we hoping to spend two weeks in GoA/Kerala mid Sept for our honeymoon. We'd like a mixture of some chill out time plus activity & would welcome all suggestions of where to stay; how long for in each location & activities to focus on.
Also flying from Heathrow what airlines do we use...have a mid range budget - would like a holiday of a lifetime but without breaking the budget too much especially after wedding !!
Also would it be too much travel hassle (and/or worth it) to also include a trip to Agra for Taj Mahal? what are internal flights like or is there a better way of getting there? Again once there where should we stay?
Have been reading all the comments to date with interest & look forward to some responses...

I travel to India a lot and so will give some general advice. I have not been to Goa or Kerala in a while so I hope people who have will post some specific reccos on hotels.

If your trip is this September, if you haven't already please start getting your visa arranged as it takes some time to be issued. The website for the Indian High Commission in London is at http://www.hcilondon.net/

Please know that in mid-September you will probably have more rainy days than not in Goa and Kerala as it is nearing the end of the monsoon season. Take a look at weatherbase.com and worldclimate.com. Just bear this in mind so that you don't have visions of spending every day at a beach, as that may not be possible. The winter and spring months are really the dry and sunny months in those places.

For flights, if you want to include Agra, look into a round trip from London to Delhi and then you can buy an intra-India ticket to fly down to Goa or Kerala and back to Delhi for your flight home. You could do Agra at the beginning or end of your trip depending on your international flights, if you decide to skip sightseeing in Delhi entirely, you might even arrange to have a car take you straight from the airport down to Agra or vice versa. This would be more quite a bit more expensive than the train, but more convenient in that you would not have to go into Delhi (and face Delhi traffic) to get to the train station. You can train or take a car from Delhi to Agra in 3-4 hours. As you want to see sunrise, sunset at the Taj, I would try to plan 2 nights there if you can, or one night, but don't try to do a day trip. There is also Fathephur Sikri which is very interesting as well. There is no air service out of Agra these days, so you have to go back up to Delhi to fly o Goa or Kerala. You could take a train to Goa or Kerala, but this would be a quite longish trip, and with only 2 weeks, you might not want to spend that much time on a train.

For good private airlines in India, try jetairways.com, http://www.airdeccan.net/airdeccan/home.asp, http://www.spicejet.com or http://www.airsahara.net/s2v1/. I would avoid Indian Airlines if you can, they simply can't compete IMO with the private carriers. Website for Indian Railways is indianrail.gov.in, I find it a bit hard to use.

For hotels, A very useful website I have found lately is at http://sawdays.co.uk/, click on the book for India. You can also buy the book, but the website will give you a very long list of hotels to start with. The vast majority of these hotels are not in the luxury range and some are in the budget range, but all look interesting and several, like the Imperial in Delhi, are outstanding. A good source to start. The best Indian hotel operator IMO is oberoi (www.oberoihotels.com), also try neemranahotels.com as they run interesting hotels, and tajhotels.com which is another good Indian operator.

In Agra the Amarvillas run by Oberoi is very beautiful, in an unbeatable location and completely OTT but may be out of your budget , there is a perfectly good Sheraton as well, and check the sawdays site for other reccos. For Goa, there is an old but still useful article from the Guardian which describes 6 hotels which might interest you, take a look at http://travel.guardian.co.uk/hotels/...328337,00.html. In Goa I always liked the Marriott, although it is not on the beach but does have a riverfront location and is next to the beach. The Leela was built to be a Park Hyatt and so would be quite nice as well. http://www.theleela.com/goa/goa_home.htm. For Kerala, I would suggest you arrange to rent a houseboat and ply the canals with cook and staff. I could probably dig up the name and contact details of an outfit I used a few years ago if you are interested.

With 2 weeks you could do both Goa and Kerala, IMO even with 2-3 days in Agra. This would depend on getting decent non-stop flights between all the places, otherwise you may waste valuable time sitting in airports. (You could look into train or bus service between Goa and Kerala, I don't know anything about that.) You should first check into flights to all the places you might want to go, and then see how it fits into your 2 weeks.

many thanks for your response & the useful links / websites to get us started.....

Namaste and Congrats!

Hi there!. I know U! Gooday! I have sent u a bit of info already, but thought to make some general comments on trip.

India is a great destination for honeymooners, colorful history, great tales of romance, fascinating culture, superb food and beautiful places to stay! A trip to Goa/kerala is certainly a great place for a honeymoon destinaton! Another great honeymoon destination is the State of Rajasthan!

If u decide to do a two week trip to South India as u are contemplating/, including the South States of kerala and Goa, u can surely do this and with a bit of good planning include AGRa as well..

So i wld start ur trip in the North by flying into Delh, and that will postion u for a trip to AGRA! If u opt for this, U will definately have to add a bit more domestic flights to your trip to get u from North to South, but as long as u have come so far, *Very Lovely to see the Taj On your Honeymoon!

And of course, if u can afford it, by all means stay at the Amar Vilas in AGra!

Again, I wld do a trip like this by flying into Delhi for starters. Speaking of such, in terms of ur flights, fly into Delhi and return home from Bombay!

After ur romantic visit to Agra where u can easily reach from Delhi via private car and driver, u can return to Delhi again by car/driver and then fly south on one of the domestic carriers that serve this route. Delhi to Goa!

So yes, in two weeks u can certainly cover all the places u mention,Agra, Goa and Kerala! That said, Sept is not the best month for travel down south, but on the bright side, the prices will be less and there will be less toursits too. Always a trade~off!

U can spend perhaps three days at one of the beautiful hotels/resorts in goa and then proceeed South to Kerala!

From Goa u can easily fly to Cochi in Kerala and spend about 7 days touring/traveling in Kerala,. U have many options of what/where in Kerala, Fort cities, wildlife sanctuaries, tea plantations, beaches, etc,...

A rough idea for ur time in Kerala..U can do 2 nights in Cochi, a night on a houseboat in the backwaters(Quillon~Allepy), perhaps a night or two at Kumarakarom or Periyar and from kerala u will fly back to Bombay.

I wld probably spend a day in Bombay too. Love that city and great food and shopping too.

So overall, a trip can be something like this, plus or minus.., Delhi,1/2days) Agra,(2 days) Goa,(3days)Kerala~(7days a few places) Bombay(1)

Namaste//happy travels and feel free to drop me a line. [email protected]

Always been one of the best choices for any vacationer, Goa also welcomes honeymooners with equal delight! Goa has been a popular honeymoon destination for Indians as well as foreigners. Blessed with scenic natural beauty, topped with delicious cuisine, Portuguese heritage and a youthful vibe, Goa is a magnet for young couples to have their first trip as a married couple.

http://www.goaleisure.com/blog/goa-h...ners-paradise/