You're never alone when you travel by yourself in India

There's always someone starring, someone begging, someone selling and someone who wants to be helpful! At the incredible temple in Tiruvannamalai there were hundreds of pilgrims who have walked there from far flung places, women dressed in their finest saris to pay their respects to Shiva, and families galore.  This huge temple has been totally restored in the last forty years and is the fifth largest in the world, preserving this important Hindu site for another thousand years. It's a privilege to visit  such a sacred site and once I got my camera out, everyone wanted to have their photo taken. The four pilgrims by the gate were the keenest and were eagerly giving me instructions on how to take the best portrait. Eventually they agreed that a close up was the most trilling portrait ... Job done.... 

And a squeeze of lime in your eye will stop you drinking

I head out of Pondicherry to the west for a day of forts and temple viewing. My taxi driver, who insists his name is Guru, makes plenty of stops when I want to take photos and we end up in a tiny temple just off the main road to Gingee. Here a group of men are celebrating their sobriety and during the blessing from the priest they get a squeeze of lime in the eye - crikey that would be enough to put anyone off drink! They then get a red band on the wrist to remind them off their sobriety, but brilliantly the priest answered his phone whilst performing this ceremony. 

Then I stop at Gingee Fort, a complex of forts across the multiple hill stops. The views are stunning and an ancient temple provides another opportunity to be blessed. Here I'm invited to lunch by a lovely family, but I'm running out of time and need to press on! It's so funny being here where there are so few International tourists! 

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! 

Mad Adventures in Mongolia come to an end

What an incredible trip, amazing on so many levels, but as always made by the wonderful people that we met along the way.
It was a privilege to see a small part of this nation that under Chinggis Khan around 1,000 years ago ruled EuroAsia, this small country fought to dominance and then introduced a diplomatic representation in each country, safety of traders and brought the East trade through the Silk Route to Europe,
I will miss the sheer overwhelming vastness of the country
The warmth of the people, as it was an incredible privilege to spend time with the Eagle Hunters and others that we met along the way
Making anywhere our camping home
The freedom of being the only jeep on the 'road'
Our fabulous crew of cook, driver and translator
Afternoon power naps in the back of the jeep.
Curd
And the only hard bit was camping at zero degrees and finding the right more secluded place to go to the loo!!!
Mongolia provides some of the remotest and beautiful scenery, still a true nomadic population, where the country belongs to them.
Life can be incredibly hard with such harsh winters, but their sustainable living must be truly envied, with rich traditions and amazing community spirit and cooperation. In the eagle hunters village they asked how we wash our clothes and heated our houses. Everything we do is at a touch of a button and it was great for a short time to wash by the river, and help collect dried dung for the fire, with no buttons in sight!   

Chinggis Khan fell off his horse

It's amazing to link your holiday with a festival and the Nadaam festival across Mongolia in mid July was the reason for coming. So we organised getting a day trip including tickets to the amazing opening ceremony of the festival. In the National stadium hundreds of singers, dancers, United Nations peace core soldiers and wrestlers and horse riders all danced and paraded their way through the grand opening ceremony. On a tight schedule we then headed to the ankle bone shooting, where the good luck humming throughout the stadium was impressive. Then to the archery where the opposing players sing and chant, mocking their opponents as they aim their bows.
Like any large event we then spend an inexplicably long time getting out of the car park and then headed out of town in a long slow procession of cars to where the horse racing was taking place. Here the young horses and their young riders galloped for 30km and with over 200 riders this was a long and hard race. When they came past us they looked like they were hanging on for dear life!!! We were weirdly surrounded by other riders on their horses, pushing forward, which was a bit scary, when you turn around and there's a row of horses almost looking over your shoulder.
In the evening the main square filled with revellers wanting to celebrate, listen to the live music and watch the fireworks. Ulaan Baatar was ready to party