Varanasi/Agra, India

Love it or hate it, it's hard not to be drawn in by India's sensory overload. The smells, the sights, the sounds and the tastes are all uniquely Indian and unlike anything I've experienced. The cities are a maze of colourful saris, roaming cows and goats, haphazard rickshaws, roadside vendors, the occasional car, and above all else, people. 1.2 billion of them.

Our Indian initiation was a little rocky. We crossed from Nepal via rickshaw and boarded a bus for Gorakhpur, with a record breaking lack of leg room. I'm not what you'd call tall and even I had a to pull some maneuvering to shoehorn myself into the seats. After all of this I had to change seats and was joined by a very large man. Him, his uninhibited staring and all of his 300lbs seriously invaded my personal space, most pointedly so when he fell asleep on my shoulder. And then fell asleep on my shoulder again.

2 hours and 1 unwelcome cuddly-buddy later, we arrived at the train station and India hit us like a ton of bricks. People were lying on every available inch of floor, both in and out of the station. Literally hundreds of them. A goat was blocking the entrance and everyone - goats included - was fascinated by the foreigners and their ticket buying endeavors

We arrived at our destination, Varanasi, after about 30 hours of travel. I think we all immediately fell in love. The people were unexpectedly friendly, and everything looked, sounded, and tasted so different that we felt a little like kids in a candy store. Of course we've had our minor difficulties with young men and their inappropriate behaviour, but for every groper and starer there are 50 friendly smiles.

We spent our first full day in India wandering through the cow jammed roads, silk factories piled to the ceiling, and markets with bangles as far as the eye can see. Between all of these and the multitude of gorgeously colourful saris, India is, if nothing else, an amazing plethora of colour.

The main draw to Varanasi is a sunrise ride on the Ganges to watch the Hindu rituals that take place on the ghats (steps leading down the worshipped Ganges). Again, the colours were striking. The buildings and temples have somehow evaded sun-fading over their hundreds of years and provide a unique backdrop to the Ganges. We came across a corpse burning ceremony, but I was happy not to be able to get a clear view of the proceedings. We did, however, come pretty a close to a floating dead body.

We left Varanasi on a night train after our trip to the Ganges. Steph and I lucked out and got top bunks, tucked safely away from staring eyes. Each wall has a bottom, middle and top bunk. Sounds cramped, but it's actually reasonably comfortable and a great way to save on time and accommodation. Our next stop was Agra, home of the amazing Taj Mahal. It fully lives up to its hype. It's huge, white and beautiful. We saw it first at sunset, then at sunrise and finally in daylight. Each time it appeared a different shade of white. The inside, like the outside, is made of solid white marble. The gates enclosing the tomb are difficult to explain, but resemble a floral lattice all hand carved from solid marble. What struck me most about the Taj Mahal was that it was created in a single lifetime. It looks like it could've taken centuries. It's an astounding sight and I'm having difficulty getting my mind around it the reality of my being here and seeing it.

Agra and Varanasi, the only 2 cities we've visited thus far, have distinctly different feels to them. Varanasi was a city of constant action and I felt like a fly on the wall of Varanasian life. The roads were jammed, people were everywhere and there was an endless supply of interactions and happenings to spectate. Agra, on the other hand, feels like it exists solely to showcase the Taj Mahal. I hardly feel like I'm in India here. Instead of watching people go about their daily life, I AM their daily life. I'm a walking ATM. Tomorrow morning, at the ungodly hour of 6am, we're heading to Jaipur in the province of Rajasthan. We'll stay there for a day to breakup the long trip to our ultimate destination, Jaisalmer, in the Thar Desert near the Pakistani border. Here we're going camel trekking and sleeping in the desert under what's touted to be the world's starriest sky. More importantly, apparently camels fart a lot. I will confirm later.