Salut!

Goa, as you please

I do not always enthuse about holiday destinations. Goa - our last week away before the big return to Europe, coming up soon - is an exception.

A stunning green landscape. Superb food, at less than half London or Paris prices. Elegant architecture, much of it a legacy of 450 years of a Portuguese presence. Relaxed, friendly people (for the most part). And a bloody great shipwreck off the coast of Candolim...

India (6): the Ganges to Kathmandu

Cheating a bit, I suppose. But since I think this should be the last posting about my recent visit to India, I cannot think of a better place to end than at the top - even if Everest is actually on the border of neighbouring Nepal and Tibet.

Visiting Kathamandu without hiking boots or climbing gear, the must-do activity has to be taking one of the early morning flights to view the magnificent Himalayas. Mine, in a 16-seater Buddha Air plane, everyone beside a window with the bonus of a few seconds in the cockpit, was worth every penny of the £75 ticket.

Taken through an aircraft window, any photograph I produce of Everest is going to be vastly inferior to what you'd find on the cheapest postcard. But I had to post one picture of my own and this is the best I can do.

It was a fitting way to finish off a tiring but completely absorbing holiday. Last stop before Nepal had been Varanasi, with striking sorties in rowing boats on to the Ganges.

By night, people were cremating their dead in keeping with ancient tradition on the ghats lining the river. Next morning they were back, or perhaps hadn't been away in many cases, bathing in the murky waters and even, on occasion, gulping down a few drops.

Our guide said he'd have no problem taking a dip, but would be as ill as any of us if he treated the Ganges as drinkable, holy though it may be.

It was easy to see why Varanasi has always proved a powerful magnet for people in search of spiritual inspiration. Long after George Harrison's sojourn, you see plenty of 2007 equivalents of the hippies and mystics of the late 1960s and 1970s.

So that was our farewell to India. What, apart from Everest, was there to see in Nepal?

India (5): sign language

Something for the weekend, sir?........

Not quite the remedy Gandhi had in mind for India's population problem........

Oops. Did they mean me?........

Don't ask if the Times of India headline writer's clueless, too....

India (4): a flawed peace

"Ah, Varanasi," said the man driving us to New Delhi airport for the flight to the Holy City and its even Holier river, the Ganges. "Such a peaceful place."

No one had thought to tell him that 19 hours earlier, fanatics had killed nine or 10 people in bombings aimed at the court complex there.

India (3): the rocky road from Agra

How many rupees does it take to make a busload of tourists feeling less guilty about trampling all over a school as part of their holiday?

The village of Achhnera was a sudden stop on the bumpy, hair-raising road from Agra to Jaipur.

It was a relief to escape the coach. Indian drivers make use of every inch of road space. This is easier to bear in congested town and city centre traffic, where everyone is moving so slowly that it matters little if there's scarcely the width of a postage stamp between you and the next vehicle or beast. On dodgy highways, there's the added excitement of daredevil overtaking manoeuvres and a worrying approach to speed.

But if the pause briefly made us feel safer, it was difficult not to wonder what right we had to be there in that school, poking our heads around corners, swanning in and out of classrooms and generally making our presence felt.

The kids, of course, saw things differently. It was the high spot of their day, and they clearly loved every minute of our visit.

India (2): economical with comfort

When I saw in the Times of India that Sir Richard Branson wanted to branch out into the domestic flights market in India, the appropriate response seemed to be one of sympathy for future inter-city passengers in the sub-continent.

Having just endured Virgin Atlantic from Heathrow to New Delhi, I could imagine little worse than having to continue my journey on another Virgin aircraft.

My first Virgin knees-up was in 1986. Plain Richard Branson, as he then was, invited a crowd of thirsty freeloaders to knock back champagne on the inaugural flight of his London-Miami service.

It was a jolly affair and our host was, if I recall the event correctly, dressed up as Robin Hood to emphasise that he was the good guy robbing from the rich carriers to open up the skies to poorer travellers.

Some bright spark in Virgin PR had even taken the trouble to bring along a few Page Three girls whose sole function was evidently to be photographed cavorting with Branson in the hotel swimming pool, thus ensuring tabloid inches for the new route.

I have no memory of spending the flight with my knees pressed so hard into the seat in front of me that I felt like a battery hen crammed into a crowded cage by an unscrupulous poultry producer. That sort of knees-up was a treat I had to wait 21 years to experience.

India (1): of muck and brass

Dirt, smell and noise. Elephants and cows, camels and boars jostle for space on crowded roads while the tiger vanishes from the jungle.

Wherever westerners pause, gangs of angel-faced children, armed with useless trinkets and multilingual command of the stock phrases crucial to a street seller's trade, are ready for them, Fagin figures lurking in the background to collect the proceeds.

Delhi belly, the guide book warns, is almost inevitable. The hassling will worsen when we reach the Ganges.

Not, you may think, a promising holiday snapshot.