Lucky in Lucknow?

Hi,

To start things off from where we left you, in a restaurant in Agra city centre. We found out the train we had been booked on arrived in Lucknow at 3am, rather than what we originally thought of 9. We thought we should be prepared and call the hotel to see if the front desk would be open that early, which we found out they do not like British people staying there because of the amount of paperwork they have to fill in. So far booking.com has really let us down! We panicked and booked the first cheap hotel we found, knew it wasn’t exactly 5 stars but how bad could it be?

We walked into Agra station with all of our worldly belongings ready to take on the adventure on our own, loosing the safety net of Mr Nandu’s Maruti Suzuki. The station itself was rammed there were hundreds of people lying all over the floors, setting up camp hours and hours before their trains. We got strange looks from absolutely everyone as we were stood there like lemons, not knowing what platform we were standing on, if the next train was ours and if we had enough snacks for the journey. We spotted a tour group of young travellers and quickly latched on and bombarded their tour guide with hundreds of questions. Turns out we were on the right platform, the next train was ours and we did indeed have enough snacks.

The train itself was actually rather comfortable, after the obvious acrobatics to get into the bunkbeds. 8 people per cabin, and around 10 cabins per carriage, we set off over an hour late, petrified we would sleep through our stop in 8 hours time, consequently neither of us slept a wink.

Around 2.45am we hopped down from our beds, and packed up as we were told the train would be getting into Lucknow at 3am – rookie move as we stood in the entrance way right next to the worst toilets ever for over an hour as our beds were nicked the second we got out of them.. by police officers none the less!

We got into Lucknow at 4:30, totally petrified. Hassled by what seemed like hundreds and hundreds of  tuktuk drivers, telling us where they would like to take us, rather then us telling them, we found a quiet man in his tuktuk and asked him to take us to our hotel. Use the term ‘hotel’ loosely. Now we know we are doing this on a budget and we are totally able and prepare to live without luxury and hot water but this room was the absolute pits. Plaster chunks missing from the wall, pillows that once were white but now a deep grey with the occasional stain of red and a window missing the glass, we cried as we went to sleep (in our own sheets). Although we must say, the Wi-Fi connection was fantastic.

The day after was a right off as we didn’t get to bed until 5am, so we only wondered down the road for some dinner and then back to the hole that we were staying in. Dinner was delicious, had a gorgeous Aloo Gobi, naan bread and mushroom pilau.

 Tuesday we plucked up the courage to turn on the shower and headed off to see Lucknow’s town centre. We immediately felt so much safer in Lucknow than in  Agra or Jaipur, the lack of other tourists made us feel like we weren’t being fleeced every time we paid of something, or hopped in a tuktuk. We went to Hazratganj and found lots of wonderful shops that sold sari’s and then onto the Residency where the British were camped during the siege of Lucknow. The shells of buildings remained laden with bullet holes, a sombre place to walk around within such beautiful scenery, which masked the horrors of previous battles. One of our favourite spots of the trip so far.

Our final stop was the Bara Inambara, a mosque on the outskirts of the city centre. The building was beautiful and the gardens were bright and colourful, although we this time we weren’t prepared to pay the ludicrously marked up prices for entry for tourists so we walked on home to the little hole we were now becoming used to.

Lucknow was the first time in the trip we really started to enjoy ourselves, going at our own pace and not Mr Nandu’s. The food was so much better and the people have been so kind and helpful throughout this leg of the journey, its left us more positive about the rest of our time here in North India.

Were off on the train now back to Delhi for a quick stop before heading further up north to Shimla to the foothills of the Himalaya’s.  Will check in again soon.

Lily and Luke

We kept meeting locals who wanted us to take their picture. These three little ones were by far the cutest!