Jaipur

Next up, Jaipur, a big, pink city. We had two nights in out hotel here, arriving late evening and leaving early morning a few days later for Agra, via Fatepur Sikri. The hotel was an in an old builing, so the room had a bit of character (and the usual head injury risk for me), but it had only just opened, and we were the only diners in the posh and newly fitted out dining room that night (apart from the occasional visit from our driver so he could drop hints about things). The hotel was nice but plagued by mysterious water and internet stoppages.

On our day in Jaipur we first went to the Amber fort, which was actually just outside the city, stopping for a photo opportunity by a palace in the middle of a small lake on the way. The amber fort was quite impressive, with fortifications extending over nearby ridges reminiscent of the great wall of China (photo 1 is the view from the fort). While the defences and scale were pretty impressive, the decoration inside didn't compete with Bikaner or Jodhpur forts we'd already seen (although see photo 2 of Sarah by the mirror palace (Shish Mahal)). We decided to walk up the hill to it, rather than trouble an elephant to carry us. After the informative audio guides that were included in the Jodhpur fort and the National museum in Dehli I decided to get an audio guide here (an audio guide being an electronic thing you hold with headphones, it plays a pre-recorded description when you reach a point of interest). Well I don't know if there was just less interesting things to say, but I was disappointed! It droned on and on with various different voices, and was prone to anthropomorphising various parts of the palace. ("I am the great geat of the Amber fort, so many great armies have I seen ...over long trumpet call... but now let me hand you back to shugghi, who was a guards here 500 years ago...." No thanks!). I can't quite remember the details, but there were ramps all around the palace, I think this was so that the queens (there were 9 of them, plus concubines) could be wheeled around as they couldn't walk when they were dressed in their finest finery!

The way back to town was punctuated by a stop for a photo opportunity in front of the "Bagpiper english wine-shop" and a trip to an extortionate craft shop for tourist that we agreed to go to for our driver as he admitted he got some sort of comission (it seemed most people go to a lot more of these!). We had the driver drop us and made our own way around Jaipur as we were trying to be more independent by this point. We first went for lunch, in a place memorable for being about the only time India I saw "glamorous" women (appart from the ubiquitous pictures of bollywood actresses in any paper). Anyway, I digress.... went up a big minaret thing affrording great views accross thr city. We then went to the Jantar Mantar, an ancient observatory built by one of the Mughal emperors (see photos). The english captions on the instruments were minimal, but I found it very interesting and so different from everything else we saw. Sarah found it a bit, in her words, " another restaurant for tea before getting an autorickshaw back to the hotel. Walking to the restuber-boring". The palace/museum we went to afterwards was a bit samey after previous palaces and museums, it had a large selection of weapons, and some very impressive minature painting, but by this point we had walked a very long way that day. We headed toaurant we walked along a huge street lined with sari shop after sari shop. Thankfully these were not aimed at tourists so hassle was minimal!