Friday 15 October Off to Bundi

Just lazed around prior to going to the Agra Fort station, a nice rickshaw ride on which we were able to get glimpses of the Taj as we drove round the fort walls. We were in plenty of time for the 12.35pm train to Kota which eventually arrived at about 3.30pm, I suppose it wasn't too bad we found seats next to a family with small boy, Aman who practiced his English on us, and the little girl who I thought, much to his amusement was his brother, she was deaf and dumb but never stopped dancing and was a real handful.

The train arrived and we found our seats but were horrified to find that they didn't serve food and we only had water. We had expected to arrive at Kota at around 17.45 but eventually arrived at about 21.15pm. The carriage had a number of men going to Gujerat they were very friendly, and when they realised we were without food they opened their bags and plied us with fruit, sweets, biscuits and John was even offered beer from one bag, a lady on the corridor seat peeled a pomegranite for John - we were very appreciative of their kindness and generosity. One man was worried that our hotel, who had arranged for a car to meet us, should be updated, he phoned twice just to confirm that we were on our way and to advise of arrival time. We were more than grateful for their assistance.

When we arrived at Kota we found the driver and were so pleased that our daughters had insisted we book ahead as there were no taxis, just a few rickshaws. The drive to Bundi took about an hour on an extremely busy road full of enormous trucks going in both directions, all with headlights full on and belching black smoke, this is the state highway going from somewhere to Gujerat full of potholes and obstacles. When we thankfully arrived at our hotel Haveli Katkoun everyone had gone to bed. But they quicky appeared and rustled up a quick meal of chapati, rice, dhal and our favourite aloo jeera.

A charming young man, the son of the owner took us upstairs and again we had a choice of rooms, we chose a huge room with lots of windows, a terrace opening to a view of the fort which was lit up, a large bathroom with plenty of hot water and bliss a huge comfortable bed. Can't wait for tomorrow.