched lights off leaving us in darkness - so had little choice but to go to sleep - low and behold we woke up 7 hours later and we were nearly there! nice one!! so we got our stuff together and at 4.30am we arrived at Ahmedabad.

We got out bags and found a waiting room at the station - because we had good tickets there was an air con waiting room which was basic and pretty full but ok! Despite a few randoms strolling round in towels getting a full on wash and treating the place like their living room!

From 4.30am until 10am we read, chatted and tried to relax. Ross managed to catch 40 winks on one of the sofas (he pushed an old indian woman off the settee to get his snuggle on!! - only joking but he was eyeing it up for a while til she left!!)

At 10.30am we saw our next train pop up on the screen so feeling ok and thinking the trip was actually going quite quick and all to plan we set off to board!! We baorded and this time the train was a bit more airy (no prison cells!) and we only had 3 beds in our bit so it was quite nice and we had bottom bunks - we were well chuffed and off we went! we spent the whole day on the train - eating, playing cards, reading and chilling. we met loads of people (all indian) - army lads, university people and families who were all so nice to us! then at about 6pm we were 24 hours in and feeling good cause we only had 4 hours to go (we arrive at destination Kerela at 10.30pm) however.....................

While chatting to an indian guy who happened to mention about going through goa tomorrow morning - it slowly dawned on us that kerela where we were going is a lot further south than goa - so it didnt quite add up!? after 2 mins me and ross looked at each other and realised we were actually 28 hours away and not 4!! we couldn't actually beleive it we had miscalculated the time and missed out a whole day!!

so we decided to get comfy cause we had a lot longer in our cabin / beds! ross decided to make the most of it and got invited to the army lads cabin party to smoke and drink navy rum!!

we actually slept ok (ross did after the tipple!) and in the morning the indian army guys brought us breakfast which was v nice!

we finally arrived at 10pm the next evening after ... yes wait for it.... after 52 hours of travelling!! we had never been so pleased to get showered and lie down!!

but you'll be plased to know it was all worth it - we have had the day in Kochi today and it is gorgeous and amazing!! we'll write more about it later but its sooooo nice and we are loving it!!

Fort Kochi Fort Kochi is a definite change to the north but in order to get there we had to get a ferry, the heat was immense - we have never sweated (beth in particular) so much in our lives - we got to the ferry stands and the queue for the tickets was literally out the door. There was one queue for men and one for women so Beth got in the one for women - The queue was just not going down and sweat was dripping from her knees. She nearly passed out but there was no way she would leave the queue. Finally she got the tickets and got on the ferry - we spent the day wandering around - eating / drinking - we also found a new place called Anna's Home Stay which is like the equivalent of an Indian B&B. After a 2 week curry marathon we also found our first Italian retaurant. The restaurant was next to a big church and it was Good Friday so as we sat eating our Pizza's we watched a massive procession come out from the church and parade arround the town - They had a statue of Jesus in a bed that looked like something out of Bo Selecta. The next day we went on a back water tour of the countryside water inlets. The first part of the programme (as stated by the little Indian fella who was the guide for the day) was on a big house boat - we got to see how the locals lived on the outlaying Islands like the women washing the clothes in the river against a rock. When we got off the boat to have a look round an Island we were shown round an abandoned Chalk factory where allegedly they made calcium tablets from the shells of mussels - not the most riveting part of the day. But we got back on the boat and had a traditional Keralan lunch - Beth doubled up on the Desert which was rice pudding but with vermacelli noodles instead of the rice. After lunch we got in a small canoe and ventured down into really small tributaries of the main river - It was really nice and peaceful! We met a couple of good guys - Lucy and Dan who we ended up travelling with and staying with in Goa. The next day we got up and went for breakfast at a little place called Teapots which had the best home made Museli and Pancakes - we decided to have a chill out day so we found the best hotel in Kochi and sneaked in to use the swimming pool - every time the manger came we just held our breath and ducked under the water. The money we saved from not having to pay for the swimming pool meant that we decided to visit the best restaurant in Kochi. It was awesome. After relaxing for a couple of days we were ready for the beach and headed off to get to Goa.......