I know it's only 50 rupees for the rickshaw, but I am a little fat and need to walk

Now the jet lag is slowly waring off I spend a dozy day wondering round town. There has been a local tragedy, with three women living in the local ashram threatened with eviction and committed suicide. This has caused local outrage and the whole town was on strike. Riot police were everywhere and the shutters were firmly shut across Pondicherry. After heading to a couple of temples, being blessed twice !! I then have to go in search of the restaurant where I'm meeting an old work colleague who's here teaching yoga. I spot the shutter of the closed restaurant of our rendezvous and luckily it's only secretly shut, so when we go they bring up the shutters and whisk us in! After a good catch up and a walk we head our separate ways and after a stroll along the beach I indulge in an afternoon nap. After making my reviving coffee I then manage to kick it over, smashing it and spilling all the coffee on the beautiful rug in my teak festooned heritage hotel room ...aarghhh! 

With the sun going down the shutters come up and the city springs back into life. I head off in search of the clothing Mecca FabIndia, I even love it's name. I decline the offer of a 50 rupee rickshaw ride and put my best foot forward to start my shopping ....

Planes, trains and taxi's

What a journey! A delayed takeoff at Heathrow resulted in a swift transfer and Bahrain and in Chennai I was really relieved to see my rucksack appear on the crazily crowded luggage belt at 5am. By 6.30 I was sitting in a cafe in Chennai's main station, having not quite spent 50p on my train journey from the airport, got coffee and breakfast - I'm definitely back in India! 

Already fielded hoards  of questions about me travelling alone, most notably from the passport officer! But that is part of the course of travelling solo. At the train station heading into town from the airport I met a woman who was an air stewardess from Chennai and really understood solo travel. Luckily she said her favourite city was London, but on a recent stop over got a cold as it was freezing! In contrast here's it a humid 28, which will take some getting used to. But it was great to sit in the sanctuary of the women only carriage  and chat before I got to the chaos of the main station. 

On the three hour journey south soon the city rolled into rice fields festooned with palm trees and the gentle sway of the train lulled me to sleep, as I had now been travelling constantly but I woke to see the train come to a holt at my stop and had to carry my rucksack through the carriage, so as not to sweep up all the shoes that lined the aisle. Already London feels a million miles away! 

The rucksack is out and ready to be filled

I love the excitement and challenge of packing! With my holiday just around the corner, four sleeps, it's time to dust off my rucksack and get packing. Time to sync my iPad so I have all the desert island disc podcasts ready for my long train journeys and make sure all my camera batteries are fully charged and there's plenty of memory cards, as there will be so many amazing photo opportunities to come!