Written 20th August 2011

NEWS FLASH - I am currently reversing off the runway back to the airport bay so that we can offload an unruly passenger! He is now stood up arguing with one man and the staff, not sure what is going on or what has happened but hey ho….

Oh great… now we all have to identify our own bags so that we know he has only taken his own hand luggage off. Bloody idiot!

So… As I finished writing last time I was preparing to watch the first game of the season in the hotel internet café in Jaipur. I managed to watch most of the game wearing my BWFC shirt proudly. What a fantastic start to the season, a 4-0 win away at QPR is better than anyone expected. By the time the 4th goal went in, a shocker from Muamba, I think the whole of Jaipur had heard me shouting! A 4-0 win of course on day 1 of the new season put us straight up to 1st position! Bolton were top of the league! Well… that was it! The plan for my visit to Agra began….

After a fun filled few days in Jaipur we boarded a luxury train (leather reclining seat) to Agra. Agra is the home of India's most famous landmark, the Taj Mahal, one of the 7 wonders of the world! After checking into our hotel we had a quick lunch at Pizza Hut before visiting the highlight of the trip. While in Pizza Hut I spent my time creating a Tom Hampson Productions master piece. A giant poster with the words, 'WE ARE TOP OF THE LEAGUE', plastered across it! To say I was happy, proud, over the moon, in shock is an understatement! The Taj was absolutely packed, people were everywhere! I loved having my picture taken with my poster, flag and the compulsory jumping picture. After a walk around the whole building and surviving a visit inside I enjoyed being a celeb. The simple fact that I was white made me a celeb! A group of 15 white people together sent the local people even more crazy! I posed for pictures on my own, with the group and even with kids on my shoulders! One family chased me so that I would put the younger brother of one kid on my shoulders as well! After our visit to the Taj Mahal and confusion with the tuc tuc driver we arrived back at our hotel. I'm not sure why but as a result of a meal somewhere along my travels my left inner cheek basically disintegrated! Very painful! This led to a massive ulcer and I decided that I needed to see the doctor. He appeared, stayed for 4/5 mins and suggested some tablets. All for 900RPS. I ended up taking 4 tablets, twice a day, and eating not much more than rice and yoghurt (s***) for the next few days. All is ok now though but it was not good! Anyway, a great day at the Taj Mahal was had by all. I had my priceless pictures and I had visited one of the 7 wonder of the world. It really was beautiful, breathtaking, amazing from outside. Inside was pathetic. The best news of all is that the pictures of me taken at the Taj will be printed in the BWFC match day programme for the upcoming fixture against Macclesfield. How cool it that! I emailed Tony Kelly my pictures who forwarded them to a guy called Rob and a few emails later my friend Emma Norris was asked to write a piece about me and my travels to be printed next week! Lets just say I'm well chuffed!

The day after the visit to the Taj Mahal was always going to be a let down. And it lived up to the expectation. Arga is pretty much a one trick pony, and a visit to a random village two hours away was not very impressive. Especially as we had no clue what we were looking at and everyone was just grouchy. Put it this way, from the look on our faces you wouldn't have known it was India's Independence Day! However, the Indians do know how to throw a good party and throw one they did! On the way back from our disaster of a day we pulled in at a main street of festivity. We were again mobbed! All we did was walk up and down a road to soak in the atmosphere and we had about 50-60 people following us. Anything we did, they did! They loved jumping in front of the camera and shaking our hands! I think because we were out of the city, in a no tourist zone, we were actually very rare! We then all piled back into the cars and sped off leaving the crowds behind…

Then it was meal time again… another lot of rice and yoghurt for me J However, this time I was brave and had a massive bread/pancake/crisp thingy to go with it. After this we went to the Fort light show, compared to Egypt this was a light bulb on, light bulb off show! Anyway I still got some good pictures before we headed back to the hotel and set off on an overnight train to our final city, Varanasi.

Hello again, it is now Thursday 25th August and I am sat in Hong Kong airport just about to go to Melbourne. Had a hectic few days so not had time to finish writing about India. Here goes….

We got to Varanasi after an over night sleeper train. I think they are great! Unfortunately this time one of the girls phones got stolen while she was asleep. She did leave it in clear view on the table though…. (Welsh…) After settleing into our rooms we boarded cycle rickshaws for our orientation around the city. Varanasi I quite a large city and one of the most visited places in India because of the Ganges River. This is the river where people are cremated, people wash, people swim, people do all sorts in! As a result of the monsoons the level of the water had risen by at a guess about 10 meters+. It was massive! After looking around the market and following Yash through a million tiny streets we arrived at a point just about the water level. I think we were on some kind of roof… A minute later 2 guys appeared rowing a boat! Well it was dark, flooded, flowing mega fast, lightening etc… and they wanted us to get on the boat for our boat ride. So what did we all do? Got on of course! The men pushed off, avoiding what I can only think was some kind of ticket office roof, and then tried their hardest against the current to get us away from the side. Getting slightly worried we now weren't so sure! Anyway, then our decision was made… the ore snapped in two! After finding another one, like it happens every day, the men got us back to the roof top. Relieved we all jumped off! We then went to watch a daily ceremony that takes place on the river. From what I could gather is was all about making offerings to the river...

The next day things had calmed down a little so we again tried to have our boat ride. This time we had a power boat so we managed to ride successfully up the river looking at all the Ghats along the way. The Ghats were covered with people washing and doing ceremonial things. Many of them were just dunking their head under the water time and time again. In the afternoon we decided we would again venture out on our own without Yash and hopefully be more successful than last time. We got tuc tuc's for the day and went to another town called Sarnac. I think that was the name of it anyway… Sarnac is where Budda apparently did his first preaching under a tree. We were wondering around looking for the certain tree and asked a guy who looked like he would know which one it was… he pointed to a tree so we took a picture. When we got home we looked at the pictures of some other people in the group and it was obvious that we had been at a totally normal and random tree… Funny!

Back at the hotel we had our final whole group meal together, followed by drinks on the roof terrace.

The day after, our final day in Varanasi was free. A few of us wanted to go down to the river to let a candle flower float off down the river. We woke up early and went down to the river to find a crowded Ghat with everyone shaving their heads! It was very strange… I looked at a row of men sat down all with blade shaved heads and thought to myself they all looked the same. I only found out after that this is a tradition that people carry out when someone has died and the reason they all looked the same is that they are all the males in the family. Anyway, I set my flower go as I thought about people at home J Then I turned around to see Dave Kelly shaving his head! What a fool of a took! In the afternoon we visited the Silk factories for Varanasi. We saw lots of machines working automatically and creating the most amazing pieces but then we saw men working on hand run machines making something even better. All I could think of is how Grandma told me she used to work in a mill around machines. Not sure if it's the same but hey ho.

FAST FORWARD - Just taken off from Hong Kong… On a massive Bowing 747, 3 on each side and 4 in the middle! Plus an upstairs! I'm sat in seat 63H… Very nice! J

REWIND…

So after the silk factory, we boarded our last overnight train back to Delhi. Im so excited to write about Hong Kong I'm going to speed write this. We went to the Gandhi Museum, the actual place where he was shot! (WOW, The guy next to me, Niko from Auz, was fast a sleep and just twitched and scared me to death! And breathe, now just drinking a hot chocolate with marshmallow in it! Yummy!)

So after the Gandhi Museum we went back to Lotus temple, which this time was open, and went inside. Then we rushed to a really tall tower called Qutab Minar, before going to Abasharam Temple, that is not spelt right but what the hell. It was amazing. It was finished in 2005, and is a massive temple covered in beautiful carvings. It was crazy to think it wasn't a part of the actual tour!

Overall India was tough. It was a great experience which is what I went for and I saw some fantastic and some horrific things. I was with a good group but was ready to move on towards the end. I was looking forward to being on my own to do what I wanted and having spent the last few days in Hong Kong alone as I am sure you will be able to tell from what I write in a minute I loved it!

So, I am just flying over the Sulu and Philippine Sea near to the islands of Davao, Cebu and Manila according to the in flight computer.Were going 597Mph, at 33000ft, and its -32 degrees outside.

Bye for now… Can you believe I'm flying to Australia!

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