Hello everybody.

I am beginning to plan a trip to India in August. I know it´s not the best season to travel there, but our company policies forces us to go on holidays during that month, so that´s all.

We still don´t know how long to stay there, something between two or three weeks. There will be four of us, and probably two will only travel for the first two weeks, returning to Spain and leaving the other couple on their own for that time.

I have already been to India 3 years ago, on an organized tour also in August. Back then my itinerary was as follows : Delhi-Kathmandu-Varanasi-Khajuraho-Agra-Jaipur-Delhi . I was quite disappointed with the guides, and I felt that I hadn´t got real value for money. The trip was outrageously expensive because August is high season in Spain, unlike to India, and to top that we had around three shopping stops per day (and 20 minutes to check the Taj Mahal).

My friends have never been to India, so I was thinking that we could spend most of the first two weeks in Rajasthan with an Agra stay, and then the following week it would be open, either heading East towards Varanasi or maybe south to Mumbai.

We have already checked flight prices, and we are talking of 800 to 850 euros for a return flight from Madrid to Delhi, flying BA.

So, here you have my questions :

1._ Do you know of a good travel agent in Delhi we could contact in order to organize trains, cars, hotels? We have been thinking of getting a car with a driver, and maybe take the train to and from Agra.

2._ Do you think a itinerary including Jaisalmer, Bikaner, Udaipur, Jodhpur, Jaipur, Agra and Delhi it is possible to do in 15 days? I was thinking that maybe we should leave out one of the cities in Rajasthan, but the more I read, the more I am interested in all of them?

3._ Regarding guidebooks, I have the Rough Guide and the LP guide. What do you think of Footprint? I saw their Rajasthan guide, and I was tempted to buy it ...

4._ In Varanasi, I left without having visited Sarnath. Is it worth it?

5._ We are talking about a lot of places for the last week : Varanasi, Orccha, Khajuraho, Lucknow ... We are pretty open about it ... What would you recommend? I guess Goa is a bit far away, although it would be nice to relax for a couple of weeks ...

6._ ATM´s, mobile phones ... How extended are they? I should think that much more since my trip. What can you tell me about it?

Thanks a lot, and kind regards,
Cova

My head aches looking at that itinerary!
It sounds like a lot in 15 days.

Sarnoth is OK. Probably means more if you are Buddhist. Nothing great architecturally.

I was in India last August. It is very hot, so you cannot expect to cover as much territory as you might otherwise, especially with 4 people. On any At any one day, someone might be wanting to go lie down or feeling sick. build in time for this.

Many good independet tour agents have been sugessted on this forum. (I like Compass Travel and Vinstring Travel)Make sure you get a SUV (Qualis), as a car will be much too small. An Indian agent will be very reasonable for the service they provide, along with the car and drivers. Hotels are the budget killers!

Phones service is excellent in most places. My daughter had a phone and used it all over.

It sounds like your first trip was a disappointment due to the speed of the travels. My first trip was just Agra, Jaipur and Delhi in Two weeks and that was plenty in the heat. My second trip in the winter was Delhi, Varanasi, Udaipur, and Ranthambore. Again perfect for two weeks. Daughter went to Sarnath- told me to skip it. I didn't miss it at all!

Well how about shifting your tour of India to the south? You have seen some of the north and its not as hot in the south then. Kerala is supposed to be very beautiful. Consider Coconut lagoon in Kumarakom. Do a google search. Its very nice. Have fun.

cova: you might want to check out the temperatures in rajasthan in august before deciding.

your itinerary sounds a little crammed to me, less than 3 days per locale, not including some fairly long drives or train rides. agree you should consider dropping at least one and definitely suggest you make agra a day trip from delhi (express train at 6 a.m., arrives at 8, returns at end of day.)

ATMs seem to be in abundance (found them in jodhpur & udaipur market areas.) i hear you can rent mobiles at the airport, but haven't tried it.

sounds like a great trip!

we had some limited but satisfactory dealings with "travel made easy" and i think "vipul travel."

Hi all,

thanks for the recommendations. I´ll check the URLs and the travel agents, and I will spend time during the next Easter reading guidebooks trying to decide our priorities regarding Rajasthan.

We have spoken since I posted here, and my friends would prefer to stay in the north. I would have loved to go to the South, and in fact that had been my original plan, but you must adapt, specially when travelling with friends (and I´ll substitute Goa for the beaches in North Spain ... lots of surf and wind).

I am not very afraid of the heat. I have already been there in August, we live and work in Madrid (and it can be suffocant), and I was in Egypt during the european heatwave two years ago. It was much more hotter in Spain, France or Italy (been there that June, and Venice was very sticky) than Cairo or Aswan. We know what to do, wake up early, and take it easy and slow.

My first trip was mostly a disappointment because it was outrageously expensive, the guide was extremely inexperienced (there were places where we had to jump in with our guidebooks in hand because she didn´t have a clue) and with a tendence to oversleep (never begin the day before 10:30 in the morning), lose her passport, and change room reservations without telling you and forcing me to deal with the hotel managers (not that I complain about it, it was the Jaj Mahal in Jaipur. Extremely professionals, polite and very understanding of the situation). She was spanish, but living in India for a year, so she kept telling us how poor she was and how badly needed was our tipping.The only good thing was when she decided to throw the "rebels" out of the bus in the middle of the Jaipur market ... Bliss, three hours buying cookies, wooden bangles, cotton shawls, lots of spices and lots of cinnamon (I am really going back to bring back lots of cinnamon). I still don´t know what possessed us to book such an expensive trip, if we normally have travelled on our own all around Europe, getting stopped by the yugoslavian army in Banja Luka, sleeping in the Alps and throwing your sister inside a roman fountain (mind you, she was four and it was too hot ...).

Lcuy, thanks for the SUV recommendation. I have seen the Ambassadors, but probably a SUV will be more comfortable. And thanks to the people who wrote about Sarnath, I think we will give it a miss ...

Back to my planning,

Cova

I guess you already know the drawbacks of August travel so I'm not going to harp on this. The only thing I will add is it is monsoon season in the north and hence your car journeys could be affected ie. could be longer than you have planned or you may even have to reschedule if it is raining very hard. The later in Aug you plan your trip, the better your chances of missing monsoon. India is a huge country and 3 weeks is not too long a time to be there. What you could consider is starting in Delhi, new fast train Delhi-Agra, pick up a car and driver in Agra, then Agra-Jaipur-Jodhpur-Jaisalmer-Udaipur by road, then udaipur back to Delhi by flight. I would substitute Jaisalmer for Bikaner, I ahve been to both and far prefer Jaisalmer. As Lcuy said, an SUV, which is nowadays what most tour operators provide for 4 people, makes sense. We worked with President Travels, a local Delhi based agency - www.presidenttravels.com, email [email protected]. Phone:+91 11 5153 3630/31/32, E-mail: [email protected], [email protected]
Website: www.presidenttravels.com. After Delhi I think you will enjoy a few days down time in Goa which is a fun place. Pl advise budget for htoel recos.

i will be touring north india with a private company in november....i talked with 3 different sources....all offered similar tours privately....in the end i selected castle and king....arvind is the owner....his e mail is:

[email protected]

i did speak with compass and one other also....

we went back and forth many times before we struck on the exact tour i wanted and the hotels i wanted....it takes some time....start now...

in august the hotel prices should be very low...lucky you....all 5*......

Bob:

Any particular reason why you choose Castle and Kings instead of the others? I myself will start to plan a tailor made trip to India for January 2007.

first i have to be honest....his price was at least 30% less than the other two, which were only $15 different from each other, strangely enough....

both karen and i thought to ourselves that "you get what you pay for"....so i dug deeper....

i put them all through their paces....i tried to get all three vendors into the exact same mold....all the same hotels, all the same guided experiences, etc....i was successfull in that....so then i had apples and oranges...by the way , i had told them we needed comfort, but we did not need the imperial at $350+ per nite.... our most expensive hotel is the neemrana palace for $185....we have nikko in delhi, sheratons in both agra and jaipur and the neemrana....

i knew someone who had used compass (craig and then later lcuy) and i knew someone who had used castle (paulo)....i spoke extensively with all of them... and i had read their trip reports...

so i felt i was on an even keel....i could not see where the differences were....maybe $100 but that was all...oh yes, compass added on some very strange taxes in the final layout (employment taxes, etc)...

then i found a great hotel deal on my own for the sheraton jaipur ($100 per nite for a club room---4 nites)...i thought this will be the breaker....i asked each if i could use this room at my expense, and don't you know it, they all agreed...no breaker there...

so finally after much thought i said to myself---self----do it-- save money and that will pay for your airfare bkk-delhi-bkk....so i choose the cheapest...

i am very happy with my choice and even if things don't work out 100% i have instructed myself, and karen, that i will have a good time and laugh about any problems...her response---YA????

i will report back in december

i should have said above that i had apples and apples, not apples and oranges...sorry

Thanks your your response. I was planning to do the same thing, but I will choose the hotels and itinerary and send all info to two or three tours operators, and then wait for their numbers. I will be one eagerly awaiting four your trip report. Do you have the complete itinerary already?

Forgot to ask where did youd find the Hotel deal for Jaipur? I'm still searching for Indian hotel websites to find better prices. Thaks

the sheraton deal came right off the starwoods website...i see it is now $250....let me look at my res.....i made the res on jan 13 for nov 12...that may have something to do with it....no special discounts...when i saw it i grabbed it, even if i did not inted to use it....i built my trip around it...

i was unable to find any discount sites that worked for me for india hotels, but there must be some....i expected the tour operators to secure good deals for me, and in some cases they did and in some cases they did not...all were basically discounts however over what i saw individual hotels advertise their rooms for...securring hotels in india can be quite a trip...it seems they really play games...

here is our trip in a nutshell:

arrive delhi late evening from bangkok, nikko hotel
1/2 sightseeing of old delhi, 1/2 day shopping, nikko
1/2 day sightseeing of new delhi, 1/2 day shopping, nikko
SUV to agra, sheraton agra
taj day and other agra sightseeing, sheraton
SUV to jaipur, stop at Fatehpur sikri, sheraton jaipur
jaipur sightseeing, sheraton
jaipur, side trip to samode, sheraton
jaipur, visit to sanganer AM, jaipur PM, sheraton
SUV to neemrana, village stops, Neemrana Fort Palace hotel
SUV to delhi, car all day around delhi, with 1AM departure to bkk next morning

will have driver and car available for entire trip of 11 days...

had tacked on 4 additional days in kathmandu, nepal, but cancelled a while ago after political situation worsened yet again...

we view this trip as a chance to see if we like india....if we do we will plan on having return trips...

i should add a couple of things....i really wanted to do the whole thing by myself and contract things out as necessary....but the more i read the more i thought i needed help, at least the first time....i did not want to spend any time ironing things out once on the road and i certainly did not want to arrive someplace only to find that the reservations were all screwed up, like many fodorites have found....that is where an agent comes in handy....we also felt that we wanted to have a car available all of the time and that we really wanted to get to know our driver...i have been assured that i can have the same driver that paulo had and he (paul) really like this guy...he is an employee of the agent, not a sub contractor...

don't be afraid to ask for something cheaper...at times i was very aggressive with avrind...once he told me something that was not true and i called him on it....after that we were in complete synch....

To Bob's post I would add that another benefit of a TA in India is the ability to introduce you to properties eg hotels, restaurants, etc you may not find on your own. Our hotels in Rantahmbore and Jaipur fell in this category and were entirely courtesy PresTours. The Rathambore one was so new it had not set up a website. The Jaipur one had no net connectivity as it was run by a family who did not use the net. Both were gems and we esp loved the Jaipur one which is a small converted palace and we had the unexpected pleasure of seeing peacocks dance on their extensive lawns in the morning when we woke up.

Thanks Bob and Hobbes. In my case I'm plannning around 18 days in India. Rajasthan will take the most of my trip (13 days). The rest will be spent on Delhi (2), Varanasi (2) and Agra (1). Later will come with complete itinerary and start making questions. In my case I always plan a trip like is the last time. The future has a lot of uncentanties.