One of the best books we've both read on this trip, White Tiger is part set in Bangalore, the IT capital of India. Apparently it´s all high rise plushness in some parts of the city. We only got to hang out by the bus station though as we stayed only long enough to break up our journey to Hampi. Horrible hotel, lovely dinner, and that was pretty much our Bangalore experience. We took two trains from Bangalore changing in Guntakal headed for Hospet. We were onl...

We had had mixed reviews from people who had visited Mysore but it was on our way to Hampi so we stopped here for a couple of nights and enjoyed it thoroughly. It´s a pretty modern feeling city although there are still all the Indian idiosyncracies that we have got used to we ate well here and we also shopped well, having a great time wandering through the bustling market and picking up some spices including some masala tea which we´ve become quite partial too....

Having gone a little out of our way to visit the coast we headed back in land and crossed from Kerala to Karnataka. After a day spent on those lovely plastic bus seats we hopped off in the town of Kushalanagar. Probably the least pleasant place we've stayed with constant power cuts, pushy rickshaw drivers and dead rats in the road! To escape the town for a little I left Alison who wanted to laze around the hotel room to spend a couple of hours in the Namdrol...

We headed to the coast on the recommendation of a couple we had met in Wayanad and we weren't disappointed. Thottada beach where we stayed was pretty enough, very quiet and a lovely spot to watch the sunset but just a 15 minute walk along the road brought us to empty white sands and palm trees which we were able to stroll along, a really beautiful beach that we fear won't stay so untouched for long. We stayed in a homestay where we were fed royally with deli...

We were keen to come here and get into the hills and out of the heat. It's a region with a number of wildlife reserves and we picked a homestay due to the convenience of having the park gates, right outside the door. Unfortunately, this entrance to the park was closed for 3 months, for a reason we couldn't quite establish but we think they were building a bridge in there. It didn't really matter though as we had the lovely Dillip drive us just a little furt...