I landed in Mumbai on October 31st, and I can tell you the city is neither a trick, nor a treat.

I'd initially hoped to arrive by daylight to get a preview from the air.

With the benefit of hindsight, the darkness probably did me a favour. Mumbai is full of heartbreaking poverty. Quite a sobering sight, to see two year old children crawling around on the pavement as if it were their living room, even more so when you realise that the pavement is their living room. Mick and Geoff, two guys I met on the flight, probably think I have a heart of stone when I refuse the beggars that hold their hands out in front of me. But they are incredibly difficult to ignore, especially the children. I do the only thing I feel I can do, which is to shake my head and say "I'm sorry, sweetheart". And I mean it. Talking to one of Mumbai's millions of taxi drivers, Raju, he referred to them as "big mosquitos"; I suppose it's easy to become desensitised when you've been surrounded by this your whole life. To me, it is devastating and bewildering.

The humidity, too, is oppressing. The heat feels like carrying a backpack around constantly, and when you're already carrying a backpack, it is doubly bad. Despite this in-at-the-deep-end arrival, I'm very happy to be in India. Waiting to check in to a hotel, we stumble across a private cricket club, and manage to persuade one of the members to sign us in, so we sit, in India, watching cricket from a cool pavilion, with a bottle of beer to go with it. For a 15 rupee guest fee (20 pence), there are worse ways to spend a Saturday morning.

The next stop from Mumbai after a visit to the Dhobi Ghat (a huge outdoor laundry that employs about 3000 people - all men - who work gruelling days, literally beating the crap out of people's clothes), and a flying visit to Gandhi's house - which has become something of a shrine - is Agra. Mick, Geoff and I decide to get the train there. This involved a seemingly endless 22hr journey to cover the 900 mile journey, and cost me the princely sum of 400 Rupees (about five pounds), but it is an experience in itself. The food served on here is basic but cheap, and excellent (British Rail, where did it all go wrong?). Everyone is keen to strike up a conversation.

Later, after what felt like a lifetime of a journey, I can report that there isn't much to Agra apart from an enormous fort, inventively named Agra Fort, and the Taj Mahal. In fact if it weren't for these two phenomenal buildings, there would be nothing here, just a vast expanse of farmland, which is what surrounds it. But 'if' is a big word, and it's worth the journey. I'd felt obliged to stop here because every guidebook under the Indian sun will tell you "no visit to India is complete without it". As it turns out, they're probably right. Because I'm not competent enough to describe it properly, especially with my internet cafe clock ticking away ominously in front of me, I'll have to add pictures to speak thousands of words on my behalf.

Good things come, to those who wait.

(Which I keep telling myself knowing it's at least six weeks of travelling before I get to the coast…)