Just returned from a four-day break in Mumbai – our first visit to the city. Travelling in India is never without its excitements, if that’s the word. In our case the journey involved 13 hours on a train each way.
On the way up we were treated to simply the noisiest Indian family group we’ve ever come across. Ten adults and six children crammed into seating for six adults, food and luggage and all. Their method of communicating with one another was to screech like hyenas at the top of their voices.
So we arrived ‘deaf’ in Mumbai. We then succeeded in finding a taxi driver who was deaf, dumb and didn’t know which road he was parked on. We were due to stay just north of the train station. When we arrived next to a cafe which had been recommended to us but which we knew to be south of the station, we had to stop the taxi and ask directions. On our return journey we drove past the taxi rank and alighted no more than five minutes up the road!! Such is life.
For our return journey, we arrived for a 7am train, only to be told it wasn’t going to leave until 11am. So it was a midnight arrival back in Goa. Still, we did get to admire the vegetable gardens than Mumbaikars ingenously plant between the railway tracks. In such a crowded city it’s important to use all available space.
More on Mumbai in the next blog.
