India Xmas

The friendly culture, beautiful scenery, and delicious food have made India one of our favorite places so far and a great place to enjoy Xmas!

Mumbai


Upon arrival in Mumbai, we sought out a few attractions in Colaba. 

Taj Mahal Palace and Tower Hotel was just a hair out of our price range :)

We became part of the attraction at the Gateway of India as several locals asked to take photos with us around the monument

Marine Drive

KERALA


Fort Cochin

Chinese fishing nets

Enjoyed fresh seafood in Fort Cochin

The rick-shaw- main mode of short distance transport around Indian towns

Kathakali show in India is a combination of costume, acting, mime, dance, and music.  We got to the show a few minutes early to see some of the make up

Alleppey

After having a long (one sided) conversation with us in Hindi, this lady sat down with her fishing pole at 9am while we had a rice patty breakfast before our canoe trip around the backwaters.  Lunch was at our row-man's house and was our first experience with eating with our hands... a challenge with rice based food!

Very beautiful and relaxing covered canoe ride around the Alleppey backwaters

Flooded rice field

Street festival with auto traffic allowed!

Munnar

We spent a week on this spice plantation doing yoga, hiking around the tea fields of Munnar and enjoying 3 organic vegan meals per day.  It felt like the healthiest week of our lives, body and mind.

By far our nicest room in a long while :)

Yoga gazebo where we had sessions twice a day for sunrise and sunset

Beautiful hikes around the tea fields.  The tea leaves were being harvested in several areas and we toured the local tea museum.

Munnar market

After our week of relative luxury, it's back to buses and train rides, but with batteries freshly charged... looking forward to Jaipur, Agra and other parts of Rajasthan before making our way to Nepal...

Cape Town and the Garden Route

With two weeks to spend in the Cape Town area, we rented a car and explored the "garden route" of South Africa between Cape Town and Port Elizabeth.  The garden route and Cape Town have been some of the top highlights of our trip to date...

View of Cape Town from Table Mountain

Lion's Head in the background

We tested our driving-a-manual-on-the-left-side-of-the-road-from-the-right-side-of-the-car skills in our little Chevy Spark Light. Rob could touch the passenger window from the drivers seat without leaning over :)

Victorian house in Knysna converted into a backpackers hostel where we stayed for two nights and enjoyed oysters and wine by the Knysna bay.  

ROB'S BIG JUMP!!!

Bloukrans bridge near Plettenburg Bay is home to the world highest commercial bungee jump with about 600' of free fall lasting about 5-6 seconds. 

View from the under side of the bridge.  Tannins from the tree leaves (like in tea) turn the river brown.

Making sure the ankle and body harness connections are good to go

Two screams come out... the first is uncontrollable pure fear, the second is a waahoo for still being alive! 

Plettenburg Bay peninsula hike

Cape Agulhas

Warm                                      Cold

Black tie party at Betty's Bay!

Wine country in Stellenbosh 

View from Cape Point

Wild Ostrich making Rob very nervous 

Cape of Good Hope

Toll road to Hout Bay

Back in Cape Town we met up with our Swiss friends. Thanks Martin and Lotty for showing us a great time around Cape Town, we hope to return the favour in the future and look forward to someday seeing you in Switzerland :)

BBQ at the Elements in Table View

More wine tastings!

Language monument representing the influence of many languages on the Afrikaans language in South Africa. 

Lion's Head hike

Summit of Lion's Head with Robben Island in the background 

Our two months in Africa have been awesome and have really exceeded anything we could have expected.  Hard to believe we're about half way through our trip!  We leave for Mumbai, India  on Monday and are excited for the Asia portion of our travels!!