October 21-23, 2009 – Day 300-302 – Mcleod Ganj, India

Today seems like a worthy milestone: our 300th day on the road! The 8 hour bus ride from Amitsar to Dharamsala proved to be less than celebratory but hey, what can you do? We passed the night in a true roach-hotel and fought for our various appendages and luggage throughout the night. By morning we were searching for another place to sleep and did not find one until well into the afternoon. We were saved by a delicious, if expensive, lunch of dal fry and chapati—yum! Spent rest of afternoon and next day enjoying laundry service, fantastic bakeries, and the twilight zone of Mcleod ganj that is neither India nor Tibet.

Saben at the fantastic Shangri La resturant

October 20, 2009 – Day 299 – Amritsar, India

The white marble was cool on our bare feet as we walked into the Golden Temple complex. We shielded our eyes from the bright sun and found a shady place to sit and watch life go by. Looking across the water surrounding the Golden Temple, we had an amazing view of the glistening building.

The Golden Temple

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October 18-19, 2009 – Day 297-298 – Rishikesh, India

Although we didn’t take any yoga courses like the Beatles did when they came to Rishikesh, we enjoyed the days we were outside walking around he little town.

Just hanging out

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October 17, 2009 – Day 296 – Rishikesh, India

Happy Diwali! We both woke up today and after 3 days of fear, it seems that we will be able to get better. Thanks to Cipro from pulling us from the foot-in-the-grave (we’re not even joking, we were both concerned about dying from dehydration and not sure if we would even be able to wake up the next morning; neither of us has never been this sick in our entire lives).

Happy Diwali!

October 13-16, 2009 – Day 292-295 – Delhi-Rishikesh, India

Well, we were just counting ourselves lucky in thus far not having any dreaded travelers’ illnesses from India and wouldn’t you know, Lin woke up to yak her guts out? Saben was feeling pretty weird too and Lin was going downhill fast. As it always seems to happen, if we are going to get sick, it is always on a travel day. No refunding tickets or sleeping it off in the hotel room. No, we were destined to spend the day wandering around Delhi until our night train to Rishikesh. The day was terribly unpleasant, the train was unpleasant but we made it to Hardiwar…

Besides our room this is all we saw

October 12, 2009 – Day 291 – Agra, India

Up at the hour at which no one looks good, we headed out to the train station at 4:30AM. It was still dark and the streets were not as deserted as you might imagine.

Stunning

October 10-11, 2009 – Day 289-290 – Delhi, India

A truly uneventful day (lie: we purchased train tickets) followed by a surprise celebration at India Gate the next!

India Gate

October 9, 2009 – Day 288 – Delhi, India

Ah, India. You are such a complicated, hypocritical, flamboyant, intense place and people. A walk through the streets will give you the real flavor of India. Outside your hotel lies a furiously whirling dance of bicycle and auto-rickshaws, beggars, touts, vendors with carts of fruit, clothes, watches, or sugar cane presses for fresh juice, enlightened westerners decked out in full Indian garb, budget backpackers pushing past dirty street kids and trashing-munching cows, and of course the locals who are just passing by that are too busy to try to sell you something at that moment. Everyone has an agenda no matter how friendly and sincere they seem. It can be difficult to weed out the scammers and the curious chatters.

In the streets

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October 8, 2009 – Day 287 – Delhi, India

Within one hour of arriving, we enjoyed a bright and friendly Delhi-welcome: Saben’s debit card was taken by a rigged ATM. We had not even been able to get breakfast before having to run around for 2 hours until we could finally get a combination of international phone calls and internet cafe visits to try to remedy the situation.

Some days are just like that

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October 5-7, 2009 – Day 284-286 – Khujuraho, India

Got stuck here because train tickets are absolutely impossible to come by for the next few days. We left on the 7th destined for Delhi after a few very uneventful, rainy days in Khurjuraho. We will spare you the details and leave only crazy scorpion bugs.

Our roommate, Esteban