Hi,

I think foreign nationals need to write to care@irctc.co.in to verify their email address.

I recommend you get an Indian Sim if you're going to be in India for a longer time. Will make life a lot easier.

You will need color photographs, your visa, and passport for your sim card. I recommend going to a large format store of Vodafone/Airtel etc.

HM

Hi I am Ramanan from chennai. Planning in August-September...anybody interested? Main aim to experience Wildebeest migration in Masai Mara region. I have contact also in Kenya who is from India....conducting trip. Looking for group so that the budget can be shared. If anybody already finalised please share if you can accommodate

Best to chat with the hotel/home you plan to stay. Tunis is not Barcelona so the bustling energy is tame even during the day. Tunis Airport is small--and expensive compares to the rest of the country.

My tip on walking out of the airport to the street to catch cheaper taxi ride will be more difficult at midnight. This is true in most part of the capital.

Download the ride-hailing App Bolt and use the airport's free wifi in the arrivals hall to hail a taxi using them. It's basically the same as Uber but it tells you the price up front and you pay the driver in cash. There are ATMs in arrivals. Or you can buy a sim card from the Tunisie Telecom or Ooredoo stalls in the arrivals hall (but not sure they'll be open at midnight).

Some Bolt taxi drivers will come into the airport to collect you, but most will insist that you walk out past the ticket barriers and meet them on the roundabout there. There are police everywhere at the airport, especially at the ticket barrier, so this will be a safe place to wait even in the middle of the night.

Thank you Life Support. With the trains I'm currently only looking at 12go.asia for ease.

It doesn't have Varkala trains on 12go.asia, so will have to sign-up to Indian Railways website now as well.

The #11304 on 12go.asia appears to be all sold out and they only seem to sell Sleeper class (no A/C). The #17022 is available and is 13h 50.

From Hypderbad to Aurangabad what train route would be better? The two below are again the only ones available on 12go.asia

#57549 Hyderabad Decan > Aurangabad by train 16h 40 / Time: 21:35 - 14:15
or
#17206 Secunderabad Jn > Aurangabad by train - 12h 20 / Time 16:40 - 05:00

Is it easy enough to get to Secunderabad Jn and worth doing for a shorter train journey, but worse time of day?

Udaipur to Jodhur is travel time only, I've added a note to take 2 stops enroute as per your suggestions - but thanks for following up on that :)

Jaisalmer and Jaipur the trains on 12go.asia are fully booked from 9-16 November so we may have to fly to Jaipur or drop Jaisalmer from the list. Is it worth spending a whole lot more money to visit Jaisalmer for 2 nights?

Thank you so much, again. You are saving us so much stress and time!
Joe & Kim

Thanks for the replies, were on a budget, we stay in guesthouses & backpack around , so have to be careful with our pennies! No idea yet if we get compensation as delays were due to bad weather at heathrow; anyway..... we had a very easy smooth trip to siem reap, may be useful to some of you out there! We chatted to 3 other people on our plane that wanted to get to siem reap also.
On arrival at bangkok, went down stairs & out terminal to where minubus were, asked around, we got minibus for 7 of us to aranyprathat border for 2500 bht, 3 hrs later went straight through thai border, id heard awful stories & delays about poipet borders, but we filled out immigration form and waited for 5 mins then thats ot we were through (we already had evisa, but there wasn't anyone quing for that either). We haggled for a price for private minibus (for all 7 of us still) to take us to 2 hotels in siem reap, usd 50 & 200 bht , took 4 hours with a 15 mins stop.

Siem reap is lovely btw!

You probably won't be able to re-activate your phone, but the much less costlier way is to just buy a new Telcel SIM card for around 200 pesos and add the " Sin frontera Amigo plan ". For as low as 100 pesos (15 days?) you can get unlimited Mexico calls and maybe about 1-2 thousand minutes US and Canada calls. And a few hundred MB of Internet as well

Hi there

There is info online regarding travel in Sudan; I found some. I'm not really sure what you mean by expensive. Getting my Sudanese visa was my single biggest cost visiting Sudan. I stayed at the Acropole Hotel in Sudan, which was expensive for me, at $80/night, but they arranged the letter for my visa, airport pickup, registration, SIM card for my phone, etc. I had always dreamed of going to Khartoum and seeing the confluence of the White and Blue Niles, but for me the city was a bit underwhelming, at least in the part I stayed in. If you can get your visa, just show up and look for accomodation, or try Air BnB.

The ruins are interesting in Sudan. Are they as impressive as others? Well, compared to what. Their place in the history of the region is arguablly important. It's certainly not developed and you will be on your own, most likely. Is Port Sudan interesting? Well, I went there for diving and that was very good. Stayed in the Mirak in Port Sudan, which was fabulous and great value at $25/night . Traveling on local transport, staying local hotels, and eating at local restaurants...Sudan is cheap.

I would probably skip Sudan if you only want to go Khartoum and talk to politics with locals, but that's just me.

Advice you to buy Azercell sim card

Does the email you recieved start along the lines of:

Dear Customer,
Congratulations! Thank you for using IRCTC's online rail reservation facility. Your e-ticket has been booked and the details are indicated below.
Please take a screenshot of ERS i.e. Virtual Reservation Message(VRM) OF YOUR TICKET FROM YOUR Booked Tickets History page .You have to carry this VRM or SMS send to you along with any one from the listed identity cards (Voter Identity Card / Passport / PAN Card / Driving License / Photo ID card issued by Central / State Govt / Student Identity Card with photograph issued by recognized School or College for their students / Nationalised Bank Passbook with photograph / Credit Cards issued by Banks with laminated photograph) during train journey in original. Both these i.e SMS or VRM & original ID will be examined by ticket checking staff on stations/trains for verification purpose.

If so, you should still be able to access the "Electronic Reservation Slip" in your IRCTC account, and you can print that, which does include your passport number(s).