Category: Travel (Page 8 of 21)

Of course it’s an everyday event, out walking on an evening stroll, colourful event passes by, it can only be a groom on his white stallion, heading to his wedding. What else?? Surrounded by a dozen brightly dressed men carrying umbrellas lit with coloured flashing lights, a troupe of dancing women and an even more colourful loud band. Of course its normal…..We were both invited to dance with the ladies, but kindly declined, didn’t want to show off our flamenco skills ?.

Jaipur, was named the Pink City when it was painted pink (the colour of Indian hospitality) in 1876 in honour of a visit by the Prince of Wales and Queen Victoria.

More than 150 years on, its now only got what you would call a pinky orange hue amongst the dirt and debris in this busy city. It is a walled city, established in 1690, the walls were to protect it from enemies and wild animals. Now its 7 gates cause huge bottlenecks as people, bikes, motorbikes, taxis, tuktuks and busses try to get through the tight single vehicle archway, all honking at the same time! Traffic moves eventually but whilst stationary, vehicles and their passengers are bombarded with requests to buy teatowels, coconuts, trinkets or donate cash to beggars who won’t take “no” for an answer!

Our first stop was to a temple just outside the city called the Monkey temple. It involved a gentle climb up a ravine passing several smaller temples and natural pools created by mountain water. At the top, in the very small temple, is an image in the rock that looked like a monkey a few 100 yeats ago, especially now the monkey has been painted on! The idea is to be blessed in this temple (for good health), jump into the pool outside, go to the next (elephant) temple, be blessed for happiness and jump into the 2nd pool outside, then go to the last temple, for all the gods, be fully blessed and jump into the last pool. I participated in the final blessing only, the man inside was patient and explained everything but kindly declined a swim in the murky green pools!

We checked into our hotel in Jaipur, a 5star Heritage hotel, full of marble floors, wooden furniture and smart staff. This is our first “expensive “ hotel, others have been 3 star, but this was recommended to us. I must say that our version of 3 star and 5 star vary differently to the Indian versions ?. A wooden 4 poster bed, large shower, western toilet with toilet paper are great but the window was sellotaped shut, the view was almost blocked off with the external plaster decoration as you can see below, the nets were so heavy and the room was shaded and was definitely on the 5 star level that we are used to! We have requested a balcony at our next hotel, we need some sunlight on our skin and fresh air in our room, albeit dusty air!

We spent the morning at the 17th century Amber fort, high up on a hill. It was built as a palace surrounded by a fortified town. The walls of the fortification are still visible on the mountains, as are the older and original buildings used by the royal family before the Fort was built. Its large, impressive, ornate in places and was well used in its time. Elephants were used to ferry visitors up to its gates, still in operation today for lazy tourists. We walked up, fascinated by the interior decoration, which is often described as “romantic”…….”interestingly built and beautifully decorated” would be our description.

Next was the Maharaja’s burial place, a peacefully cool structure, made up of three different areas, we had no guide here so couldn’t work out whose mausoleum belonged to who, the link between information + tourism = more tourists + more income has yet to be made! However it was beautiful and cool on a sunny afternoon and the carvings on the marble were exquisite.

That evening we ate Italian!!!!! Staying in hotels has it’s downside, the hotel menus cater for tourists and offer the same things, so we were getting a little tired of chicken tikka, masalas and biryanis. David found a restaurant called Little Italy, totally vegetarian but we had the most divine meal – and huge portions!!! Bruschetta and garlic mushrooms to start, pesto pasta, pizza and the most unusual salad ever, it came with a bowl of mixed leaves, tomatoes and dressing, and then a plate of grilled asparagus (my favourite), roasted tomato, ravioli parcels, crostini and parmesan chips!!!! AND balsamic vinegar, no curry spices in sight or smelling range! Ohhh, did I mention they served WINE too? We were heavenly stuffed that night ??

Afterwards we took a tuktuk back to the hotel, in what the owner called “a poorly machine”, he had to get out and push start it and kept revving it as we came to a junction….he so wanted our custom that he kept telling us it was “fine now” and how he was a “careful driver” which he was. It was a colourful journey at night, the city’s Albert Hall museum was awash with colour as was the Wind Palace, and the market streets, even at 11pm.

Next day was a full day in the city. Firstly we visited the City Palace which is still in use by the current royal family. Its a complex of courtyards, buildings and gardens, enlarged over the past 100 years but still in keeping with the Mughal architecture. On close inspection, certain areas were lacking attention to the deterioration, i will inform Her Maj. The Throne Room was lavishly decorated, still used when dignitaries (such as The Strattons) visit or during festivals, sadly no photos allowed, Her Maj was having a bad hair day.

Next to it are gardens called Jantar Mantar (such lovely words, David kept saying it over and over), gardens created in 1728 that look like a collection of odd structures but they are in fact buildings to measure astronomical time, date, latitude and longitude and the position of stars and the solar system. Its name is Sanskrit for “instruments of calculations” which is exactly what we found. Could not figure out why so many, or who thought them up, I’m sure Mr Google would confirm.

We fought our way through several streets of traders to enter the rear of the Wind Palace (Hawa Mahal), we actually thought we were lost so we followed a group of Indians who finally found the entrance! What’s wrong with doors off the main drag???
This was to be worth the subterfuge, this gem of a building was so beautiful, almost fairytale in its design. It was constructed in 1799 by the Maharaja to allow his Royal ladies to look out onto the world and watch the activities below. The honeycomb windows, made of pink sandstone are, in certain areas, filled with coloured glass, but the designs allowed wind to blow through, doing away with the need for water to cool interior rooms. It would have been an issue to pump it to the top of the 5 floors so the natural wind solved the problem. Both during the day and at night, its a pretty stunning building!

Finally we visited another temple on a hill, sat amongst the more modern part of town, glass office buildings surrounded by hoardings advertising health care or private schools. The temple was once again a chilled marble building, peace amongst the chaos, beautifully carved marble pillars and cornices.
Jaipur is another chaotic city that has lost it’s colour but hasn’t lost its vibrancy.

Next stops – Pushkar & Jodhpur