China was easier than we thought, Australia wasn’t nearly as bad as it seemed…then there’s India.
The visa for India was pretty straight forward, so the next thing was to get together a loose plan of what we wanted to do, where we wanted to go and how we’d wanted to go about it. We don’t want to make some kind of simulated package holiday, but it would just be nice to know the possibilities before we go.
Twenty years ago when I was last in India, you just hopped on a plane and sorted it all out when you got there. Probably it isn’t any different today, it’s just me that’s changed.
One good thing we have today (from a travellers point of view anyway) is platforms like Booking.com and there are others. I’ll leave aside the overall good or bad of the monopoly position of these platforms, they’ve just always worked for us when we want to go somewhere and know we have accommodation for the first night at least. Mostly you aren’t even tied down. We managed to cancel almost all of our bookings in Egypt and Jordan at no cost. In fact the only one we couldn’t cancel was because we failed to notice that that particular booking had an upfront payment and a clear no refund policy.
So, for India we weren’t so much bothered about accommodation as getting around. One of my favourite resources on the internet for rail travel is ‘The Man in Seat 61’. I even like the name of the site. He doesn’t ever explain exactly how he always manages to get seat 61. That aside, he really is an invaluable source of all the other information you would ever need for travelling on trains (and more) worldwide.
I have to admit that I made a categorical error in trying to assimilate all the advice on the Man in Seat 61 site. You get three options and the first one is the easiest. If you’re like me, you gloss over that one. I’m not going to sit here and psychoanalyse why it is that I do that, because maybe I don’t always do that. Anyway, this time I did.
When you go to the Indian rail site and the apps associated with booking and checking timetables they let you sign up, but trying to validate phone numbers and email addresses is a nightmare. On one of them it kept asking to enter a valid number. There is the ambiguity of including the leading zero after you’ve chosen the country code from the dropdown. I do think the norm for websites where they expect you still to supply your full number, even although if you dial you have to drop the zero, is confusing.
With the Indian sites and apps my number was rejected with the zero. I took the zero out and still rejected. So, you start again - zero in, zero out and it’s just the same. Lets even try re-selecting the dropdown country code, then it’s a too many attempts warning and try again after 24 hrs!!
I just gave up and decided we’d turn up at the station. Not trusting myself, I researched that option. I don’t know if it’s true or not, but that seems to be the last thing you should do. It was back to yer ‘man in seat 61’.
Is that a new photo he’s uploaded, or did he alway have that wry smile on his face?
A careful read and I unlocked the secret:
How to buy tickets online
Indian trains often get fully-booked weeks in advance as demand usually exceeds supply. So if you have a fixed itinerary and limited time you should buy tickets in advance before you get to India.
I recommend ticketing agency 12go.asia as option 1 for good reason: It’s hassle-free, even though it only does the principle trains on the routes usually requested by visitors. It only sells confirmed tickets, it doesn’t sell RAC or WL places. It happily accepts overseas credit cards.
However, for complete access to all routes, trains, ticket types & quotas including Waitlisted & RAC, you must face the challenge of registering with the official Indian Railways booking website irctc.co.in, which is option 2. I provide detailed instructions below. Be warned, the process may drive you nuts. Some people give up, others manage it in the end, but once registered you can book anything.
I’ll settle for being the ‘some people’!
