In the late afternoon Mark, Adele and I decided to go to the Agra Fort then I would be close to the train station for my 9:15 overnight train ride to Varanasi. The fort itself was huge and very impresive but a lot of it was in need of a ton of repairs, it seems like Agra spends all the money on the Taj and the fort gets forgotten. It was still an impressive site none the less. It did have a lot of nice big grassy areas which we laid out in the shade and enjoyed the peace and quiet.
After a few hours at the fort we decided to have a drink at a hotel near the train station. It was a nice place but really expensive we hung out for an hour and talked before I was taking off to Varanasi. I really appreciate Mark and Adele letting me hang out with them for a few days, they are in the middle of a 2 moth India trip and are off to the mountains to relax for there second half of there trip. How knows I am sure someday Danielle and I will go to Australia and we can meet up again. I was truly sad to see them go.
After they took off I ate a great Veg Thali at the train station and it only cost me 22 IND which is about 40 cents and it was one of the best of the trip. I think I was one of the few tourist that have ever ate there because the cook keep coming to see if I thought the meal was tasty, he also had me write in his book what I thought about his food. It was funny. I boarded the train about 9:45 so it was 30 minuted late to start. I was in the 2nd Class Sleeper which is the lowest class with a bed. As you can see it's far from luxurious but for $4.50 to go 607 km you can't complain. The ride took about 12 hours, I slept through most of the night waking up every few hours when we stopped at stations. I locked my bag to the bar and used it as a pillow, so there was no worries of getting ripped of while I was sleeping. When I awoke at 6:30 the train was about empty and it was full when I boarded, I was the last stop and most had already got off.
When I arrived in Varanasi I called the hotel and they picked me up for free, which was good because I would have never found it. Varanasi is the busiest city I've visited yet, and the driving is just madness, Delhi is a lot bigger of a city but the roads are normal size, these or more like bike paths. For the last mile we had to get out and walk because the streets are so small that the rickshaws can't even fit down the side streets. Once I arrived at the Scindhia guest it is a lot calmer. It sits on the Ganges river over looking the Scindhia Ghat, I was happy to see it was peaceful back in here. The hotel manager said the touts hound you a lot when you walk around, but I'm used to that by now. I have 2 nights here than back to Delhi on a overnight for one day then of to the hills to chill out for my last week.
I will have internet for sure the next few days so I will do another post tomorrow.
Varanasi has been a challenging place to navigate. A a day of exploring I feel a lot better about the city. I meet an older man in the hotel Robert from San Francisco and he has been to Varanasi 30 times, and is a wealth of knowledge, I was lucky enough to meet him while I was on the computer, he showed me all the tricks to getting around the city, it helped make sense of all the side streets. He has been helping friends start websites to promote there business I talked to a few about taking better pictures and just small things I saw that can help them out. It was cool I never thought I would be in India trying to help a Indian start ta website to sell his silk. I told him a lot of things that help Porters out.
