A travel-vlog style YouTube video by Nate Buchanan documenting his and Kara Buchanan’s first Indian train experience. They take the Kerala Express from New Delhi to Mathura in an AC 3-tier coach (car B5, platform 3), describe boarding, onboard vendors and facilities, and then take a taxi ~15 km north to Vrindavan to reach their hotel. The video ends with anticipation for the next day’s Holi celebrations.
Questions this video answers
The Kerala Express.
Car B5, AC 3-tier (AC third class).
Platform 3; they had about 25 minutes (check-in) and train was leaving in ~7 minutes later (train was early).
About a two-hour ride.
About $0.25 (25 cents).
Chapters
How much? Good luck squeezing in there.
We got this.
Taking our first rickshaw to the train station.
It's not our first.
It's our first like this.
Okay.
Just for anybody who is curious, the maximum amount of baggage that you can fit into the back of a rickshaw is two carryall bags and two backpacks and two people. My knee is hanging out and I'm really scared it's going to get taken off.
Oh gosh. Nate, bring it in here.
You can't take us all the way.
Thank you. Thanks for the ride. Pretty sure he didn't take us quite all the way there. Dropped us off across the street because it was easier for him. But there was like a 10 minute ride for less than a dollar. Pre negotiated.
Of course.
Not. Seen our train on here?
No worries. Found our train. It is on platform three and we're 25 minutes.
Our time in Delhi is coming to an end. But we had one last great meal this morning.
Today we are taking the Kerala express from Delhi to Mathra and this is going to be our first Indian train experience.
And it's pulling up right now.
So we're looking for car B5 and today we're going to be riding an AC third class.
I'm actually really excited about this train. Is so long.
You want?
Oh.
Our name's not on the list but we're on the street. Okay. Thank you.
This is it. Found our seat.
First impressions. It's clean, smells nice and air conditioning.
Cold but it's fine. It's way cooler than it is outside and there's.
About a two hour ride to mat. This is going to be great.
I'm trying to picture.
I just heard a lot of crazy stories and I'm sure that that could happen to us still. But our train was on time. It's actually early. We're not leaving for another seven minutes.
We just pulled out of New Delhi station. On the Indian trains you can hang out the door, watch the world go by. This is what I was most looking forward to about Indian train travel. This is awesome.
This from there.
This is so much fun. We've been on this train for 15 minutes and now I want to take a train all the way across India.
Sam.
So there's all these guys walking around the train selling stuff. I've seen chai, I've seen chips, I've seen yogurt, I've seen safe watches. Seems like you can buy pretty much anything on this train. Picked up a bag of fried peanuts for 25 cents and then if you want it looks like you can actually order a proper meal. I think that's called these white boxes here behind me. Are we on the train for two hours today?
So not.
Got some fried peanuts?
Thanks.
All right, this is the toilet situation. That is the train track at the bottom. Pretty clean, doesn't stink. There's my seat. I don't see the toilet paper, just the little water hose. So I've seen worse.
Goodbye.
All right, two hours later we are in Mathra.
This isn't our final destination though. We have to go about 15km north to a town called Vrindavan. So now we found a taxi.
Not right now. We can find our own.
After many generous offers, we've gone with this guy to take us to our hotel.
Very nice.
I'll show you where we're going. Okay? Okay. Hotel Yaso Gopo. Just a minute please.
Vrindavan. Mark, do you know?
Yeah.
Do you know? Okay. Okay. You know, you know. Say, come sit.
Okay.
Ma'. Am.
Happy?
Honey?
I'd be lying if I didn't say I have a really bad feeling about this. We said yes to one of the first guys that came up to us.
In the train station. I'm sure we're paying a little too much, but it's like a 30 minute drive and we were only paying $5, so hard to argue with that. But when showed him where our hotel was on the map.
He had no clue. With that said, I like to always assume the best of people, so.
Woohoo.
Thank you.
There's extra for the trouble.
It's good.
Thank you. Thank you.
Have a good day.
I was totally wrong. He was super nice. He got us here. We got lost a few times. So I gave him a little extra money because it felt bad because it was my directions.
He didn't give up on us though. He didn't leave us on the side of the road.
I think if I was him, by the end of us going down all those little back alleyways, I would have been like, get out.
Like no turn here. And then we were wrong.
Google Maps was like slightly off, but we made it. You stay at 2, 27 both then.
Okay.
Thank you very much.
Okay.
Okay. Thank you.
Thank you.
Bye Bye.
Have a nice day. Well, it was the cutest thing ever. Everyone was super nice. I like it.
I don't know if I'd go that far.
It's not like super nice. The bathroom smells a little funny, but it's clean, spacious. There's ac, so I think it's great.
Not bad. We're gonna call today's video a little bit early because we have a big day to get ready for tomorrow. We don't say this often, but you have to watch tomorrow's video.
It's gonna be nuts. Tomorrow is the first day of Holi celebrations. I've already seen little hints of it on the street. There's people selling colors and kids with water balloons. I just. I don't know if I'm ready.
It's going to be insane. Please watch it.
That was scary right now.
You're right, man. Okay. Thank you. You're welcome. From India. Thank you. From. From the U.S. yes. U.S. yes. Oh, nice name. Nice name. Thank you, ma'.
