India’s second largest city, home to 14 million people and like no where else on the subcontinent. Though still typically India, dirty streets, constant blasts of horns, spit marks everywhere, non existent traffic rules, gridlocked roads and extreme poverty. Kolkata mixes things up a little differently with colonial era buildings, leafy parks and a few traffic lights. The majority of visitors that have arrived by land will get off at the huge Howrah Junction terminal. For the city itself, hop on a ferry outside and nip over to the pier closest to your hotel. Taxis are everywhere, and despite laws requiring them to use their meter, and despite each one having painted on the side ‘no refusal’, it is virtually impossible to get a driver to use their meter, and, refusals are more common place and than acceptance. Accommodation is very expensive by India standards, something which hasn’t quite affected…