You must be wondering what took me so long to write about my trip to Valley of flowers, Hemkunt Sahib et al which happened in August last year. Well, no reason in particular…. last year I travelled a lot and every time I thought of writing it down, I travelled some more !
Other assignments kept me occupied and VOF posts got pushed again & again. I must now start documenting lest I forget.
Without further delay, here is my day by day account of the trip. Kindly bear with me …

Thanks to Air Asia’s unceremonious cancellation of their service to Mumbai, We have been at our wits end to find the right Airasia flight to Malaysia, which is our landing platform for any South east Asian city.
Should we travel from Kochi, Bangalore or Chennai or maybe Tiruchirapalli ? Am I to do an India tour first? If yes then how to reach these places? This time on return I decided to save some money by travelling by train from Chennai to Mumbai.
Arrival at Chennai Airport itself was uneventful. Getting off …

Delhi Metro as we all know is the second metro to be commissioned.
Then after a series of delays, from one Ugadi to another, “Namma Metro” was finally flagged off in Bengaluru, the third in India fondly called Namma Metro, meaning “Our Metro”.

The stretch is a short one, just about 4 KM covering 6 stations.
I got the chance to

India’s toy or midget trains are small trains that run on historic railway lines up to a number of the hill stations in India. Although these trains are slow and can take up to eight hours to reach their destinations, they are quite popular among visitors. The mountain scenery is beautiful and makes the journeys really worthwhile.
As per my knowledge there are only four toy trains running in India, one each in four zones and each one of them being special in its own way.
1) East – Darjeeling toy train
The …

While traveling within India I mostly travel by air to major cities but whenever I get a chance to go by train, I grab the opportunity. There are several reasons to do that which I’ll speak of some other time. Here I am talking about something else.
I have noticed that Gujaratis have very strong family ties. They are much more bonded than any other. I’ll tell you my reasoning.

I very frequently travel from Mumbai to northern part of India and the train passes through Gujarat. Come Surat, there would be …

KTM KOMUTER PINK COACH FOR WOMAN PASSENGER ONLY
In India, for years we are so used to a concept called ‘Ladies coach’ in a train whether it is a local train or intercity but do you know Malaysia’s first coach service for women was launched very recently?

A Ladies coach.
On my last visit to Malaysia, to my joy, I noticed that a ladies coach has been introduced. And since its launch in May 2010, it has been receiving rave reviews from women of all races.
Malaysia’s first coach service for women is marked …

What do you do when your train halts in the middle of nowhere ?
I see stories and click pictures or vice versa.
On the way to Aurangabad my train had halted a few times in the middle of the fields. Perhaps somebody had pulled chain, a usual practice in India to get down if your village or town is far from regular railway station. A very bad practice, I hate it but no one can really do much about it. These people do get penalized sometimes but mostly they run into …