The view through our Agra hotel room window. Yes, that's what you think it is, off in the distance.

Indian hotels are very big on flower petals floating on water, which are attractive and make the whole place smell wonderful. A three-foot bowl in the lobby, and a three inch bowl on the dresser in the room.

Sights along the way.

You walk through an unassuming archway.....and then, there it is. Has to be the most beautiful man-made structure in the known universe, and I'll punch anyone in the nose who says differently.

Different views.

Shah Jahan, the Mughal emperor who built the Taj Mahal, was exiled and imprisoned in the Agra Fort by his own ambitious son, and from this balcony, spent the remainder of his days gazing longingly across the river, at the tomb he built for his wife. From the Agra Fort, it's our first glimpse.

Various & sundry.

Mr Singh says the easiest business to open is a barber "shop". All you need is scissors, a razor, a chair, and a promising street corner, and you're suddenly a small-business owner!

The cows (and bulls and buffalo and goats and whatever else) still wander freely - this first herd was being guided down the main highway!

Bear with me, everybody, finding wifi (and making it work) is, as usual, a challenge. May have to wait until I'm back on the ship, but will keep at it....

This was lunch. I don't know what most of it was, other than yummy.

Everywhere.

Our guide in India is Mr. Singh. Extremely knowledgable, as well as being quite the character, in his ascot, jodhpurs, and genie shoes.

The wonderful Agra Fort, built in the 16th century by the first Mughal ruler. Amazing.

Ok, first (repositioning) leg of interior trip complete - we went from the southernmost point of India to the north, where we will set out for Agra and Jaipur. Spent 10 hours in planes, airports and buses, but have arrived in New Delhi hotel and will set out again, this time for the good stuff, first thing in the morning. Stay tuned!

So, we have "turned the corner" on the southernmost tip of India, we are now headed northwest and will dock at Kochi (upper left) in the wee hours. In recognition of our imminent arrival in India, the ship's Colonnade restaurant (the less formal, largely buffet place) did a whole multi-course Indian meal, with 8 kinds of curry and nan and raita and all the multitude of Indian accompaniments. Wonderful, and pretty spicy, even for me! And from our outdoor table, we dine while watching a wonderful lightning storm off our port bow, over the Indian Ocean. Hard to get much better than that!

As close to Sri Lanka as I'm ever going to get.

Blue dot update

Little bit of a glitch, which makes the pictures from Bagan impossible.....so right now we are headed across the Bay of Bengal, on our way to India. A couple of sea days to get there, so no port pictures for a while!

This wonderful lady smokes her own hand-rolled cheroots. She tried to sell me one, I passed.

Puppies and babies, like everywhere.

Enormous bags of fiery hot peppers.....mmmmmm.

Sorry everyone, but the Burmese internet seems to have shut down, at least as far as uploading pictures is concerned. I've been working on it for an hour, and no luck, so I will likely have to wait until we're back on the ship, tomorrow, to update the blog.

Our first stop is the marketplace, wonderfully chaotic.

We are up at 3:15 AM for the transfer to Rangoon airport, for our flight to Bagan. We board our DC-1 for the ninety minute flight.

Monk boys dance while monk Dad checks his iPhone.

Shwedagon pagoda, the most sacred Buddhist shrine in Burma.

The buses we sometimes take to shore excursions are (mostly) comfortable and (mostly) air-conditioned, but the interiors can be a little exotic.

We're bracing for temps over 100 F, with about 99.27% humidity!

Later today we will go into Rangoon to tour the town and visit the Schwedagon pagoda, and then tomorrow morning (barely), we have to be up at 3:15 AM to get to Rangoon airport. We are among only 38 passengers who have opted to leave the ship for a couple of days and fly to Bagan, which is apparently considered one of the most amazing cultural sites in all of Southeast Asia. http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bagan. Burma has only recently emerged from 50 years of military junta rule, but shows promise as far as reform and human rights issues are concerned. Now that the firm grip of the military has loosened dramatically, tourism has just barely begun a resurgence here, at least compared to the rest of Southeast Asia, so it should be fascinating to get glimpses of places that have remained relatively unseen by the west for half a century.

We have arrived in Burma, the port of Thilawa is quite a ways up the delta of the Irrawaddy river. Traditionalists still call it Burma, the fledgling regime prefers Myanmar, the State Dept still uses Burma. Even our guest lecturers seem to use the names interchangeably.