Palace – Benny & Bessy's Travels from 2021 and Samson & Suzi's European Travels 2016-2020…… (as named by Jack Spencer)

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.

Visit to a hand block printing shop, where I confess, I did purchase a tablecloth or two….well, they are stunning!

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

Saturday morning, up early, train to catch, you know – the one that took 2 hours to get a ticket for! Tuktuk to the station, ignoring the hassle from porters, went to go through a luggage scanner , “where’s your tickets please?” David looks at me, I look at him. Don’t you have it? No, don’t you? So backtracking to 24 hours ago, I do remember putting the printed ticket “safely” inside a zipped pocket so we search two rucksacks, in plain sight of 20 people queueing behind us, no ticket. FFS, (David mutters) I’m gonna have to empty the suitcases to find it…..10 minutes later, still no ticket, we learn that our train has been delayed by 6 hours anyway! The security man recommends a travel agency not so far away, it’s the only one open as today is a bank holiday, and he chucks us into another tuktuk, telling us to buy a ticket for the next train out, in 2 hours, maybe…. we just about manage to wedge 2 big suitcases, 2 rucksacks and 2 bodies into a tuktuk, my legs are hanging out the side, and off we go.

So the Official Government Travel Agency is blessed with a friendly man called Iffy ?. After listening to David bemoaning his secretary whilst trying to rifle through the suitcase again , spilling toiletries all over the office floor, Iffy offers us a cup of coffee, bottle of water and a seat and says “let me help you.”
Two hours later, after confirming that he cannot reprint our tickets (office closed) and the day’s next 4 trains are full, and we are MAD to try to “wing it” with our travel bookings, we plot out an itinerary with him that involves hiring a driver and guides in Rajasthan (the busiest and most complicated area) then trains and flights down the west coast, we pay him and are bundled into a car with Raj and begin our 3 hour journey to Agra.

David struggled with this plan but it proved that we are wet behind the ears simple tourists in a manic foreign country who know nothing, yet! Iffy is convinced that after 6 weeks with Raj we will be much wiser, ha ha ha…….

Short roadside break to watch goats and herons.

Our planned itinerary is for 12 weeks where we end up in Goa in time to meet with some friends Carol and Steve, who we met in Jamaica a few years ago! It was our original plan to head south to Goa and Iffy gently suggested a few more stops en route.

Raj dropped us at our hotel about 5pm and said to our horror, “see you at 6.30am, best time to visit the Taj Mahal!!” That evening, after unpacking our bags, guess what we find in an actual handbag, zipped internal pocket, our train ticket!!! It’s been assigned to the “lets not mention this” pocket of our suitcase!!

As you may have gathered, we are not morning people but understood the importance of avoiding the crowds so at 6.45am we were in the queue, purchasing entry tickets to the most beautiful and famous building in the world. The mist was rising from the River, the full moon was still out as the sun was rising, the monkeys were out playing and the birds were whistling around us. No noisy street vendors, just loud Americans and pushy Japanese, but our guide Yogi was great at noting where we were in the queue for the photographic “hot spots” and made sure that we had plenty of poses taken!

The building is stunning, there is no doubt about that. Perfectly symmetrical, pristine marble with inlaid colour of ebony, ruby, amethyst and amber, every carving is symmetrical, every stone in the footpaths and walls cut by hand. As the sun rose, the colours shone and the marble becomes almost translucent. You can understand why the Emperor Shah Jehan created such a beautiful building in memory of his wife, married at 17, who died giving birth to their 14th child, he must have loved her very much to honour her wish (to be buried in a beautiful shrine) and then eventually be buried there himself. It wasn’t all easy going for him, one of his own sons imprisoned him for 8 years in his own Fort nearby, whilst the finishing touches were made to the building so he could only watch it being completed. A grateful daughter ensured he was buried next to his wife and 18 years after the wife’s death, they were finally moved to a mausoleum within the main building and laid to rest. The gardens and buildings are simply stunning, there are no other words to describe it. Peaceful and calm, even the sound of the train nearby resembled a Buddhist chant, calming and warming.

We left the Taj Mahal 3 hours later for a much needed breakfast!

WARNING – WE ARE NOT AT OUR BEST PHOTOGENICALLY, AT 7AM. ?