the United Arab Emirates

We booked our flight from Mumbai to Abu Dhabi with a stop in New Delhi based on the fact that it would save us quite a bit of money. What we didn't plan on was that the flight we were scheduled to be on out of New Delhi was canceled weeks before due to lack of demand and that Delhi would be facing some of the worst fog of the year when we were trying to transit through. As a result we got to spend a solid 13 hours in the New Delhi airport waiting for our flight that finally did take off around 1am.


Lots of delayed and canceled flights on the New Delhi departures board.


Abu Dhabi looked very similar to when I was there in 2005. Some of the old places we really liked were gone, some where different and there were plenty of new places. There were still lots of US chain restaurants-like Fuddruckers.


Here the sun is setting beside the Emirates Palace and some new towers under construction. Sandra and I at the Sheikh Zayed Bin Sultan Al Nahyan Grand Mosque.

India - Mumbai and Goa

We arrived in Mumbai around 1pm and had 10 hours to kill before our train ride to Goa. We took a photo outside the Victoria Terminus (apparently the second most photographed building in India) and then walked about.

We made it onto the train and found our comfortable-ish sleeping berths. Perfect for anyone under 5'-11" tall. 12 hours later we arrived in Goa. Saw lots of old Portuguese buildings and churches and a great warning sign. I can assure you we did not misuse the holyland.




Finally, the beaches. This time of year you share the beach with everyone. Cows, Russians, Brits, Aussies, Israelis, it's a madhouse. The crowds thinned out a bit after new years and we've enjoyed some really nice days at the beach. Really just trying to make up for lost beach time in Vanuatu. When we were told we'd be living in the south Pacific on a small island we thought we be getting to the beach a lot more often than we did.
Not really sure what she's doing.