I loved Dervla Murphy's [b:The Ukimwi Road|1419349|The Ukimwi Road|Dervla Murphy|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1183442863s/1419349.jpg|469974], so I was excited to see this on a book-swap shelf at a hostel. At the same time, I was reluctant to pick it up, fearing that 30 year old descriptions of India, a place I'd never been, would mean little to me, as would this book's focus on travelling with a small child. That first fear was accurate - though I found Murphy's descriptions of India's history and the caste system interesting, the rest of her experiences just didn't grip me. As for the latter fear, I ended up wishing she had devoted more of the book to her daughter, and made "my first trip with my 5-year-old daughter" the overarching theme for her story. Instead, her daughter is given equal (or lesser) billing with descriptions of scenery and villagers, and the book's theme ends up something along the lines of "look how peaceful Coorg is and how nice the people here are", which is as cliched a travel-writing trope as you can get.