Just got back from a tour of India, AMA

[samarrange]

There's an AMA section of the site, but I thought this was a better place.

We (DP and I, mid-60s) have just had the most fabulous holiday of our lives in India. I'm writing this at the gate at Mumbai airport.

We had 13 nights: 5 in the Delhi/Agra/Jaipur "golden triangle", 4 in Kerala, 3 in Goa, and one (but with nearly two days to visit) in Mumbai. It was a completely custom tour put together by an Indian travel agency. We like to see lots of different things and they obliged. We could have gone slower, done half-day instead of full-day tours, etc.

We stayed in 5-star hotels (porters, swimming pool, concierge, room service, etc — some international brands like Radisson and Grand Mercure, others Indian but every bit as good), except for 2 nights in a lodge-type place in the hills of Kerala which was just as nice, and a night on a houseboat which was not quite 5* but still amazing.

We asked the agency to book us accommodation on a B&B basis as we wanted to be able to go out sometimes to find our own dinners, and also because half/full board would have meant buffets, and we don't eat enough to do them justice. But all of the monumemt entrances, guides, and drivers were included in the price, as were the internal flights that we took (we have some CO2 penance to do).

The price, excluding air tickets to and from India which we booked ourselves, was £1,900 per person for two people. We only had to pay for lunch, dinner, drinks, and tips. Had we chosen 4* hotels (typically smaller, sometimes more like B&B, but we looked at the reviews for a couple of places and they seemed fine) it would have been £1,550 per person. We were actually a bit skeptical when we got the offer because we had expected it to be quite a lot more.

India exceeded our expectations in every way, and the logistics of our trip were simply stunningly well done. I won't mention the name of the company here but I can make it available via DM. Otherwise, if you've always been curious about the idea of going but a little bit reticent (like we were, until a family member went — and spent almost twice what we did, because they used a London-based travel agent), then feel free to ask me anything. 🙏

were going as a family- first time and never been anywhere near India before. Would you stick to hotels? In Goa- we found Airbnb but im worried about cleanliness and safety.

Five-star hotels are pretty affordable for people with Western money. Of course you just get "a hotel room" as opposed to an apartment, but in a large hotel there are lots of public areas. I can't comment on what Airbnb would be like in India — I guess you have to go by the reviews — but we loved all the hotels we stayed in.

In Goa we stayed here https://maps.app.goo.gl/bfCYAWx14EnGnnHN9 for 3 nights and it was excellent. Our guide told us that Goa is basically divided into north and south; north is where most of the casinos etc are (lots of younger Indians letting their hair down) and south, where we were, is quieter. Apparently our hotel is the only one in the south with a casino (we didn't go in, not our thing at all). It also had a swim-up bar. (However, lots of Indian people can't swim, so the pool, while huge, was quite shallow.)

Apart from breakfasts (always a buffet, loads of Indian and Western options, eggs to order, sometimes even real pork bacon), we ate out most of the time, including when we were in Goa, where we had one lunch in the main town on our tour (I had "vindalho" which is the original "vindaloo", nothing like the legendary British version), one lunch at the Ouzo beach bar that you can see on the map, and two dinners at the "Barca Bar and Kitchen" that is right outside the hotel's front door and where cocktails are £4.50. Portions are generally pretty good, so don't order too much.

If you are staying at the hotel and fancy a day of touring, just go to the concierge desk and they will arrange everything (pickup with guide and driver). We saw plenty of temples on our tour but the ones in Goa, both Catholic and Hindu, were the best of the trip. People were coming in to worship in the Hindu temple that we visited, which was fascinating. We were loaned dhotis by the office because our shorts were deemed too short, even though they were knee-length.

Generally the dress code for tourists across the regions that we visited is "conservative Mediterranean country" — in the cities most Indian men wear long trousers and long-sleeved shirts, and of course the women wear amazing saris (or blouses and slacks). This is not a politico-religious requirement as it might be in a Muslim country, it's just fitting in with local traditions (you also see Muslim women in hijab or niqab). We saw a couple of Western teenage girls in short tight denim shorts in the airports and they stuck out a mile — one or two men were having a surreptitious glance, but nobody said anything. And in Goa it's fine to wear a bikini on the beach, and there are plenty of Indian tourists walking around in shorts.

Just back from our India holiday and had a brilliant time. We saw tigers several times on the reserves - also wild dogs, sloth bears, loads of deer and wild boar etc - then started and finished with cities. We had really good guided tours in both Mumbai and Delhi, saw a lot of markets, ate street food, rode in rickshaws etc. Loved the holiday but wouldn't call it particularly relaxing - cities are very busy and people drive on their horns constantly without any concept of keeping to lanes. People, bikes, carts, buses and cars are all competing for the same space. Didn't get any tummy upsets - although we were careful with ice, sanitiser etc we did eat from some street stalls and had quite a lot of indian food in the jungle lodges, home stay etc. Happy to respond to any specific questions.

Loved the holiday but wouldn't call it particularly relaxing

This sums it up for us. Stuff going on every day. No lie-ins. And when we weren't sightseeing we were travelling between regions. We really enjoyed our one veg-out day on the beach in Goa!

cities are very busy and people drive on their horns constantly without any concept of keeping to lanes

On the Road Mayhem Richter Scale where a small English village is 0.1, London is 0.5, and Madrid is 1.3, we rated Goa at 2, Cochin at 5, Mumbai at 8, and Delhi at 11. In Mumbai we actually saw "normal" traffic jams, whereas in Delhi the traffic never stops, it just inches forwards. The lane markings on the road are purely for decoration.

Love this....I think this scale should be used eveywhere!

Like the actual Richter Scale, it's logarithmic. 🤣

What wouldn’t you have missed if you had to choose, and what didn’t you do that you wished you had?

Hmm.

If you made me chip days away from what we did, I would maybe skip Jaipur, because the various forts and monuments were of less interest to us than the general culture of the place.

It's hard to say what we wish we'd done because we don't know enough about India to know what we didn't do. Again it was more about the general Indian-ness for us rather than checking off places, if that makes sense.

Our choice to go to 4 centres, with 5 internal flight sectors, in just 13 days might seem a bit intensive to some people. My sister took 7 days to do the Delhi-Agra-Jaipur "golden triangle" where we took only 4, but she is older and most had half-day excursions with the rest of the time at the hotel. Every hotel we stayed in had a pool, including in the cities, but we only got in to one of them apart from the full "off-duty" day that we had in Goa because the days were so full. We loved this, but as with AlohaRose a few posts upthread, it wasn't an "unwind and chill" holiday.

What a fabulous thread! Thank you for all of the ideas and views.

We are currently planning a trip to India for (hopefully) October time. We can't be away for more than two weeks, so for this initial visit we're thinking Golden Triangle, Ranthanbore and Varanasi. We usually plan ourselves, but think we might be sensible to book with a reputable agent this time, to make sure everything flows.

Excited and hesitant in equal measure!

Please feel free to send me a DM if you want the name of the agency that we used.

Have messaged you samarrange - thanks!

I wish someone would do a thread like this for China.

Hi we are visiting Mumbai then flying to Kochi later this month. I would love to hear your highlights if you have time TIA!

I did a similar tour in1995 with exodus, joined the trip in Pakistan and travelled through India and finished in Nepal........ camping 🤣

I went back to Inda (last time 1995) in October last year. Did a 17 day North India tour with Mercury Holidays it was fantastic would definitely recommend this trip.

The main thing not to miss in Kochi is the houseboats out of Alleppey. We also went up-country to Kumily and walked around a nature reserve. In Mumbai we only had a day and a bit — we went shopping and had some street food. The whole trip was as much about "being there" as ticking off sites.