Now don't get excited, I'm not buying anything for you but I thought I'd just mention about some of the things we've bought so far and their prices. I'm sure I didn't pay the lowest price for any of this but te prices do seem so low compared to back home.

In Agra, just outside the Taj Mahal - it isn't usually a good idea to buy anything near a tourist attraction but we couldn't help ourselves - we bought some lovely coasters made out of "marble" (I don't think!) with inlaid "precious stones" (not!) and carved too: 3 sets of 6 for Rs450, that's about £6.50.

A little boy selling guide books started out with his price for a rather ropey looking Taj Mahal guide book at "normally I sell for Rs2000 but for you Mister, RS1000". I laughed, walked on (repeat many times) and finally got it for Rs120 (£1.60ish)

In Jaipur the girls bought their Salwar Kameez's for £10 each and considering that Amy's was tailored made, I thought that's pretty cheap.

In Amber, Amy bought two cloth puppets (Maharajah and Maharani) with painted wooden faces for Rs150 (down from Rs1600) which is about £2.

In Pushkar last night we bought some cushion covers for Rs350, which is about £5.

Some Rajasthan cities are known by their colour and today we're in Jaipur, "The Pink City", so called because the walls of the old city are painted with a pink wash. On a colour theme, in a few days time we'll be moving on to Jodhpur, "The Blue City".

Jane and I have been to Jaipur before and I we fondly remember the guide's statement about the city when we went for a stroll through the city at rush hour: "There's 2 million people that live in Jaipur and on this walk you'll probably bump into most of them". How true it seemed then, but now it seems a whole lot busier. 

Yesterday we travelled to Amber Fort which is probably my favourite fort from my previous time in India. It truly is a wonderful place and would be 100% better if those pesky monkeys weren't around.

"Ali Baba" took 19 photographs of the family on our elephant ride to the Amber Fort and told me to meet him in the car park after our visit.

I forgot. He didn't and he chased the car up the road once he spotted us. We stopped and he thrust the photos in my hand. "Only 100 rupees each sir". I laughed.

So that'd work out at about 30 quid. I don't think so.

He quickly dropped his price again and again, without me saying anything, with each price drop so did his enthusiasm for selling the photos.

He'd obviously failed to realise that if I didn't buy them no-one else would.

I said 200 rupees and he laughed, or was it cried?

He tried to get our driver Kamal into the argument and get him to say that 500 was a good price - it was - but it was a difficult position for Kamal to get into so he refused.

Minutes later I handed two crisp 100 rupee notes to Ali Baba and we drove away, Kamal laughing at how cheap we had bought them for, he'd have paid double!

Watching birds isn't really my thing but the Keoladeo National Park is reputed to be one of the best bird sanctuaries in the World: it seemed worth a day's exploration. It's a very good place to escape the masses of people in the big cities (Agra, Delhi) and to be able to wander around, or cycle, is just wonderful.

Today we spent eight hours, with a guide, spotting birds and looking for a nice big Indian Rock Python to take a photo of.  We found one quite soon after feeding turtles and Macaque monkeys are the Hindu temple in the park.

If you listen to what people say about the place you HAVE to get there very early to see any activity at all. We arrived at 10am and thought we'd only last a couple of hours but the heat wasn't too bad as there was a lovely breeze cooling us down. We saw bird after bird after bird including Ibis(es?), Storks, Owls, Eagles and many, many more. Our guide was very good at spotting and brought along a pair of binoculars and a spotting scope on a tripod for us to use.

Now yesterday at the Taj Mahal I managed to hold myself back and only took 100 photos, but today, I just couldn't help myself and shot a few hundred - they're probably all rubbish but I MUST have got at least one good one. Thanks to the guys in my team at work I took virtually all the photos using my new monopod that they bought me this last Christmas; it was brilliant and I couldn't have done without it.

Unfortunately the Rainbow Cyber Cafe here in sleepy old Bharatpur has done a good job of hiding ths USB slots on the PC so I can't upload any of the images without risking thumbling in the dark and switching the PC off! But keep any eye on the Winchcombe Gallery at www.winchcombe.org/gallery.aspx for some India photos: I'll upload when I can.

We're staying at the Hotel Sunbird, which is really nice albeit quite simple. Food is pretty good at 90 rupees (£1.30) for a nice curry; naans come in at a hefty Rs30 (£0.45).

Tomorrow we're off to Jaipur (3.5 hours by car) to see the Amber Fort and hopefully we'll get to ride an elephant.

Today, after a single night in Delhi, recovering after the flight, we started our trip properly and headed off to Agra, the home of the Taj Mahal.

Agra is often regarded as a place you visit only to see the Taj Mahal and get the hell out. But it's steeped in history (and dirt) and played a major part in the Mughal empire. There's wonderful moments to see here; The Agra Fort; Itmad-Ud-Daulah (affectionately known as the Baby Taj); Akbar's Tomb at Sikandra and more more.

We're travelling in a Tata Sumo, a seven seater 4x4, provided by Namaste India Tours who are also sorting out the hotels for tonight and the next 8 saving us the hassle of having to find one when arriving in unfamiliar surroundings.

After four hours in our car dodging autorickshaws, very large trucks, camels and cows we arrived at our hotel (for the next 18 hours). Then straight out to visit the Agra Fort - which for me is possibly the best fort I've ever visited: if the fort wasn't good enough the view down the river Yamuna of the Taj Mahal is simply stunning.

Tomorrow will be an early start so we can catch the Taj Mahal during sunrise which is 06:11am (eek!) so I guess we'll need to get up at 5am to get there, get tickets and get through security in time to watch the world's most beautiful monument bask in the early rays of sunshine.

With less than a week to go things are getting pretty exciting in this house - as if they weren't already: the planning for this trip has been going on for ages.

I've just finished the Where In The World page on the blog with options to view a static or animated version of the route and also(by default) you can see where we are. Each city/place we're stopping at has a map marker which you can click on get more information including links to Wikipedia, Flickr, the weather and (if I ever get to upload any pictures) my gallery.

Today is the only day available for getting things together and loosely packing up the suitcases/rucsacks. The obvious plan was to travel light but things like this never seem to happen and it's mainly my fault; what with the two cameras, three lenses, monopod, camcorder, chargers, DSs, flash readers. The medical kit also outweighs both kids by 2 to 1. Luckily though our concern about the kids getting ill has meant that Dioralyte and Imodium WILL survive the credit crunch.

Tonight, without phoning a friend or asking the audience I'll be watching Slumdog Millionaire for the third time. Oh no, of course, I can't do that, it's not out on DVD yet.

Searching for information about Ranthambhore can prove a little tricky. To start with you've got to know how to spell it and it's open to debate. But the winner it seems is 'Ranthambhore'.

Firstly, let me recommend a lovely photo book, Tiger Forest: A Visual Study of Ranthambhore National Park. I got my copy for about £15, brand new from Amazon. Full of gorgeous pictures it really whets the appetite for a trip to the tiger reserve.

Next, let me recommend the best set of photos I've seen around. Taken by a man name Aditya Singh who runs the Ranthambhore Bagh hotel, which unfortunately is over my budget range. How I would have loved to talk about wildlife and photography with Aditya but never mind, I'll just have to bore the kids. Aditya's images can be found in many places: his blog; his web site; but above all else, his photos on Flickr.

I love this shot of a tiger almost as much as this shot of a leopard.

If I manage to take one shot half as good as some ofthese I'll be a happy man.

Going on holiday is an excuse to buy that much need gadget. Invariably this 'good idea' turns out to the equivalent of hiding under a table and covering yourself in Bacofoil during a nuclear attack - as seen in the Young Ones episode "Bomb".

Not this time though: I've got the best gadget in the world!!

A Powertraveller Powermonkey eXplorer. Cost £35, new-ish on eBay.

It's a LiIon battery that you can charge from the mains, usb or the solar panel. Add a car cigarette lighter with USB output and you can charge it in your car too. There a few mains charging options which allow you to charge the battery in 150 countries, but not, of course, India. Doh! (One does fit shaver sockets though and I think/hope/guess they're universal the world over.)

Various power tips (actually called Monkey Nuts) mean that you can charge up a whole collection of devices from the lithium battery. The monkey nuts also fit direct onto the leads from the charging plugs (mains/USB/solar) so you can charge a few things at the same time; one from the mains; one from the battery; one from the solar panel. For the main charging there are a few different connectors, so you can charge the device from the main in 150 countries...but not, of course, India. Doh! One of the charging plugs will fit shaver sockets which are universal the world over.

Just think, the next time you're nipping out for the day, you pick up your keys and your phone...damn, it's nearly out of charge. Who cares, pick up your powermonkey battery and the appropriate tip, plug the together et voila. Hold on a minute. You did charge that powermonkey didn't you? Another scenario, you're going out for the day, taking your kid's DS Lite, which of course is fully charged, they watch a film on it, it's dead: Charge it up from the powermonkey and you're the best Dad in the world. "No Dad you're not a real geek, that Powermonkey really is good!".

But the best bit isn't the use of this whilst travelling, it's the use of it at home. We used to have five different charging leads in our kitchen (nokia, sony and HTC mobiles, DS Lite, iPod). Now we've got only one lead and selection of monkey nuts. Pop on the required tip and you're ready to charge your device and suddenly you're the best Husband in the world. "Yes, Kev that Powermonkey really was worth the money, look only one wire".

When we changed one of the phones the other day, we just bought a new monkey nut, cost £2.50 including postage.

It's been an odd couple of weeks.

The flights are booked; car and driver is booked; trains are all booked; India related books have all been purchased - mostly from Amazon, some were only £0.01 plus £2.50 postage...bargain!; we've watched all the India related films we've got, or borrowed ()

So the only thing left to do is get stuff ready.

Always in the market for something useful, different and cheap I decided that we needed to sort the water carrying out. Amy is very forgetful at drinking water and in temperatures around the 40°C mark, we needed to make sure water was always nearby. A solution was needed, preferably a geeky one, but failing that, something that works. There's loads of devices out there from carabiner clips through to Camelbaks and beyond. But I'm me and I wanted CHEAP.

I decided that we were not going to take water bottles (like our bike ones) with us but we would just buy (plastic) bottled water and carry that around. Half a nanosecond of thought later and I decided that we needed to buy a device to carry the water bottle in. Before you say it, yes I've seen Slumdog Millionnaire, I'll watch out for a glued bottle cap.

Thanks to the wonderful world of eBay, I'll soon be the proud owner of two of these from Malaysia; total cost: £6.11.