[Mr Beau]

I was there in August and it was a bit of a shock. I've traveled a reasonable amount (South America-Argentina, Uruguay, Cuba; North America; Western and Central Europe; Turkey) and found India to be unlike any other place, which really shouldn't come as a surprise as it was the first Third World nation I have visited.

We started in Mumbai and toured most of Rajasthan, going across to Agra, up to New Delhi and then back to Mumbai. It was a backpack/train/bus sort of trip so my experience was probably different than that of most people's (the first 10 days I spent a total of 150 euros on food, lodging, and transportation). I'm glad to have went but I'm not exactly in a hurry to go back. The photos I took bring back a lot of memories but I found that the relentless hassling, heat, and filth wore me down by the end of the 3 weeks, plus I had a nasty cough and fever for the last week (not too much in the way of stomach problems though and I was most adventurous when it came to ordering food).

It was the first vacation I took where I was happy to come back home. On the other hand my travel companions fell in love with the place and are planning to visit southern India next year. To each his own I guess. :-)

I'll let you know once I manage to host some of my 800+ pics from the trip.

Cheers,