72 hours in Mumbai

After a relaxing week in Goa, Bombay/Mumbai was a thrilling change. Unfortunately the journey up there left something to be desired. All the trains were fully booked from Madgaon (train station in Goa) to Mumbai, so in a effort to save money, instead of flying we opted for a night bus. Noah did some research and found out the that road between Goa and Mumbai was in great condition, well I can tell you that if that was great condition I would hate to see poor. So not only did the road leave something to be desired, but after watching a few earlier busses depart, with gleaming windshields and lush padded seats, we were just a wee bit disappointed when our bus turned up looking like it had been built in the 70's and hadn't been cleaned since. But what doesn't kill you.....We arrived safely in Mumbai 13 hours later, without much sleep after our sleeper bus experience. If it wasn't the loud rattling from the uneven road that made it sound like the bus was falling apart, it was Noah’s fear of being lurched right off our top bunk and down to the filthy floor below as we whipped around an innumerable amount of sharp corners. I luckily had the window on my side, meaning that instead of being worried about being thrown off, I had a lovely wall of glass that I would be thrown into...I am not sure who was luckier in that situation. But we arrived in one piece and after our taxi driver who we picked up from the bus terminal got lost and then tried to charge us extra for his own mistake (we obviously didn’t fall for it) we arrived at the Residency Hotel, recommended to us by fellow travellers we met in Goa.

Located in the Fort area, just a few minutes walk from Colaba and the Taj Hotel, we opted for a club deluxe room. A nice spacious penthouse room, it was great to come home to after the hot madness of Bombay. Our first few days were spent wandering around town exploring the local food joints and markets – Mumbai was an interesting mix of the very rich and the VERY poor.
On our second night we met some Americans who were staying at our hotel and headed out to a proper Mumbai club with them. Reminiscent of some of the cool bars in Berlin, we found ourselves at a happening venue and were very interested to see the nightlife of a totally different world from the one we know. Having done the requisite drinks at Leopold’s Cafe (requisite due to Shantaram), we also checked out Dome at the intercontinental hotel on Marine Drive. After a few cocktails at London prices we decided to leave the luxurious white couches with the stunning sunset view of Chowpatty beach and head down to have dinner in a local restaurant. The next day, having obviously not completely satisfied our impulse for luxury we had tea at the Taj. A stunning hotel, every detail was perfectly executed, it was just hard to imagine that not too long ago terrorists stormed the Taj and held it hostage for almost 3 days. What a horrific experience it must have been.


Our last night in Bombay, we met up with a friend of Noah’s who had done a 3 months exchange to London’s EY office. Since they lived quite a ways out of the city, we took the a commuter train to meet up with Pratik, his wife and 3 year old son. It wasn’t even rush hour and the train and train station was pure madness, Noah did as the Indiana (and dogs do) and kept his head stuck out the door for the whole ride . After a delicious dinner that we were warned was going to be spicy (it wasn’t) we finished off the night with paan, basically a mix of herbs and nuts deemed to be good for the digestive system and traditionally given to guests after a social occasion, wrapped in a betel leaf to be eaten whole. The taste was not unlike eating a bar of soap but without the aftertaste and a crunchy nut interlude. Not an experience we will be soon repeating.
And that was Mumbai, we set off early the next morning to catch our flight to Udaipur.