My travel Advice
This is really just bits and pieces that might be useful, based on my 25 years of visits.

VISAS. These should be applied for well in advance. Your passport should be valid for at least 6 months from your application date. It should have at least 2 blank pages [preferable adjacent]. Applications are made to a company vfsGLOBAL [not direct to the Indian High Commission]. Applications must be online. It can take 6 weeks unless a printed copy is taken by hand but this is a lengthy messy business.
     The best way [but costing an extra £30] is to use a specialist company. I recommend Travcour [UK] Ltd. They provide excellent advice [online] to help fill in the online Visa Application Fom. You print this and send it by Royal Mail special Delivery to them with passport, 2 photos and fees to them. They then take the application to vfsGLOBAL and post it back to you. They give excellent advice by phone and are completely reliable.
Links: Indian High Commission;    vfsGLOBAL;   Travcour.

MAPS and GUIDES. Maps are rarely used in India even for long distance driving.  For my list of good sources go to Guides. I recommend the Lonely Planet travel atlas and guides. Maps in Lonely Planet and Rough Guides are of course useful. One of the best places to buy maps in UK is Stanfords. The biggest website for maps is Maps of India which has a huge range of maps for download or purchase.
      If you need maps of villages, towns, cities other than the major places then an excellent site is Google maps. For an example of the quality look at a map of 'my home town', Tirupati. And of course you can see the terrain and general appearance of the region in Google earth.

Booking flights.  My main experience has been with British Airways to Chennai. It is always cheaper to book direct with BA [their stated policy].

Travel by Car and auto.  I would not recommend driving yourself; to see why not then Click Here. Hired cars come with drivers. It is usual to pay for their food but they usually find their own overnight accommodation. I usually offer in advance a higher tip if they drive more slowly and considerately, especially through villages. It is more difficult to get them to give up the pleasure of hooting their horns randomly every few seconds. The autorickshaws [tuk tuks in Thailand] are often the best way of travelling shorter distances in towns. It is usual to haggle over price. It is often so low that you think haggling is not needed but still best to do so. If you find being driven in an auto is nerve-wracking you should consider how much you would have to pay for such excitement in a fairground. I love them.  
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