On saturday evening we met all of our group that we'll be spending 15days with, we were surprised at how many ages and nationalities there were...2 danish girls, a norwegian couple, a Finnish couple, a Canadian couple and their 15 year old son, an English girl and an Australian girl. We're actually surprisingly gettin on best with the family and the Australalian girl, everyone else is very different but it should be a good couple of weeks. We went for dinner in Delhi and then we had to get up at 4.30 to get a train to Jaipur the next morning.

So Sunday was an early start, when we got to the train station the floors were lined with people sleeping there - not sure if that's where they sleep all of the time but must be so uncomfortable. It was so dirty and the smells were awful but the train was actaully really good, got free breakfast and Chai tea which is so sweet but yummy. It was so nice to get to Jaipur, it's still very busy and hectic but in a different way. It's the pink city so the main street is all painted terracota colour. There is less traffic but the drivers are still crazy! We got tuktuks in to the centre and saw the pink palace which is a really impressive building in in the centre of the old town. In the evening we went for dinner at this 300 year old colonial hotel which was so cool although very quiet.

Monday was such a good day, we spent it in Jaipur again. We got tuktuks again to the Amber Fort/Palace which was built in three sections - the oldest was built in the 15th century and the newest in the 17th century. On the way we saw a headless dog lying on the road which was awful, surprised we haven't seen more crashes and fatalities though, the animals and people risk their lives dodging the traffic! We walked 20 minutes up to it, although we could have got elephants up there. They still use elephants as transport around the city, and camels which is so so strange to see amongst the cars and mopeds..some mercedes around too! The fort was amazing, such intricate details where the Kings used to live. The women used to get carried around in chairs by their maids as their jewellery weighed 10kg!!

We then went to see how they made block printed fabric and how they made rugs. On the way we were literally SO close to hitting a cow, seriously lucky. In Jaipur they just herd in the middle of the roads, there are so many and they're worse than the dogs at getting in the way! We watched a man who was making a rug, so clever, there were loads of strings in this wooden frame, a bit like a harp kind of, and he knotted each bit of coloured string a cut it, so the one he was making had millions of knots and will take him a year and a half to complete - the huge ones can take 3 years!! Jo bought a very small one and I bought a silk and kashmir pashmina :). Then we went to see a family-run jewellers where they made all of their jewellery with soo many jems, it was really expensive but good to see. Jaipur is surprisingly dirty, there are piles of rubbish every 50 metres along the roads at the side where people just empty their rubbish, the animals then just eat what they can to survive. What is crazy is that people just go to the loo anywhere, on the roads..anywhere so weird, that's why it smells so awful everywhere. It was the festival for women on Monday so all the women were wearing the most beautiful saris, oranges, yellows pinks! We went up to this temple at the top of the city to watch to sunset which was amazing too.

We had to get up at 4.30 again to get a train to Agra on Tuesday. When we got there we went to see the Agra fort which was kind of similar to the fort in Jaipur, it overlooked the Taj Mahal but was built 100years before. Then we walked to the Taj Mahal, it took a while to get in and there were hardly any Westerners again - even there, so of course everyone just stares at you and we probably got asked 20 times if people could take our picture, we said yes when it was with kids, but not with the weird Indian men lol! It was the most majestic building I've ever seen, literally incredible, so symetrical and white, even after 300years. The story behind how it's built is lovely too - a king built it after his wife died in childbirth with their 14th child. She made him make 3 promises, not to marry again, to look after their children and to built an amazing landmark that people will visit for centuries!! We went inside it and then watch the sun set over it and took lots of photos!! An amazing day!

We've got an 8am train to Orchha on Wednesday, so much more peaceful there! We're staying in Tents but they're air con and beds and a bathroom so just a room really, the resort has a pool though, so we spent the afternoon just relaxing by the pooland then watched the sunset over the river :)! We're all going to watch the prayers at the temple in a bit and then get dinner somewhere. Getting the sleeper train tomorrow evening (Thurs) to Varanassi!!