Long blogging pause... But this blog's about travel and food, and there's just been too much of both over the last few weeks to allow for detailed reporting.

The northwest corner of India occupied us for nearly four weeks. What a fabulous, out-of-this-world destination this is. (Look for pics here.)

I can't begin to detail it all, but here are some quick impressions, in no particular order:

1. Delhi exceeded all our expectations, in terms both of ease of travel and rewarding places to visit.
2. I loved the desert town of Bikaner -- camels everywhere, a fort out of Arabian nights, an evening on a country estate, a morning at the much-sought-after pilgrimage place that is the rat temple, and a very pleasant untouristy feel.
3. Jaipur would have kept us happily occupied for lots longer than the time available to us. Must return...
4. Everyone does them, but a camel safari really is a great thing to experience -- ambling along on your haughty beast, and watching the stars revolve above you at night.
5. Keoladeo National Park gives you lots of glimpses into the world of migrating birds. We particularly liked the gorgeously attired painted storks.
6. The forts just kept on coming... Jaisalmer has the biggest sand-castle you've ever seen. The fort in Jodhpur dominates all around it. Amber has protective walls that climb vertically up mountains. And so on...
7. This was our first chance to visit Sikh and Jain temples. Very impressive.
8. Udaipur has a fairy-tale setting by a lake ringed with mountains.
9. We stayed in some amazing historic residences -- superbly painted havelis in Mandawa and Jaisalmer and a royal summer palace in Nimaj.
10. We adored seeing a Bollywood movie along with a tumultuous crowd in Jaipur.
11. The dancing is superb in this part of the world, and puppetry survives as a quirky, humorous, clever art form.
12. Emphatically not superbly, but enthusiastically, we danced too -- to Abba tracks in a cave-like disco in Jodhpur. Very weird.
13. The Taj Mahal lives up to all the superlatives so frequently bestowed on it. It's superb. It's sublime...

OK, so that's the travelling. But the feeding was also awesome. It's hard to know where to start, but a possible opening would be the vast variety of breads (so many shapes and sizes, so many ways to cook it, so many grains to use...) and of milk products (that lassi in Jodhpur... that milk pudding in Agra... that fig shake in Udaipur...). The sweets are indescribably wonderful, from the decadent kulfa in Jaipur, through the box of assorted delicacies we bought for our first bus trip, to the simplest rice or semolina pudding, delicately flavoured with cardamom. It's positively desirable to be vegetarian in India -- there's just a ridiculously huge choice of yummy vege and pulse dishes. And then there's the spices -- no curry seems to taste quite like the last one; cumin pops up in deliciously unexpected places, like lassi or lime soda; saffron does its ineffable bit for so many sweets; masala chai became my newest addiction. It's all just inspired.

After a brief couple of days back in Melbourne, we set off on our next adventure.

Malaysia. For a year. We've been here a week and a half of it now, and already it's going fast. We've been exploring the modern wonders of Subang Jaya, delving (of necessity) into the housing scene, and clocking up our first brief foray into KL.

But there are plenty more fabulous things to explore here, and there's lots and lots of good food...

Prudence will not be short of travelling and feeding experiences over the next little while...