I think I should put myself out there and say I love travel days. They are a time where I get to relax and catch up with my Q fam. Sometimes this looks like a van ride to the Cambodian border. Sometimes this looks like a few flights and a layover or two on two-three different continents. Sometimes this looks like a 28 hour bus ride through Eastern Africa. They are all different, but all great. I love love love travel days.
This time around, however, was quite a doozy.
Let me take you on a little adventure called India-Nepal travel day[s]. I will give you the uncensored-journal version of my journey. Enjoy!
May 1, 2011
Happy May Day!
Let’s just say this has been the longest.travel.time.EVER!
So. Flight to Delhi from Hyderabad. Group 2 [about 14 people] left the convent at 5pm on 4/28. Took bus to airport – about an hour long ride. Driver refused to take us all the way to departures unless we paid an extra Rs 500 [which we had already paid]. Ryan was not happy. Had to unload all of our packs and cram everything into an already-crowded shuttle bus that took us to the departure gate. Went through security. Hung out. Boarded plan around 7:30pm. Sat with Jennilee. Journaled for a few minutes. Then slept the rest of the 2 hour flight.
Got off plane. Boarded shuttle. Arrived at arrivals gate – greeted by Group 1 that had left at 9am.
Found out we could not leave — or, if we wanted to leave, we could not get back into the building. The only food around was outside of the building. Perfect. The vending machines for drinks were broken. [World Race chh chh].
Set up camp in a corner. Some people put out their sleeping pads because we were going to sleep in the airport in order to wait for Group 3 to arrive around 8am.
“Bedtime” came along. I was WIDE-AWAKE. Perfect. I danced around/fidgeted like a 5-year-old on Christmas morning. Bethany decided to take me on a walk. PTL. We “ice-skated” around. Creeped on people around the baggage claim conveyer belts. & THEN. it happened! We had the brilliant idea of welcoming the new arrivals!
“Welcome to Delhi! We’re so glad you arrived safely.”
“Please enjoy your stay in this wonderful city.”
“We hope your journey has been great. You will find your checked baggage to your left.”
We won several smiles, a “That’s so cute,” and a “How drunk are they?” Cheap entertainment. Yes. I am easily amused & so was the security guard standing watch nearby.
Finally decided to try to sleep. Woke up well-rested with enough time to greet Group 3. Rode baggage claim conveyor belt for fun.
All of The Q boarded the nice, air-conditioned bus around 9:30am-ish. Ryan got on the microphone. He mentioned how it was funny when we tried to April Fool’s each other at the beginning of the month. HOWEVER. It seemed as though the bus company played a dirty April Fool’s on us. You see – we were told that this bus was around 12ish- hours, and we would arrive in Kathmandu, Nepal by midnight that night. Turns out, it was really a 33ish-hours bus ride to the Nepal border. Perfect. [World Race chh chh].
So. We rode. We stopped at McDonald’s for lunch & we rode some more. Stopped along the way to take pics of the Taj Mahal. Pretty sweet.
Ash, my bus buddy, decided to sleep on the aisle floor which gave me two seats to sprawl out on. Nice. Read the book of Judges — pretty intense. Hung out with JD for a bit. Watched part of UP.
Stopped at some shady place on the side of the road for dinner around 8pm. Tricia bargained & got us a good deal. We ate without thinking twice about how sketch this place really was. Boarded bus again.
…stay tuned to read about our upcoming accident…
