The Many Faces of India: A Photo Story

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As we prepare to leave India we thought it only fitting to show you the many faces of this country. We hope you enjoy them!

Digging for mussles on the beach in Goa

A friendly face on the Ghats of Udaipur

A wise gaze from a wise man

A Shilpgram Musician shows his talent

The innocence of a child

Our proud camel guide Bilal

Laughter all around at Holi

A true craftsman

A saddhu collects money!

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How Travel as A Couple Makes Life Easier

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There are many solo travel blogs out there that talk about how traveling is solo is great and we admire the people that travel alone.  It takes a strong person of a certain breed that can go out into the world solo and explore.

We are not those people.

Traveling as a couple is all we know.  Having been together since we were in college, Dave and I have only ever traveled together and we have made it work for each other.

Traveling as a couple has it's advantages!

Over the years we have developed a system and have found traveling as a couple provides a lot of benefits as opposed to going it alone.

Here are the things that we have found made our travels around the world easier as a couple.

1. Good cop bad cop – When traveling in a third world country everything involves bartering.  Hotel rooms, taxi’s, shopping, tours… everything involves working out a bargain.  Dave is great at playing hardball and if he were a solo traveler people might find him a little too hard and probably wouldn’t get his deals. But having a woman with him smiling as he works his magic helps to smooth the rough edges.  When they are stating a price and he is saying no, they look to me for support. I smile and laugh and they give in a bit while Dave gives in a bit and we all go home happy and having a good time.

2. TLC – Tender Loving Care.  It is inevitable. Everyone is bound to fall ill during travels.  It could be travelers diarrhea, the flu, headache or fatigue.  Having a person take care of you makes everything better.  Being sick while traveling is not fun, but being sick alone in your hotel room is even worse.  Having a person give you some sympathy, tell you everything will get better, give you a back rub or bring you some water makes being ill just a little easier to take.

3. Sounding Board- Bartering can be exhausting and sometimes we just don’t know how much to pay for something.  All we can do is discuss it with each other and see if it is a price that we are happy with.  We can sound off on each other to see if a person is ripping us off and we can slow each other down before buying too impulsively.  It helps out the budget a lot.

4. Strengths – We each have our strengths and can divide the workload.  I am very good at packing and organizing and Dave is very good at planning and researching.  If we had to rely on me to plan a trip, we wouldn’t see anything. If Dave were in charge of packing, we would have the entire house including the kitchen sink.  I don’t have the attention span to do research, but Dave is great at checking out what there is to do in a place.  It works out well.  I putter around the room organizing, washing the clothes and packing up the bags while Dave reads up on the place. He runs it by me after he has thoroughly explored what we should do and we are both happy.  Dave and I are a little anomaly, we like the same things, feel the same about places and situations and have the same interests. It can be annoying to other people, but it makes traveling very easy.

5.  Sharing the Experience – It is admirable that people are self-sufficient and fulfilled enough to enjoy a place on their own.  We however need someone to share it with.  There is nothing better than enjoying a beautiful sunrise, conquering a great peak or witnessing a rare site with the person that you love.  We have built memories together to talk about for years to come.

6. Inspiration – Traveling as a couple can open each other up to new opportunities.  We can inspire each other to try new things.   If one of us is a little wary of something, we can be each others cheerleaders.  We love telling each other just how great we are

7. Safety – Traveling together offers a little more safety than traveling solo.  Getting into a rickshaw or taxi feels a lot better when there are two of you as opposed to being alone.  Safety in numbers we always say.  We can watch each others backs and not feel threatened.  Many times I say to Dave, “I don’t know how people can do this alone.” But they can and do and they are a stronger person than me.

8. Care for our Gear -We can keep an eye on our packs and gear as well when one of us has to go to the bathroom or buy some tickets.  Someone can stay with the packs while another gets in line.  Our gear is never left alone on a train or bus or anywhere.  It helps a lot.  I can even give Dave my scarf, and bag when I have to go into a nasty toilet.  You don’t want to take the chance of anything falling in, so having someone to hold onto your things eliminates that problem.

9. Company – We see a lot of solo travelers at dinner. While I tend to be a chatty one and strike up a conversation with them, (most times they are happy to talk) I see many people just reading a book or sitting silently.   I know, I know, a lot of people like being alone.  We are not those people.  We love talking at dinner, playing travel scrabble or cribbage, we can talk about the days events and we just never seem to get bored.  Even on a long train ride, we have company.  We are a couple of people that love company.  When we hook up with other travelers or people on the road it is even better.  We are the more the merrier type.

10. Support - Travel can be exhausting.  People hassle you daily for rickshaw rides, tours and any other sale they can think of.  Sometimes you just don’t want to talk to anyone.  When one of us is having an off day, the other can take over.  They can field the questions and shelter the other person.  When one of us is feeling stronger than the other, we can take over the duties of inspecting hotel rooms to make sure they are livable, deciding on a price or simply answering the questions of a curious local.  The other person can sit and wallow for a couple of hours or for the day and not have to deal with a thing or talk to anyone.  It works out very well having a support system.  We also have each other to vent to so that we don’t have to take our frustrations out on the poor receptionist or vendor.  We couldn’t travel if we didn’t have each other for support.

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Top Scams to Watch out for in India

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When  traveling, a person always has to be on their guard.  All countries and cities have their dangers and annoyances and India probably is one of the worlds leaders when it comes to scamming tourists.

Here are a few that we either encountered or heard about during our travels through the country and hopefully will help you when you travel to India or another developing country in the world.

1. Prepaid taxis – You have arrived at the airport or train station. You are exhausted and it is the middle of the night.  Rickshaw and taxi drivers approach you before you barely have time to get off the platform and offer their services to take you to a hotel.  They will tell you that the prepaid booth is closed, or that there isn’t one there.  Don’t let them pressure you.  Take your time to look around and ask the right people where the prepaid taxi booth is.  You will pay a fair price to your hotel of choice and avoid being overcharged or taken to the wrong destination. For your safety take the prepaid taxi. Especially if you are new to the country.  Keep your receipt from the booth and don’t give it to the driver until you have arrived at your destination.  That is his receipt for payment from the company and your insurance that you will get to where you are going.

2. Drivers for hire - you are overwhelmed with the distances and navigating the country.  Many people approach tourists fresh off the plane, or even worse, Taxi drivers (not prepaid of course) will take you to a tourist office enroute to your hotel where you will be fed a high pressured sales pitch to buy a driver for your time in India.  Even if you are considering a driver, don’t go with these guys. They are scam artists and will over charge profusely.  Take a prepaid taxi from the airport or train station they won’t stop at one of these fly by night places.

3. Cheap Rickshaws - If a rickshaw driver offers you a ride for a price that sounds too good to be true. It is.  He is most likely going to take you around to gem shops and textile shops.  He will take you everywhere but where you want to go and collect a commission from all of the shop owners.  You are better off to negotiate a reasonable price that you are willing to pay.  50 to 100 rupees always seems average for us going anywhere and have them take you directly to your destination.  If they suggest a market or shop along the way, reply with a firm no.

4. Train Captains - We all know that booking trains can be tough in India.  You often have to book weeks in advance to be guaranteed a seat.  That is why Dave and I simply go to the train station, buy a general ticket and then upgrade when we see the train captain on the platform. This has worked well for us.  But during our last ride from Agra to Delhi we encountered fake train captains.  Luckily we had traveled this route before, so when they asked us for 400 Rupees each for the upgrade, we said no.  We knew that the upgrade was only 200.  This happened 2 more times before the real captain came to check our tickets.  We didn’t realize the other guys were fakes, we just knew that they were charging too much.  They had on blue jackets, just like the train captain. They had a receipt book to give us a receipt and they seemed very official.  But after the real captain came, we noticed the differences.  Here is what you need to look out for.

• a) The real train captain has a seating chart.  He has a stack of papers in his hand to check what seats are empty and what are taken.
• b) The real train captain has a badge with his name and number
• c) The real train captain checks everyone’s ticket, not just the tourists.  If a group of official guys comes to ask for your ticket and then asks for money for the upgrade, but doesn’t look at any of the locals tickets, you can guarantee that he is a fake!

5. Touts – It starts with a hello, whats your name, where are you from when you arrive at the train station or tourist site.  You say you don’t need a rickshaw or a guide. They say they are not a guide or driver, they just want to help.  Believe me, it is rare that anyone will offer you help out of the blue.  They want something and you will soon find yourself following them to a tourist office instead of the actual ticket booth or office that you asked them directions to.  When people approach you on the street or in the train station, politely tell them no or shake your head. They are not helping, they are trying to lead you astray.

6. Tours - We heard a story from a nice couple. they were approached in a park in Delhi by a “good samaritan” that offered to take them to the official government tourist center to book a car. The followed him and it looked very official indeed.  It was only a word off from the official tourist site. They then sold them a 6 day car hire for 650 Euros. They didn’t have time to think and bought the tour.  They told us that they didn’t know if it was a scam or not because they did get a driver and they are being driven around Rajasthan.  But 650 Euro’s for 6 days is out of control for a driver in India.  We didn’t encounter anyone that was happy with their driver, ourselves included Read here at What were we thinking? so a word to the wise, be careful when hiring a driver and take your time, don’t bow to pressure.

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Snapshot Sunday: The 1444 Marble Pillars of Ranakpur

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Ranakpur Temple

When we entered the temple at Ranakpur in India we were totally taken off guard.

You see temples are not really our thing but when we wlaked through the marble door of this one we knew it was different. Constructed between the 14th and 15th century this temple houses 1444 uniquely hand carved pillars. They are all different and the detail is exquisite. You can see why now it is now considered one of our favorite temples in the world.

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Travel Blog 3 Months In: How’s it Going?

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It is a little over three months into our travels and running our travel blog has been fulfilling, exciting, time consuming and at times confusing.
We wrote an article at Travel Writers Exchange about How to Manage Your Blog While Traveling to give you an idea of how we do it.
But we thought that we would share the things that we have had difficulties with, things that we want to change in the blog and directions that we want to take.

Content.

This has been the easiest part of running our blog. With new adventures and destinations happening daily, we have no problem posting information and travel stories.

Difficulties: We have come to the conclusion that we may be posting too often. We are not sure if we are turning off regular readers by putting up blog posts 7 days a week. We have so much to share however, that if we don’t post daily, we would still be writing about India while we are in Sri Lanka!

Solution: We decided to change things up a bit recently by giving readers a break two days a week. Sundays will be featuring our favorite snapshot of the week from Dave’s repertoire of photos. Each week we have a highlight of a fabulous moment and instead of having to read an entire article, you will have a short synopsis of our favorite moment.
On Fridays we have decided to feature Dave’s photography by posting a photo story. Dave was originally going to post these photostories on his photgraphy blog picturetheplanet.com, but we haven’t given that blog the time it deserves and decided that his photos would receive much higher traffic at theplanetd.

Niche:

Our Blog Niche is about Adventure Couples Travel. We wanted to focus mainly on adventure travel and destinations and how we enjoy them as a couple.

Difficulties: While India is an adventure unto itself, we feel that we have been lacking in the adventure aspect of our Blog. India is such a big country and there is so much to see. While we love adventure sports and travels, we still wanted to see the temples, palaces and experience the spirituality of the country.

Solution: We are expecting to start our adventures in the North with more hiking, treks and white water rafting. While we tried to fit as many adventures as possible from camel safari’s, bouldering and even intensive yoga classes, we feel that we really thrive when we are in jungles and climbing mountains.

Itinerary:

Traveling for long periods of time lets a person have a loose itinerary. We can change our minds on a whim and are free to travel in any direction.

Difficulties: While the freedom is great, we have found that we are a little too loose in our itinerary. We stay in places for just a little too long, we don’t really have a focus on where we are going to go next and we don’t do the proper research on what activities there are to do at each destination. Once we leave a place or talk to someone else, we realize that we missed out on a few great things.

Solution: We are going to do more research before each destination. Not just through our guide books, but on the internet. We are also going to visit tourist offices. When we were well into our travels in Sri Lanka and were running out of time, we came across a government tourist office. We discovered that there was rock climbing, rapelling and mountain biking in the North. It wasn’t mentioned in the Lonely Planet, (which we never solely rely on anyway) but we also didn’t see anything about it on the Internet or from other travelers. A visit to a government tourist office is at the top of our list from now on.

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Travel Blogging as a Couple

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We have several blogs that we admire and we often wonder how they manage to stay ahead of the game so well.

Most of the travel blogs out there seem to be solo travelers.  They travel the world and manage to post quality articles while staying connected to their community and running an appealing blog.

Dave and I are lucky.

We can split the workload.  While it may seem to some that Deb does the bulk of the work because she writes the posts, that is only one portion of running a successful travel blog.

We thought that we would share with you what the roles are of Dave and Deb at theplanetd.

Since Deb is obvious, let’s start with Dave.

Dave:

Dave’s main focus lies in three main areas of the blog.

1. Photography

He takes photos that not only complement Deb’s writing, but he also posts his gallery at www.picturetheplanet.com

While photography brings him accolades, it is his behind the scenes work that really plays an important role in Canada’s Adventure Couple.

Dave proofreads and edits all of Deb’s posts and chooses the photos to go with the articles that she write.

2. Code and Website Design

Do you see the layout of this blog? Well, Dave has sat at the computer for hours on end learning code and reformatting the website.  From the little things like adding sponsors and advertisers to changing the look of pages, sidebars and even the colour of the blog he has become a self taught web designer.

It may seem easy when you look at it, but each area of the blog has delicate coding to deal with and Dave does it all.

Dave makes changes to the blog regularly. It is hard to believe that our little box stating “connect with us” contains a lot of code and can’t just be done through widgets and plugins.

3. Business.

People contact us regularly to advertise on the site.  Dave deals with the business aspect of theplanetd.  He fields emails, writes proposals and sets up our rates structure. While we would love to take all the money and run, Dave screens advertisers to see if they are right for our site.  He has a strict code that other blogs may not follow.

We won’t bring our price down just to get more advertisers on our site.  Quality is always better than quantity.

Deb

Deb’s work is directed to the creative, marketing and social side of the blog.

1. Writing

Deb comes up with ideas for articles and writes the content.  It can be exhausting during travels to constantly look for the story, but Deb keeps us moving to the next adventure.  Once she has run out of content, it is time to move on to another destination.

2. Networking

Deb is also the social force behind the blog.  She visits other sites to comment on their content, give them a tweet or stumble and helps to advertise her friend’s content.  She is the person that keeps our presence alive in the Internet universe.

3. Marketing

Deb works on building relationships and getting the word out about theplanetd.  She contributes guest articles to other websites and sends queries to newspapers.  She has also mastered social media, working hard at building followers on twitter, stumbleupon and creating links through unique article wizard and ezine.  Deb is also never to proud to hand out a business card and tell everyone what they do for a living when they are traveling.  If one person looks at the blog, she has succeeded in her job.

Together as a Couple.

This blog is run together and it is a team effort.

1. Brainstorming

Dave and Deb brainstorm story ideas and decide whether people will be interested in what they have to say or not.  We check for key words and search engine optimization together.  We also make sure that the blog stays focused to our niche of adventure couples travel.  (something we are still working on)

2. Video

Dave is by far the more technical savvy of the two and he has set up the entire system of editing.  He is in charge of transfering files to the computer and keeping it organized.

Editing is a team effort that takes a lot of time.  We have fallen behind I am afraid, but working to catch up.

3. Planning

We plan our itinerary together.  Believe it or not, we plan our travels around the blog.  We would love to sit at the beach for weeks on end, but that would not make for interesting writing.  We choose locations and adventures that we feel people will interested in.  We climb mountains and go on safari’s because that is the adventure.

So there you have it.  Dave and I have our roles, but we also work together.  We are lucky to be able to split the workload.   We admire the solo travelers out there that keep such great blogs going and have no idea how they manage. 

We are overwhelmed with double the manpower.

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New India Visa Rules Update

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A few weeks ago we posted an article about the changes to the Visa rules in India.  India has now changed their 6 month multiple entry Visa to basically a non  re-entry visa.

You can read more about the new rules here at our post New Visa Rules for India, but to give you a little recap…

Here is what is going on.

In December, India decided to stop allowing visitors back into the country until they have been gone for at least 2 months. India has had problems with terrorism and after the arrest of an American suspected of taking part in the 2008 attacks, they have clamped down.

He freely traveled in and out of the country for two years without raising any alarms.

We did some research on the subject and after reading about the new visa rules in the Times of India and the India Times, we came to the conclusion that the average tourist that already has a 6 month multiple entry visa should not have a problem coming back to India.

The conclusion was that the average tourist would be fine and only people that have stayed their entire 6 months in the country or people that work in India will have a problem.  That is a pretty big problem for them, but at least the average traveler wasn’t going to have to worry about re-entry to India.

If the average tourist wants to go to say Sri Lanka like us,  or Nepal for a side trip, all they will have to do is keep all of their documents to prove that they have been traveling and not up to no good.  Customs and immigration will need these documents to see what you have been up to and will then let you into the country.

Great we thought, we can still go to Sri Lanka.

Well things seem to have taken a confusing turn.

We bumped into some fellow Canadians that had their entire itinerary planned before leaving for India.  They had their tickets prebooked to Sri Lanka and they have their ticket home booked already from Delhi. 

They were issued a 6 month multiple entry visa before the rule took place and thought that everything would be fine.

During their time in Sri Lanka, they met an American that was already turned back when he tried to re-enter India, even though he too had the multiple entry visa that should be honoured since it was issued before the rule took place.

They worried that they to would have a problem and upon further investigation, they found that their passport had been stamped with a big black notice when they exited India.  It clearly stated that they were not allowed back into India for 2 months.

They fly back to Delhi in a few days and already have train tickets and hotels pre-booked in India. Even worse,  their flight back to Vancouver is booked from Delhi.  They had all of this booked before they even left Canada.

As they said,” we are not young and we are not traveling cheaply”  “We have dropped a lot of money into the India economy and we have a lot of money to lose if we are not allowed back in the country”

They went to the India High Commission here in Sri Lanka where they received no help whatsoever.  As with everything in India, they only encountered bureaucracy and frustration. That is after filling in a bunch of useless paper work, standing in long queues and being told to come back in a couple of days.

They have no other choice but to try to fly back to India.  This trip and itinerary was planned months ago. And they were issued a 6 month multiple entry visa!

Shouldn’t India honour the visa’s that were already issued?

Unfortunately, they are at the mercy of the whim of their customs agents.  Much of India works this way we have learned.  Ask one person one thing and they will have a completely different answer than another person.

Ask at least 3 people average it out and you may have the right answer.

As for our last post about New India Visa Rules, I guess we should have read a 3rd newspaper before we came to the conclusion that the average tourist would be OK.  The two major national newspapers were not enough, we needed a 3rd opinion.

What will happen to us?

Like I said, India is very random.  We left the country almost at the same time as the other Canadians, but we do not have the big black stamp on our passport.  We simply have a little red exit stamp that doesn’t say a thing about not being allowed back in the country for two months.

It looks like we may be O.K.

We have followed the rules that we read about and have kept every receipt right down to our bus, train and entry tickets.  We clearly have a 6 month multiple entry visa and we have no notice on our passport that states we cannot re-enter the country.

Luckily, Dave and I don’t have our flights back to Canada booked from Delhi.  If they refuse us entry, we may just have to fly on to Nepal early or fly back to this paradise of an island that we absolutely love, Sri Lanka.

Or we could end up like Tom Hanks in the Terminal and stuck living in the Delhi Airport without visa or country.

Yikes! Now that could be a problem.

We have asked the Canadians to let us know how things go for them.  I hope they get in touch so that we can update you all on the situation.

If not, you will just have to wait until Feb. 22 when Dave and Deb try to re-enter India.

It will be an adventure.

But like Dave and I and so many other people that we have encountered on our trip have started saying on a regular basis…

That’s India.

Links to more information

India Revises Tourist Visa Rules

No Change in Tourist Visa Norms

New Indian Tourist Visa Rules

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article6966518.ece

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/5388578.cms

Some Correspondence that we have received from a person that contacted an expert on the subject.
We have heard that if you provide the Indian consulate with copies of your travel documents for your time spent in India, they are allowing tourists to enter more than once, if you are visiting neighobring countries. We have clients successfully do this after going to India then to Nepal and then back to India.
Here is what we got from the Indian visa people:
Question #2:
Whether the gap of two months between two visits would apply irrespective of the duration of stay in India during the previous visit ?
Answer:
The intention behind the stipulation of a gap of two months between two visits on a Tourist Visa is to curb the abuse/misuse of the Tourist Visa. With a view to ensure that the genuine tourists are not affected by the recent guidelines, the following clarifications are furnished:
I. Foreigners holding Tourist Visas, who after initial entry into India plan to visit another country largely on account of neighbourhood tourism related travel and re-enter India before finally exiting, may be permitted two or three entries, as the case may be (need based), by the Indian Missions/Posts subject to their submission of a detailed itinerary and supporting documentation (ticket bookings). If they are already outside of their country of origin, they can also get such an endorsement from the nearest Indian Mission/Post.
II. The Immigration authorities in all the Immigration Check Posts may also allow such foreign nationals on Tourist Visas arriving in India without the specific authorization from the Indian Missions/Posts to make two or three entries into the country (need based) subject to production of an itinerary and supporting documentation (ticket bookings).
III. The total period of stay in the country counted from the date of first entry into the country shall not exceed the stay stipulation period of 180 days or 90 days, as the case may be.

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