My visa has been granted!- Quick tutorial on applying for an e-visa for travel to India.

The past few days have been quite frustrating trying to figure out how to apply for a visa for my upcoming trip to India. Initially I thought I would need to apply for a regular tourist visa which is a more complicated process then the e-visa. The e-visa is perfect for a yoga teacher training program because the time frame for visitation has increased to 60 days, whereas in the past it was only 30 days. Also you can apply for the visa several weeks in advance of your trip and select your intended travel date. The visa will be valid starting when you first arrive in India and allows for 2 entries within the 60 day validity period.

Here is what you will need for the e-VISA

1) Valid Passport that has at least 6 months remaining on it beyond your arrival date. Passport should also have a minimum of 2 empty pages.

2) A recent 2 inch x 2 inch digital jpeg photo no more then 1 mb in file size.

For my photo i used my webcam and the mobilefish website: to take the photo. I then used an online photo resizer to get the photo down to the 1 mb requirement. It came out as 1.25 mb directly from mobilefish and was too large to load onto the passport application.

3) A digital scanned scanned copy of your passport. I used a color scanner to scan a digital image of my passport to my computer and saved it as a pdf file.

4) The website to apply for the e-VISA for travel to India is: https://indianvisaonline.gov.in

5) The link to the direct application is: https://indianvisaonline.gov.in/evisa/Registration

6) The price for the e-VISA for travel to India is $75 as of the time of this posting. There is also a small processing fee which brings the total to around $77 or $78.

From here its just a matter of filling out the application accurately, uploading your documents- (photo and passport scan), paying the fee, and waiting for approval.

Here are just a few tips for filling out the application

1) Make sure you include you middle name along with your first name on the "Given Names" line if a middle name is shown on your passport.

2) In the section where you are asked to enter your Reference in India you can use the name of the hotel you are staying at or the name of the Yoga Teacher Training School that you are attending.

3) In the section for the reference phone number do not include the "+91-" country code designation. Only enter the 10 digits of the phone number. I actually had the application close out on me and had to go back into the application several times to fill it out and finally figured this out through trial and error so hopefully I will save someone the frustration.

4) Make sure to copy down you temporary application ID number. It will save you frustration of having to fill out the entire form again from scratch if a page doesn't load and you get booted out of the application for some reason.

5) When you reach the payment option there will be 2 payment processors to choose from. My personal experience was that SBI-epay did not work for me after attempting it 2 times however when I switched over to the Axis bank payment on the 3rd try it worked right away. Both methods allow you to pay by debit or credit card.

6) After you submit your application it should take anywhere from 24 to 72 hours to learn if your visa has been granted or denied via email. I was approved in about 24 hours.

Hopefully this information will be useful for someone that is looking to obtain a visa to travel to India short term for a yoga teacher training or for any reason at all.

Why I decided to start this website and blog

Hello! In just 6 short weeks I will be boarding a plane to Rishikesh, India to attend my first yoga teacher training. I will be attending the training at Ekam Yogashala. I am very excited to begin this new journey in my life and I want to share my experience leading up to, during and after the training as I become a yoga teacher. In the past several months I have gone through many life changes. I ended an engagement, moved from a huge 2 family house that I owned, to a small studio apartment that I rent, and put in a letter of resignation to a corporate job that I have worked at for nearly 4 years. I have been slowly downsizing my belongings as I have realized that having unnecessary stuff is weighing me down physically and spiritually.

I began researching and learned about something called your Saturn return which is a big time for change in peoples lives. It occurs between ages 28 and 30. It is the time when the planet Saturn has completed a full cycle which takes about 28.5 years and returns to the position where it was at when you were born. Being a Capricorn sun born in 1989 my Saturn return happens to also occur during the time when Saturn is back in its home sign of Capricorn. This started back on December 20th 2017 and will end on December 18th 2020. It is said that your Saturn return is a time of momentous change and restructuring in your life. It is also said that even though legally you are an adult at age 18 in most places, you do not spiritually and mentally become an adult until you have gone through your first Saturn Return. Well I am going through mine now, and I am looking forwarding to meeting the person waiting on the other side.

I want to use and explore my love for yoga as I navigate to that destination. I want to learn more about yoga and myself, who I am as a person, and what my inner philosophy is. One day I hope to be able to share my experience with other women that are going through life changes and help them to find their inner philosophy through yoga.