Touchdown in India...alive! Just...

Bridie and I have arrived in Dehli, unscathed and a little bewildered, but enthusiastic nonetheless. Our flights were of a rather radical nature, watching Kung Fu Panda and playing video games against each other (some weird form of Tic Tac Toe...). We stopped in at Bangkok and Dubai airports, both ridiculously clean and huge structures. We arrived in Delhi at 2:30 in the afternoon, flying in through the dusty smog that covers the city. We were picked up from the airport by a young Indian dude with an Adidas jacket and a Subaru, walking past barbed wire fences and Indian police with machine guns to the carpark. Hmmmm... out of comfort zone much?

To put it in a word, Dehli is INSANE. There are people everywhere, in cars, on rickshaws, in shops, on median strips, in the middle of roundabouts... There are lanes on the highway, but these seem to be more like "guidelines" than anything else, meaning every possible means of transport from bicycles to Jeeps to crazy traditional carts with cranking devices all hustle to play Traffic Tetris. But you never really stop moving.

And it is a city of contradiction and opposites. Absolute poverty sits outside exuberant wealth. Modern technology drives around roundabouts next to ancient bicycles and rickety carts drawn by bicycles. And frustration and fear go hand in hand with admiration and awe.

We will meet up with our tour group today, and explore Old Delhi tomorrow, after a long day of sightseeing yesterday.

Now to find our next hotel amid popcorn sold on woks on bicycles and beggars and stares aplenty...

ahoy foreign ferret correspondents!

the time has come for shanford and bridezilla to move past the gates at the international airport to which we have trekked numerous times for our nearest and dearest, farewelling ourselves with a patterned hankie and parting guard of honour comprising only of sweater-clad ferrets... welcome to the tour diary of cactus unicorn moneybox.

our first adventure will begin in new delhi, as we saunter through the streets of both northern and southern india saddled up with backpacks and trilbies to boot. stay tuned for tales of travel trauma, sobs of our lack of sitar-skill, and sordid encounters with beastly and  creatures the kids today are calling 'la camella ferocio'.

sailing off in 7 days and counting...