Home again

Well, that was the quickest three weeks I can recall, but alas all good things must end, and we need to return to reality and start paying of the bar tabs from all the hotels we have stayed at (which are lengthy!!). India was amazing, and I have learnt many things which I will try and summarise now.

 

General 

1. The only rule to driving in India is to beep your horn frequently to let lorries, pedestrians and cows know you are there.

2. Indian people like having family photos taken with Westerners - it is not as creepy as it sounds!

3. Indian people are possibly the friendliest people I have ever met! 

4. Cows do not hurry when crossing a *major* roads, they know their sacredness!

5. A dosa is the perfect way to start the day, they are a lovely breakfast pancake!

Delhi

1. Delhi mosquitoes are dirty and love biting Sarah!

2. You can get on a train to Agra without your passport (although probably best not to risk it!)
3. The Spice Route's wine list prices are enough to scare the bejesus out of most folk!

Entrance to the restaurant with most expensive Thai meal I will ever have!

Agra

1. The Taj Mahal is as impressive as people say!

2. It closes on a Friday though, and so the whole area goes into shut down with very little open!
3. Avil is great at taking down the swelling of infected mosquito bites!

I like this - Happy hour is 1 for 1!! :D

Jaipur

1. Elephant skin is not as rough as you would imagine!
2. The Palace of the Winds is not some famous Jaipur Curry House

Winner of the smallest toilet flush handle 2015

Jodhpur
1. When it is hot in Jodhpur it is HOT! bring trousers and shirts made of ice!!
2. If you are going to stay in Jodhpur, then you can't go far wrong with the Raas, a wonderful boutique hotel, with very impressive Fort views.

I love the way Indians name their shops - zero ambiguity!

Udaipur
1. Octopussy is always on TV at some point during the day when you are staying at the Lake Palace.

2. Don't wake Sarah up early in the morning to go on a cycle ride of the old city.

Lady delivering us our curry at the Lake Palace ;)

Goa

1. Egrets are fun, and will eat a surprising amount of different nibbles!

2. A meal at Vernon's bar on the beach is about a tenth of the price of that at Leela.

3. There are an insane amount of Dentists in Goa.

Our Egret stalker.....he was never far away from us

That is about all there is to say for this tour. Sarah and I have had a lovely time, seen seven world heritage sites, stayed at some amazing hotels, and basked in the Indian weather (for the most part!). I hope you have enjoyed following along! Take care until next time.

Sunsets and Kingfishers = Heaven

Jodhpur - The Blue City

After a relatively peaceful night (there are town-based monkeys which decided to howl and make loads of noise in the early hours), we were up nice and early looking to have a bit of a tour of Jodhpur.

This is by far and away the hottest we have been on the holiday so far. We were dining in the hotel last night and at 8:30pm the temperature was still 33 degrees. There was a whole lot of sweating going on, and to dispel a myth, eating a hot curry did not cool this blogger down, it just made me sweat in a different way!! However, it is slightly churlish of me to be complaining about the heat, especially as that is one of the reasons we came to India, but this is probably the hottest I have been since Luxor.

The roof terrace of our hotel, who would want to go anywhere else!

....and the view of the Fort from our room - heavenly!

 

OK, today we have had an early morning tour of Jodhpur, taking us to the impressive fort we can see out of our window (Mehrangarh Fort). Jodhpur is known as the blue city because in the old city particularly, large sections of the housing is all painted blue. Our guide was very good at explaining  why they people did this. There are two competing theories 1) It is to do with Brahmins (priest caste, which is the highest caste in Hinduism) wanting to differentiate themselves from other, lower castes and 2) The blue buildings have helped to keep away the bugs and flies. Whether there is scientific proof of this, I don't really know, but I can confirm that we have not been bitten half as much as we were when we were staying in Delhi! Although that might be down to the large number of bats that are flying around our hotel at night rather than the blue colour!!

Jodhpur - the blue city, as seen from the fort.

Anyway, we wound our way up to the fort, but before going there we visited a mausoleum for the maharajahs, which is on the way. This was called Jaswant Thada (which translates roughly as Jaswant's mausoleum), and it was built using the white marble akin to the mausoleums in Agra. Bearing in mind that sort of marble doesn't exist around the local area, it was being shipped from Jaipur it was a seriously logistical exercise to get enough marble here to build this mausoleum, so we were impressed - as well as with the detailing! There were a couple of men in full dress dotted about the place, who when seeing a tourist began playing music (in the expectation of getting a few rupees). I do love this sort of thing so was very happy to part with some lower denominational notes for taking their pictures (after asking first of course!).

Jaswant Thada, very intricate and fit for a king (which was handy!)

Man blowing his own trum-erm-flute

Wonderful sounds of India at Jaswant Thada

From the mausoleum we made a short trip further up the cliff to the fort, which we had seen on our first night from the hotel room. The guide explained that the fort stands over 400 metres above the city and gives an impressive and imposing view of the city! We made our way around the various rooms, enjoying our  guides narration, as he loved saying "the ladies" (or more precisely I loved the way he said it!), and we saw lovely silks, some beautifully ornate rooms where "the ladies" would entertain the maharajah, and a few elephant carriages (that is saddles for people, not a carriage for elephants!).

Mehrangarh Fort, as viewed from Jaswant Thada

Mehrangarh Fort, impressive!

Place where "the ladies" entertained the maharajah - no wives allowed apparently!

Tiny wedding carriage. The guide explained that brides always fit in it before marriage, but not after!!

Man showing me how big his turban was.....

The temperature walking around the palace was insanely hot this morning, and according to the man in the shop I was changing some currency at, it was over 43 degrees today and so this really sapped our energy. It meant that we didn't have the guided tour of the old city, but instead we just retired to the sanctuary of the pool, which was a welcome relief!

Later that afternoon, while Sarah was having an afternoon nap (I think she got a touch of heat exhaustion), I walked down to the old city to have a look at the market there. It was all very reminiscent of Marrakesh for me, but a lot less intensive with trying to sell you things. Indian people are friendly and respectful, if they see you lingering over their shop they will invite you in, but there is no real hard sell in the market. It was similar in other ways too, namely the narrow labyrinthine streets, which you could easily get lost in, if you didn't have a reference point. Thankfully I did (it was the old clock tower). I didn't buy anything from the market, partly because we didn't need any more mangoes or children's plastic cricket bats, but mainly because our baggage limit for the internal flights we are undertaking in a couple of days is already at breaking point!!

The clock tower, which is the central point of the market

Anyway, that is Jodhpur done, although I could have quite easily stayed at that hotel for a couple of days more. But time is pressing, and tomorrow we start making our way down to Udaipur, stopping off at another former hunting lodge at a village called Narlai on our way.

National Lampoon's Indian Vacation

Short post today, as not much has happened. Well apart from leaving the plane tickets for Udaipur to Mumbai and Mumbai to Goa in a safe in Jaipur that is!!! I put them in the safe to make sure they were, erm, safe! I can't quite believe it really, but it wouldn't be a Mouseburger blog if it all went smoothly. Anyway, I have spoken to the hotel we were staying at in Jaipur, and they have sent me faxed copies on email, which my current hotel has kindly printed out for me, so I am hoping that covers us really, as they are just e-tickets.

We have had a bit of a lay in this morning, which was a welcome relief from the early starts, although that said, my body clock woke me up at 5:30am as I could hear all the birds singing. I haven't got much to write about as we have done little today apart from being in the car for about 4 hours driving from Bijaynagar to Jodhpur.

The journey is long and there were the usual cow obstacles to contend with and the occasional herd of goats, but otherwise it was a drive through the Rajasthani countryside. Some things have changed though, there are more hills to negotiate and drive over and there is a strong wind blowing across the open expanses.

For a while I worried that the wind meant we would be greeted with a Gambia weather scenario (see the Gambia blog) when we got to Jodhpur, but these fears were soon allayed when we stopped off for a comfort break and I opened the car door to be blasted with a wind which could have come from the fires of hell!! It was scorching out there, and I had been lulled into a false sense of security, even thinking it a bit chilly in the air conditioned car we were driving around in!!

 To help pass the time when driving (Sarah was having an in car snooze) I started looking at the shop signage as we were driving along, and I noticed a curious thing. Cement is big business in India. I guess when we want cement, we just pop to B&Q or Homebase, but in India there is a whole gamut of choice. I then started doing an Eye-Spy of cement brands I could see advertised to help pass the time on the journey. There is Wonder Cement, UltraTech cement, Bangur cement, Rockstrong cement, Jaypee cement, ACC cement, Lakshmi cement and Ambuja cement. There is a hell of a lot of building and development going on around India from what I have seen, so I guess cement is big business here!

Finally, we approached Jodhpur where we met up with our local contact (Singh), who had a most impressive handlebar moustache! He was very enthusiastic about Jodhpur and welcomed us to the city and explained what we were going to get up to in our time here.

We are staying in the old part of Jodhpur at a boutique hotel called the Raas Haveli which has views of the fort. I have to say this place is spectacular, we have a balcony overlooking the fort, and the room is superbly cool, which is a relief as the days here are just getting hotter and hotter (42 degrees)!! This is definitely one of those hotels rooms which you will always remember, it is that plush (we even have a bath which has views of the Fort!). Anyway other than settling in, we have done very little after getting to Jodhpur apart from dipping in the pool and drinking beer!

I will however give you a couple of snaps, to whet your appetite. 

View of the Fort from our room

The Fort at night from the Roof bar! I will never forget this view!

Tomorrow we do a proper tour of the city, so we will need be mindful and pack plenty of water as it is supposed to be even hotter again!