a full day affair in jaipur, the pink city!

we headed off this morning for breakfast at a little restaurant that made grilled tomato and cheese sandwiches to die for (or so it seemed :-)  from there, we wandered around jaipur city centre doing some errands before we headed off on our half day tour.  we were rushing back to the tourist bureau when i was shat on, not once but twice, by pigeons!!  luckily they only got me on the shoulder and my front, not my hair, as i would not have been happy!!  cleaned as best as possible, we embarked on our tour with mostly other indians.
we started the tour at the observatory (Jantar Mantar) which boasts 18 huge astronomical measuring devices created in the early 1700s to measure time and the astrological affects of time passing on the earth.  the devices were all interesting to look at however our guide was so impossible to understand due to his thick accent that i have no idea what the majority of the items were used for!!  from there, we went to the city palace and museum which was pretty as much of it was a pinky/terracotta colour.  they boasted a massive collection of guns, swords and different period costumes which were fabulous!
we boarded our double decker bus and headed off to amber fort which is about 11km north of jaipur.  the fort sits on the site of a hillside (obviously) and is imposing in size and stature.  it was absolutely beautiful to look at from a distance.  we wandered through the fort, took some photos and then rejoined the tour bus.  by now, it was nearing the end of the tour however the guide hadn't managed to fit in all of the attractions so we rushed to the jaigarh forth just south of the city however neither amg nor i could be asked to climb up and take photos!!  it was all too hard :-) 
i had a quick chat with the tour guide as we'd booked ourselves movie tickets for 6:30pm (tour was due to finish at 4:30pm) however it was close to 6pm when he dropped us off near the cinema.  since we were pressed for time, we ended up in mcdonalds for dinner (i know, i'm not proud to admit it) where i had a mcveggie burger and amg had a chicken maharaja mac before heading next door.
the cinema holds 1,500 people and is decorated in an art deco look and feel.  the main entrance hall was dusty rose with peacocks painted on the walls and interesting carpet throughout.  we bought ourselves a snack and headed for the cinema.  it was assigned seating and we had great seats to watch "blue" a bollywood film.  it was predominately in hindi with a couple of english words and generally, based on the expressions and postures, you could ascertain what was happening in the film.  it was a cheesy but fun movie to see ;-)
i headed off home alone after the movie (amg had to leave early as she needed to buy another suitcase to hold all of her new purchases :-), collected my clean laundry and headed off to bed after an action-packed day. 
we're heading off to the taj mahal tomorrow and we've been warned by a number of locals to take care in agra...

taking the train....

as i alluded to previously, we had an bit of a mishap involving our train tickets for a night train from jaisalmer to jaipur; we'd arranged for someone to buy us the "last two tickets" for 25 october however when we arrived at the train, there was someone else in amg's seat!!  after much discussion, we realised that our tickets were actually for 24 october, not 25 october as we'd requested.  unfortunately, we really wanted to take this train so amg rushed to the ticket counter as i waited with the luggage.  we had to forego our 2nd class sleeper tickets (a hard collapsible bunk with a vinyl cover) in exchange for general seating (a free-for-all with no assigned seating, no bunks and hard vinyl chairs!!
the trip itself was an interesting affair with a multitude of people "walking by", curious to see the foreigners in general seating, some openly staring for much longer than polite!  in addition, there were the chai tea sellers, chanting "chai, chai, chai" to anyone and everyone and the occasional "rushes" as people at popular stations rushed to get onto the train and secure themselves a seat.  it was definitely a cultural experience!! 
we had an early breakfast in jaipur (5:30am) and then headed off in search of a hotel that might be nice enough to let us check in so early in the am.  we walked to a nearby hotel, much to chagrin of the rickshaw drivers as they desperately wanted the fare and advised it was "impossible" to walk :-)  we both checked into two different hotels as there wasn't enough space in either and had a bit of a nap. 
i had a quick shower and then headed off to the tourism department to inquire about their half day tours, then onto the post office where i was jostled and pushed while i tried to buy stamps.  i had a quick look at their stamp collection and then ran into amg.  we had lunch together and then spent the afternoon separately.  i wandered the city centre until i'd had enough of the noise and the people and then found a nearby park.  i relaxed and wrote in my journal and was left almost completely alone for a change :-)
en route back to the hotel, i got stopped every 500m or so by an indian man who wanted to know about canada or wanted to show me his artwork or wanted to read my horoscope, etc...  i'd get rid of one of them and then 100m, another one would start chatting with me.  it was ever so annoying as in the end, despite all of their protestations that they don't want to sell you anything, they all eventually would start their sales pitch, about 2-5mins into the conversation.  there was only one exception to this rule and i ended up having tea with him later that evening ;-)
i had a quick but fantastic dinner, some tea with this gentleman and then headed off to the hotel for bed.  the gent invited me to his place to make sweets with some other foreigners however i just wasn't certain enough about him to embark on the adventure.  possibly i missed out, possibly i didn't. 
 

into the desert...

our first day in jaiselmer was spent doing those important things we haven't had the time to do as yet; email, laundry, journal, etc...  it was a pretty low-key day which resulted in amg spending a fortune in a leather goods shop and me talking on skype to some lucky folks back home :-)  in addition, we booked ourselves onto a 2-day/1night camel safari leaving the next morning!!

i woke after a fantastic night's sleep and went to rouse amg to see the sunrise on the jaiselmer fort however she'd come down with delhi belly and declined so i wandered the quiet streets at 6:30am with the cows, dogs and the occasional shopkeeper.  i arrived at the fort however had time to kill as the sun wasn't rising as yet so i bought some chai tea and a small loaf of bread and watched the world wake up.  it was a peaceful affair!  chai finished, i headed into the fort for the morning light on the yellow bricks and i was definitely not disappointed ;-)  i wandered the fort until i ran out of time and had to head back to meet our camel safari tour group.

it was an intimate tour with only me, amg and the two camel herders on the tour!  we mounted our seated beasts and then slowly leaned forward then backwards as the camels raised themselves off the ground.  it's quite amazing to actually watch a camel raise itself from the lying position ;-)  once settled, we started on our journey.   our first stop was the kings' cenatophs about 6km outside of jaisalmer where we stopped to take pictures. from there, we headed to a couple of lesser sites, had lunch and then wandered through the desert on camel back.  by about hour 3 on camelback, i was a bit over camel riding, particularly since i had a sore butt, the sun was ridiculously strong and there was no escaping it!!   in addition, the desert didn't quite live up to my expections as it wasn't nearly as barren as i'd expected; there were small shrubs and trees which didn't fit my image ;-( 

we arrived at a pretty sandy spot around 6pm and set up camp which effectively meant removing the camels' load and gathering some firewood.  amg and i took some silhouette photos of the sunset with the camels and our camel herder before we settled down to have dinner and relax for the evening.  we slept out under the stars which was a cool experience however whoever attempts to convince you that sleeping on sand is comfortable hasn't done it ;-)

we rose the next morning and headed off again by camel, passing a small village and a temple en route.  we settled for lunch and then had our siesta before we were collected by a jeep who took us to the sam sand dunes to watch the sunset.  we arrived around 3:30pm and watched as the masses of buses, cars and jeeps arrived as we approached the sun-setting hour.  the dunes were absolute madness with large amounts of people, camels and hawkers selling cold drinks and chips - it was definitely not a tranquil setting!!  i'd hoped that the sun would light the sand before setting however it didn't so we just watched the sunset with everyone else and then quickly departed in hopes of beating the rush!!

our final day in jaisalmer involved a complete tour of the fort, some jain temples and more photos.  i'd considered heading off to a ghost town about 25km out of town but was pretty worn out from the camel trek, etc...  we headed off to the train station for our overnight train to jaipur and well, we had a bit of an incident involving our train tickets which i'll share next time ;-)

 

hugs to all!

s

mumbai and udaipur...

we woke early to meet up with some bollywood folks and head over to elephanta island.  that said, amg wasn't feeling 100% and couldn't attend so michael and i headed over to the gateway to meet with the others but no one else arrived...  i'm guessing they were all suffering from mild hangovers ;-)  the boat ride was about an hour long and we chatted, observed the fluorescent film on the water and watched mumbai disappear into the haze as we got further and further away.

we arrived at the island and had a tour of this fantastic cave dedicated to shiva, an indian god.  the carvings were absolutely beautiful, depicting shiva in a number of different tales however many of the sculptures were ruined by the portugese who reportedly used the sculptures for target practise.  from there, we checked out the three lesser caves and started heading back to the docks to catch a boat.  luckily, we passed amg en route into the complex as we had to head to mumbai to catch our flight to udaipur.  

an hour long taxi ride to the airport later, we arrived at the airport with a little over an hour to spare before we caught our flight.  i'd booked all of the flights after our all-nighter and unfortunately, one of the flights/airlines i'd written down had to be changed as it was sold out however i didn't write down the new airline.  as such, we arrived at the kingfisher terminal and were informed that there was no flight at 4:50pm and no one could advise where a close internet cafe was so i could check to see which terminal/airline we were flying.  midly panicked, we managed to get some assistance from a kingfisher employee who checked the computer and then walked us to the correct terminal and checked us in.  i was overjoyed to get to the right terminal with time to spare before our flight!  that sorted, we kicked back and relaxed until take-off!!

we arrived in udaipur, caught a taxi into the city and found a place to sleep and eat before we headed off to bed.  i was up at the crack of dawn to update my emails while amg slept in.  from there, we went out to breakfast with these two guys we met in the hotel and then we headed off with a rickshaw driver for the day to see the sights.  we started in a garden above the city to see the two palaces in the lake.  then we headed off to a local market, then to some cenetophs which were beautiful, some more gardens, a couple of shops (amg spent a fortune ;-) and then he dropped us off at the city palace & museum. 

the museum was nothing short of madness!!  we had to queue to buy the tickets and then we had to queue to get in the main entrance and then we had to queue every time we changed rooms and on and on and on...  i can't say that i have ever attended a museum (or any event for that matter) which was more clausterphobic instigating than this!!  all we both wanted to do after the second room was leave but you had no choice but to keep walking forward through these stuffy, non-ventillated corridors with a million of your closest indian friends, hoping to get to the end!!  i can't say that we appreciated much of the palace museum because of the quantity of people and the overwhelming heat - it certainly was an experience!!!  outside, we had a very expensive bottle of water and waited for the sun to lower so that we could take some photos.

we had dinner at a rooftop restaurant (every restaurant in udaipur is a rooftop restaurant, met a canadian ;-) and then headed back to the hotel to collect our bags before our night bus to jaiselmeer.  the bus trip was 12 hours in duration and for some of the trip (udaipur to jodphur), we'd booked ourselves into single sleepers.  effectively, this means sleeping in a tiny, narrow, clausterphobic compartment above a seat which wasn't long enough for me to stretch out without hitting either end of the compartment.  i got lucky and ended up over the back wheel of the bus so that i was jostled throughout the entire night.  this, coupled with the cold and the constant musical horn made sleeping slightly difficult to say the least ;-)   

we stumbled into jaisalmeer exhausted, filthy dirty and hungry around 10am the next morning.  from there, you'll have to wait for the next posting ;-)

hugs to all!

s

 

p.s.  i'm not sure exactly why but i'm being asked to stand in photos quite frequently with the indian people.  on our tour of udaipur, i ended up in four different family photos...  i'm pondering agreeing to be photographed for a fee of 5 rupees, just to see their reaction :-)