All life goes on at the side of the road. Broken down trucks surrounded by a bevy of advisors and onlookers, local tuk tuk drivers chewing bright red paan while hanging around waiting for a fare, men clustered around tiny food stalls peddling all sorts of fried delicacies, school kids in impeccable uniforms on their way to or from school, lethargic dogs, contemplative cows, snuffling pigs. No one, it seems, is home. As we, mostly, crawl past, our pale foreign ...

And so we're off again. Back on the bus for a few more hours heading for the lesser known town of Bundi, which turns out to be far less touristy and far more delightful than anywhere else we've been. Our drive today takes us past vibrant green and yellow fields of dancing mustard seeds, occasionally interrupted by the sight of several women drawing water from a well then balancing the bronze jugs of water on their head to take them home. Sometimes we see a massiv...

From Jaisalmer we travelled to Jodhpur (home of the trouser of the same name, fact fiends). Jodhpur is known as the blue city because a lot of the houses are painted a beautiful indigo colour. We visit a huge fort dominating the hill that overlooks the lovely blue houses and learn lots more facts about maharajahs and maharanis that we never knew before and will still not know in another ten minutes because, like all the other bits of information we are squishing ...

We both have colds. Of all the illnesses we anticipated getting in India, a common or garden sniffle wasn't one of them. Brian is, of course, far worse than me, necessitating antibiotics, cough syrup and 24 hour round the clock nursing care. He has an irritating cough like that of seal with a 40 a day habit. I think he finds it almost as irksome as the rest of us. Every time he speaks he has another coughing fit, so on the bright side he is uncommunicative for t...

Well, our new van arrived, and it's a corker. The only drawback seems to be that our new vehicle comes with a new member of staff, the driver's mate. And of course he has to have a seat. It seems only fair. And now Nareesh, the guide, has bagged himself a double seat, so we have actually only gained one extra seat between us, how did that happen? But there is now room to move around, our seats recline and they are bigger and comfier and, as Nicole so eloquen...