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Bikers ride through the Himalayas.

A few numbers help to illustrate the sheer size of India. With 1.3 billion people, only China has a higher population; the four next-largest nations combined do not equal India’s size. One in five people worldwide is Indian. This huge population resides in a small space, most of it along the coastal regions and in the Ganges RiverValley of the north; some parts of India, especially the western deserts, have almost no population at all. India’s climate varies by location. It is predominantly known for its tropical climate, because most of the country lies within a few hundred miles of the equator. The eastern half of the country is hot and rainy, enjoying the annual monsoon storms in the summer months that dump huge quantities of water throughout the country, providing the moisture needed for intensive agricultural produc- tion.The western half is far drier, most notably theThar Desert of Rajasthan at the border with Pakistan. This region receives little rain, creating the world’s 17th-largest desert. Despite the lack of rain for agriculture, sheep herding in this region produces about

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