Travel update

Tags

Delhi, India, Pushkar, Travel, Travelling

Photos of Delhi by my husband

Everything took a bit of a wobble this week, due to three things: an outbreak of Zika virus in Jaipur where we were meant to go to next; getting sick; and realising being in a horribly polluted city is, well, horrible.

We had a train booked to go to Jaipur in Rajasthan in the early hours of Monday 15th. However, there was/is an outbreak of Zika virus there. Zika, whilst it is very dangerous for pregnant women, is not fatal as far as I am aware, and most people who had it have recovered, but we still didn’t want to risk getting it. It’s transmitted by mosquitos and they just love my husband.

And then we got sick. I’ve had one or two days of a funny tummy quite often, even recently in Varanasi, Tokyo and Thailand, but this was the first time of being proper sick since the last time we were in Delhi, when we first arrived in March.

So we decided to skip Jaipur and go to the next place on our Rajasthan itinerary which is Pushkar, but could only get there by bus, it wasn’t possible to get a train at such short notice. This meant we had to stay holed up in our hotel room in Delhi until we were well enough to manage an overnight bus journey (no loos on bus!).

We’ve been holed up in our hotel room- for six days!*- not only because we’ve been sick but because the pollution levels of Delhi, whilst always bad are currently appalling.

They apparently implemented emergency plans, ceasing the burning of plastic and enforcing factory regulations, which sound to me like the kinds of things that should be happening all the time anyway, let alone other things like electrifying the auto rickshaws etc… I really feel sorry for the people who live in Delhi all the time.

Here is a link to a photo of a Bryan Adams concert that took place whilst we were there, and information about the problems and control measures.  

Anyway, this has made us reassess our plans, which had involved going from city to city in Rajasthan, a week in each, then Kathmandu, another very polluted city, for two weeks. Seemed like a good idea at the time, but the reality of being in a polluted city has made us question if that was such a great plan.

*Watching funny X Factor auditions on YouTube, watching Dear White People and Big Mouth on Netflix, and sleeping like a cat.

 

But, as my husband said, ‘Things change quickly in India,’ and here we are in Pushkar. We arrived Thursday morning and oh do I feel happy! Lovely big light room, comfy bed, super friendly staff, beautifully painted guesthouse with gorgeous roof terrace with food. We’ve met nice people at the guesthouse and out in Pushkar. Pushkar itself is lovely with its holy lake, well fed cows, lots of cool stalls and good food.

See you next week, and thank you very much for reading

Photos of Pushkar by my husband