It has been awhile since I last updated my blog for a simple reason that I did not travel anywhere for the past six years 😅 One day I had a conversation with my mom and she made a remark that we have not been travelling for the past six years already. I was shocked! I thought it was only five years 🤔 How time flies! So I booked two trips. One to India with my mom and another for me to travel solo to Pakistan.
Pakistan trip was however cancelled due to the short war between India and Pakistan in May 2025. I was packed and ready to go to the airport when the tour company called and told us that our Pakistan International Airlines flight was cancelled. The flight was postponed a few times before being cancelled altogether.
Initially I planned to reschedule my Pakistan trip to November 2025 but I found out that the flight duration to Islamabad is now nine hours instead of six (prior to the war) due to different flight route (not allowed to cross Indian airspace). So the trip will be postponed to the time the flight duration revert to pre-war hours. No worries. Plenty of other countries to visit first 😁
Coming back to the India trip. The tour was six days five nights. Full board. The price was RM9980 for two persons (not inclusive of travel insurance and visa). I applied the online visa myself. The tour company can apply for you but they will charge RM150 per person for the service. In my opinion it was not worth the money since it was a pretty easy process to apply the visa online yourself. Since my mom is older than 70 years old, her travel insurance costs RM200 for this one trip. My annual travel insurance costs only RM290. Another reason to do all your travels before 70 😅
Our itinerary was as follows:-
16 April 2025 Kuala Lumpur - New Delhi
17 April 2025 New Delhi - Srinagar
18 April 2025 Srinagar - Gulmarg - Srinagar
19 April 2025 Srinagar - Pahalgam - Srinagar
20 April 2025 Srinagar - New Delhi - Agra
21 April 2025 Agra - New Delhi - Kuala Lumpur
22 April 2025 Kuala Lumpur
My World Countdown:
No new addition for me. I've been to India back in 2003. So I am still stuck at #65 😋 For my mom this is an addition, so for her world countdown India would be #54.
NOTE: Recently I've recalculated the number of countries we have been so far to follow the United Nation's official 195 sovereign countries. So we have to remove Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau from the list.
Tour Company:
This was the first time I travelled with Kembara Sufi. I like this company. Very efficient process. Friendly personnel. Remember my Pakistan trip that was cancelled? It was not the tour company's fault but they fully refunded the cost to me with no fuss. Well done! Plan to travel with them again in the future.
Itinerary:
I like that the trip was short. Nowadays if I want to travel with my mom, maximum nights is five and maximum flight duration is five hours. The itinerary is good. Mostly quite relaxing. Only the first night was a bit rushed because we arrived at the hotel in New Delhi quite late and we had only three hours to sleep so that we can catch the early morning flight to Srinagar the next day. After arriving at Srinagar we immediately continued with a full day tour. Not enough time to rest.
Airlines:
From Kuala Lumpur to New Delhi (vice versa) we flew via Malaysia Airlines. From New Delhi to Srinagar we used Indigo Air. From Srinagar to New Delhi we flew via India Air.
16 April 2025 MH190 KUL-DEL 1850 2150
17 April 2025 6E2120 DEL-SXR 0835 1000
20 April 2025 AI2612 SXR-DEL 1130 1245
21 April 2025 MH191 DEL-KUL 2310 0705(+1)
Indigo Air is a budget airlines, so no food. Malaysia Airlines inflight meals was unfortunately not as good as before. Pretty disappointed. India Air hot snacks was surprisingly good though.
Tour Leader:
Our tour leader name is Lutfi. After travelling for more than two decades with international and local tour agencies, I personally think that he is one of best tour leaders out there. I liked that at the beginning of the tour he highlighted clearly his expectations (and the reasonings behind) of our (tour members) behaviour and also what we can expect from him in term of support during the trip. He also helped with the bags of senior citizens without needing to be asked. Always ready to take photos and videos for the tour members. Most importantly he is not there to do his own personal shopping. Really took his job and responsibility seriously. Well done! Hope to meet him again in future travels. I'll rate him A+ 👍🏻
Local Tour Guide:
An average B. The service was acceptable. No complaint.
Bus:
We used two vans when we were in Kashmir and a medium sized bus when in New Delhi and Agra. Comfortable rides. The bus was good, the van was a bit tight and had quite a low headspace at the entry point. A few times I bumped my head. Ouch!
Bus Drivers:
Drove responsibly. Pretty shy. No obvious interaction with the tour members, possibly due to language barrier.
We stayed at four different accomodations; hotels and houseboat.
Hotel Pitrashish Pride, New Delhi
Dal Lake Houseboat, Srinagar
Hotel Sejour Luxury, Srinagar
The Taj Villas, Agra
The first hotel in New Delhi was terrible. The others were quite good. The houseboat was acceptable, terrible shower though 🥴 The best hotel for this trip was Sejour Luxury. Luckily we got to stay there for two nights 🥰
Hotel Breakfasts:
Breakfast in New Delhi was average. In Srinagar, they were fantastic. In Agra, slightly better than New Delhi. I just wished they served normal chai instead of masala 😅
Lunches:
All good especially in Kashmir. Lunch at the houseboat was fantastic. Fried chicken at Pahalgam restaurant was awesome.
Dinners:
Food served were generally good especially at the houseboat and the hotel in Srinagar. The houseboat served plain chai during dinner. It was a perfect end to a wonderful meal 😍
Rapport With Fellow Travellers:
This group was fun and friendly from the get go. Started as strangers ended as friends. We had a wonderful time together ❤️ Hope to cross path with them in future tours.
Timing:
We went there middle of April. I think a better time would be early April. Better looking tulips and you most probably will get to take photos with apple blossoms. Cleaner and thicker snow too instead of sludge AND you don't have to hike so far to reach the jet ski station 😋
Overall:
We had a fabulous time. Good itinerary, awesome food, great people, enjoyable shopping and safe journey 😍 Syukur alhamdulillah.
I have uploaded the photos and videos in my Instagram account mkhasha.n.travels. Do check it out.
Hashtags specific for this trip:
#mks2025India #mks20250416 #mks20250417 #mks20250418 #mks20250419 #mks20250420 #mks20250421 #mks20250422
Njoy!!
