Ibb

Greetings from Ibb! Its a charming town weve been kicking about in for the last week or so, due to its picturesque mountain location and the fact that it has possibly the best budget hotel in Yemen. For $8 weve have a spiffy en suit room with all mod cons (well a fridge and a TV) We didnt opt for he $11 room which has a kitchen, but a charming Chileno chap turned up and took it, and weve been cooking with him on ocasion. Other than that we've been enjoying the local hospitality, wandering off the surrounding villages where you are guarenteed of an invite for chai, and a run down on the family history, often complicated given how many kids they have here, 3rd in the world rankings of baby production, so they are! Weve also been wandering in the beautiful mountains, visiting abandoned Ottoman forts and the like.
Taking the next step is proving tricky, mainly due to present comfort levals. However its likely we will descend to the coast, where it will be steamy hot, but at least well get on the beach. Aden looks like the easiest choice, we'll see (see the map!)
One final issue is the getting of our Indian Visa. For a start we've knocked our flight back 10 ten days, Yemen is worth more time, but we have to get our visa sorted before we go. Standard policy in Sana'a is to only issue a month, which wont be enough, but if we plead to the embasador there's a chance of 3, which might be. If we only get 1 then we likely head to Nepal to get a longer one after a breif visit to Hindustan, being in Varanasi to celebrate our anniversary where we got together a huge 6 years ago!