We arrived behind a French family with 3 small children who had driven from France in a camper van.  We had some time on the Indian side of the border to chat with them.  They have sold up everything in France and are now 8 months into a 4 year round the world tour.  The kids still have ‘school’ on the move and are undertaking a correspindance course.  Instead of shipping their vehicle from India, they intend to travel through Bangladesh and try their luck with the Burma border.  We arranged to meet up with them at the Golden Temple, but somehow never managed to locate the right carpark (a french campervan in India ought to be unmissable!).  Please e-mail us and let us know your news. 

In the end, we decided that the temple was too busy and chaotic for us to stay there and undertake some vehicle maintenance, so we changed course for the peace and tranquility of Mrs Bhandari’s Guest House, where we could camp in beautiful gardens and relax with a beer (the first since before Turkey!) watching brilliant green parrots squabbling over fruit. 

While we were supping our beers on the covered terrace, we were joined by an excellent group of English people who were having a weekend break from Islamabad.  Most of them worked in the British Consulate.  It was extremely interesting chatting to them about Pakistan and their work.  Following our ‘helpful’ (NOT!) interactions with the Brit consulate in Istanbul, they have changed our opinions of Diplomatic staff.  We went out to dinner with a group of them.  Had an excellent curry (although the service could be described as interesting!) and went to the Golden Temple to see the ceremony that takes the Sikh’s Holy Book from the Temple, across the bridge to it’s nightly resting place.  Lots of ceremony and rictual, but rather incomprehensible at times.  The temple looked beautiful lit up at night.