Booking Trains for India

So something we’ve learned in our trip planning is that trains in India should be booked well in advance. And when I say in advance, I mean at least 3 weeks if you want to get your 1^st choice train.

Alternatively, there is apparently something called the tourist quota. You arrive at a main train station, with foreign currency, and should be able to get a ticket. They only set aside a few though (2 to 12) so you aren’t guaranteed to get one, especially in the popular season. You might have to wait a day or so to get an actual seat, which isn’t a big deal if your schedule is flexible.

So we decided to book our tickets in advance to make it easier on ourselves and save the tourist quota tickets for an emergency or plan change.

Full proof plan and fully prepared….

As many know, life really likes to make things “interesting” for me….

I knew that trains booked fast so I planned to book them at the beginning of March. Of course, this was when the Indian train system decided to update their online reservation system. No big deal I thought, if I can’t reserve it, no one can. 

But once the official IRCTC site started working, I learned that the only form of payment an international person can use is an American Express credit card. I read on some forums that this is a recent change to the system. So I borrowed an American Express card and tried to purchase the tickets. I tried several times because each time it said that the booking didn’t go through because of “communication failure.” I later found out that the IRCTC charged me for those “failed bookings.” They actually charge you for failed transactions! Who does that?! 

They claim on their site that failed transactions are immediately refunded but it’s actually tricky to deal with from the US. 

I had to give up on trying to book through IRCTC and tried to book through Cleartrip but Cleartrip was having their own problems. Apparently the updates to the IRCTC site caused problems for all the other train booking sites. So we kept trying Cleartrip for the next two days but the site was still down and all I could do was sit and watch my 1^st choice trains disappear.

Luckily, my mom has friends in India and I was able to get one of them to purchase our tickets for us. He’s the best person ever.  It’s a good thing we didn’t wait for Cleartrip to start working again because they ended up being down for two weeks. 

So anyone planning to travel around India by train, plan accordingly or go make friends with an Indian and get some connections.

Some sites for anyone wanting to travel by train:

1) For information about train classes, booking, etc:

      http://www.seat61.com/India.htm (very useful, also has train and bus information for many other countries)….there are actually many sites out there with train information, this is just one of them.

2) For only train schedules:

     www.erail.in

3) For booking trains and train schedules (I do NOT vouch for either site but apparently many people have had a good experiences with both sites): 

     www.irctc.co.in (the official site, but does not accept international credit cards)

     www.cleartrip.com/trains/

Vaccinations 3

I wasn’t planning on making a 3^rd vaccination post, but I thought I’d do one after receiving the 2^nd JE injection.

So I had no side effects after I received the 1^st shot. Unfortunately, the  2^nd one gave me a pretty severe headache for the rest of the day. I felt slightly out of it. Now I didn’t look at the side effects beforehand because sometimes I have hypochondriatic tendencies. But it turns out a headache is in fact a mild side effect which occurs in about 1 out of every 5 people….this actually made me feel pretty special. 

I didn’t go into many details about the JE vaccination because everyone should be checking with the CDC and with their travel clinic about whether or not they need it. But one thing to know is that JE is contracted in the presence of rice paddies AND pigs and is transmitted through mosquito bites.

The mosquito is such an insane little creature. So tiny, so susceptible to being crushed between a person’s hands but yet so deadly….and even in some rare cases they help bring back dinosaurs.

 

And an interesting fact is that the vaccination is grown in mice brains, which is like mad-scientist crazy.

Vaccinations 2

Aside from the typical vaccinations for Asia, Japanese Encephalitis (JE) and Rabies have also been recommended by the CDC (cdc.gov). Both JE and Rabies can be very expensive depending on your insurance and both take multiple shots. JE takes 2 and needs to be done 28 days apart and Rabies takes 3 shots (so plan ahead people!).

I won't be getting the Rabies. I've learned not to mess with the psycho monkeys of India. Besides I don’t think vaccines would protect me from their monkeys…
 

I did decide to get JE though because mosquitoes absolutely love me.  

So I was at the doctors a 2^nd time to get the 1^st JE shot. After I received my shot, I had to wait in the waiting room and ended up sitting next to an elderly couple who were reviewing what medical updates they needed:

     

       Old man “Why do you need so many things? How come I don’t need them?”

       Old woman (seriously as loud as possible): “It’s because I have boobs.”

Oh old people