1 Minute per Mile of Delay

Our final full day in India today, which turned into a day of frustration.

We were due to catch an overnight sleeper train at 19:30 (on the 6th), but it was an hour late setting off from its starting place. Our guide was regularly phoning the railway company and having got a fairly definite arrival time at our station of 23:00, we set off to the station late in the evening.

Due to roadworks causing large vehicles like our bus having to take a major detour, we had been decanted into a minibus and a taxi. There was another (non-photographic) group from the same company with us, they were in another minibus. I was in the Tata built taxi. At the entrance to the bridge with the width restrictions that the big bus wasn't allowed across the driver stalled. There was absolutely nothing in the battery, and eventually he found a couple of people who pushed us backwards into the traffic at night with no lights on. They got the car started, we texted the others in the minibus to say we had broken down! The taxi was not in a very good state - the demisters didn't work, the bonnet release had to be held open while the bonnet was opened, the spring that held it up having broken, and so the list went on.

The driver managed to stall again later, and this time he was bump started by the drivers of the minibuses, and then while driving along the engine finally gave up and died. We squeezed into the minibuses and left the taxi at the roadside.

We got to the station in plenty of time, unlike the train.

The train finally arrived at 03:00, and slowly made its way to Delhi. We were scheduled to arrive in Delhi about 7 in the morning, we finally arrived at around 22:00, so our day of seeing some of modern, urban India was lost.

Our only photographic opportunity was out of the train doors (you could open them and look/lean out as much as you wanted, no locks to stop you opening them). 

This building may claim to be abandoned, but was in better condition than many along the route that were occupied.

The train journey from end to end was about 950 miles (we were only on it for part of that), which made the delay approximately 1 minute per mile. Compare that with my train journey into London (if I used the trains) of 30 miles, and the delay was less per mile than is regularly achieved by the various holders of the Thameslink franchise, which puts it a bit of context.

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