The camel is a symbol of love. Really??!!!
So now it was time for our 2 week tour of Rajasthan. It is the end few weeks of the tourist season before the really hot weather sets in. We were lucky as it was hot but bearable if we stayed under shade in the afternoons for a few hours. We had booked this part of our trip through a company as although we like to travel independently, the cities are so far apart that we thought it was better to have the same driver and use a travel company's expertise for accommodation and itinerary.. It all worked out very well. Initially, we weren't sure about our driver, Banwari, as he was older than we expected and fairly quiet but he redeemed himself with some interesting stops and his driving was as fine as any Indian driver's can be on these lunatic roads. Our route was Delhi, Jaipur, Pushkar, Udaipur, Jodphur to Jaisalmer (2000kms) returning to Jaipur by night train and spending our final night in the fairy tale palace of Samode. As time went by we were captivated by the people, the forts, the palaces and the vibrancy of Rajasthan. It definitely worked its magic on us! As the scenery becomes more arid and dry,the level of beautiful craftsmanship from the artisans seems to increase but so does the pressure to buy. Still, never seen such beautiful coloured textiles and miniature paintings.
The Pink City, Jaipur, is the capital of Rajasthan. It is very busy and congested with lorries, cars, motorbikes, autos, cycle rickshaws, camel and bullock carts and the normal melange of cows, pigs, dogs and people. The old city is full of bazaars. Feel it should be called the Terracotta City as that is a more accurate description of the colour of its city stone. My initial lukewarm reaction to the city was blown away the next day when we visited the Hawai Mahal 'the Palace of the Winds' (the 5 storey narrow palace with sandstone carved panels for the royal ladies to gaze at life outside the palace without being seen) and the City Palace still lived in by the 15 year old Maharaja with its beautiful courtyards and gardens. One inner courtyard has 4 gates to represent the seasons - the magnificent Peacock Gate stands for autumn. The royal public halls are fantastic to visit. The Hall of Public Audience has 2 huge silver vessels used to hold sacred water from the Ganges and the Welcome Palace now houses a collection of costumes. While in one of these royal rooms, we came across a group of ladies chanting in preparation for the Gaugaur festival taking place that night. I was soon invited to sit with them, to cover my head with a sari and to copy their prayer ritual. Think it was because l was dressed in pink which our guide said was the colour for women for the festival as they didn't invite any of the other foreign women! Or maybe l looked the most gullible as they whispered donation, donation to me as l got up!!! We also visited the Jantar Mantar, a astronomical observatory resembling bizarre sculpture with its massive sundials and other instruments. Then it was off to visit the massive Amber Fort, 11 kms away. We started in the temple and were soon garlanded and red dotted. The royal rooms with their mirror work, inlaid panels and mosaics were beautiful. It was fun exploring all the hidden corridors in the zenana (the women's quarters) designed so that the maharaja could visit a wife or concubine without the others realising!!! On the drive back to town we stopped by a large lake and again l was approached to dance with some women going to their temple for the same festival. It must have been my pink top!!! I did my best and loved being swept along by these joyous women. Quick visits to see semi -precious gems being polished and block printing on cotton rounded off our tour. That night, we went into the city to watch the procession for the Gangaur festival, honouring the goddess, Gauri, one of the manifestations of Lord Shiva's wife. Women dress in their pink finery and pray for their husbands!!!! (Not sure about that one!) A temple priest invited us onto the rooftop of his temple to watch as the procession passed beneath us. It was an hour of wonderful colour and spectacle with decorated dancers, musicians, horses, camels, an elephant and thousands of brightly dressed families lining the streets. Fell in love with it all that night. Rounded it off with a meal on the rooftop of the Pearl Palace Hotel, followed by a cycle rickshaw ride back to our hotel where a Rajasthan puppet snow was taking place. Perfect day!
Pushkar- what a peculiar place! Only 15,000 people but probably another couple of thousand cows, wild pigs and dogs all living around a lake which was where Brahma, the cosmic spirit, dropped a lotus flower. Yes, this is now my daily vocabulary. Now the lake is lined with bathing ghats where devotees bathe and offer prayers and many bogus holy men try and entice foreigners to buy flowers and threaded bracelets in return for prayers to keep your family safe and successful. The foreigners look as if many of them have been here for years with dreadlocks, tattoos and an air of lethargy. Meat and alcohol are banned in the town but apparently you can buy bhang (cannabis). Could explain some of the lethargy. There are lots of rooftop restaurants and cafes and so many tourist shops. Lots of tribal people come in from the desert and sell crafts on the street. The town prohibits cars but you have to be wary of the speeding motorbikes and cows when they start running!!! The town is packed during the annual camel fair in January.
We stayed in an old Maharaja's Palace on the edge of the lake. Fantastic old building with original photos of hunting parties and elephant processions. The staff were relaxed which is a polite way of saying could do better. We had a lovely thali on the rooftop restaurant of a boutique hotel, Seventh Heaven and could hear the loud music coming from one of the temples, followed by fireworks.
Our next stop after a 7 hour drive was Udaipur. We stopped en route at a village in the desert and saw all the women harvesting wheat in the fields. They protect their livestock at nights from panthers with thorny branches. We had chai with an ex Indian Army man and his 4 sons who seemed to all be relaxing while their wives toiled away!!!! There was a lot of road construction and surfacing happening. We passed through a mountain range and saw many marble factories and the resulting lorries packed dangerously full with marble and granite. We stopped near Udaipur at a Vishnu temple full of intricate and beautiful carving in the sandstone. I was very taken with the daughter of the caretaker of the temple who had the most beautiful smile and rewarded me with that when l gave her some stickers l had. Udaipur is absolutely stunning. We stayed in a small haveli (traditional house) with views of Lake Pichola. The lake has 2 islands, one is now the very exclusive Lake Palace hotel where Octop**** (James Bond) was filmed. It used to be the maharaja's summer palace and the other also a former royal palace, Jamandir Island is a hotel and restaurant which we visited by boat. We ate and drank in lovely rooftop spaces.It was easy to wander around the city and the shops were great. Found a wonderful old haveli packed full of textiles and bought some miniature paintings of Rajasthan scenes from a cooperative visited by Bill Clinton!!! So gullible!!!! On our first night, we witnessed Udaipur's version of the Gaugaur festival as pairs of ladies carrying matching male and female dolls dressed in matching costumes, on their heads, walked down to the lake to where the dolls, as idols of deities, are worshipped and water is offered to them. It was a whirl of continuous bowing, flowers, noise and coloured saris. The next day we visited the lovely carved Jagdish temple in the city. It was full of singing women and musicians. The City Palace complex was impressive with its guards in khaki uniforms with brown berets sporting red and orange feathers. It was a pleasing jumble of towers, pillars, balconies, cupolas and coutyards added onto through the years. The rooms are an opulent mix of mirrors, tiles, paintings and artifacts. One gate has a large metal sun, the symbol of the Mewar dynasty and opens onto the lovely Peacock Courtyard with its mosaics. The grand Durbar Hall is a very impressive royal reception area. Saw the tiger cage for any captured tiger and the wall where elephants were made to have tug of wars with their trunks for the amusement of the court. The paintings showed horses wearing elephant masks to try and fool the opposition in battle and elephants brandishing swords in their trunks. All in all a fascinating place.
We left Udaipur and drove westwards towards the desert as the temperature rose. The ground became more shrub like with patches of trees and rocks. We saw less cows and more goats, bullocks and buffalo. I sat on a circular contraction pulled by 2 bullocks that was driving a water wheel as the farmer grinned. We saw a male funeral procession (the deceased still wearing a large turban) en route to the crematorium, and a group of trees, in one village, with hundreds of large bats roosting in them. The visit to the Jain temple of Ranakpur was really interesting. The complex has 29 halls all made of marble with 1,444 pillars all carved differently. It was really beautiful and peaceful inside and a priest blessed us and our family.
We now drove to the Blue City of Jodphur, famous for its polo history and its equestrian trousers! The city is completely dominated by its huge sandstone Mehrangarh fort with the town in a hollow beneath it. You only appreciate the Blue City tag when you view the city from one of the fort's high viewpoints and then see the mass of blue Brahmin (the highest caste - the educated) owned homes. It is an old fashioned bustling Indian city. We stayed in the Pal Haveli, an old house practically next to the clock tower and the bazaar area. The streets were chaotic and dirty so we thankfully escaped at times onto the rooftop of the hotel and watched life unfold below us. It was also a great vantage point for the fireworks on both nights we were there. The second day there was a festival procession so we followed that for a while after we visited the white marble Jaswant Thada, (a Maharaja's memorial), and the fort. We walked up to the fort and took the excellent audio guide tour. We saw 2 beautiful royal audience rooms, displays of elephant howdahs, royal cradles, tents and miniature painting. Kevin had his palm read by the palmist, Mr Sharma who was surprisingly accurate about his personality traits!!! A very poignant sight was the 31 handprints by one of the gates, cof the wives of one maharaja, who had to burn on his pyre when he died. Horrid to imagine their terror as they passed through that gate.
Jaisalmer, the desert Golden City near the Pakistan border is medieval in atmosphere. The fort is a huge complex with many people living and working within its thick walls. We stayed at Nachana Haveli, a 300 year old house just outside the fort. It was wonderful with orange turbaned staff and lots of photos and artifacts. It had a great rooftop restaurant as did the nearby The Trio, complete with turbaned musicians. We visited the nearby Gadi Sagar lake to feed the massive catfish and see the temples, walked all around the fort and then visited 2 havelis just outside. Watched the man with the longest moustache (claimed to be in the Guinness Book of Records) unroll it. Felt it only appropriate that we should ride a camel in this city of thousands of the beasts. My one and only previous experience was in Tunisia in my 20s when I climbed onto a smelly belching and farting camel who kept trying to bite my foot. The horrible experience was compounded by the camel boy trying to take me further than agreed to charge me more. So it was with some in trepidation that we set off by car at 5.15am to drive into the desert. As we stopped on a track in the scrubland, 2 desert boys who looked about 14 and 11, galloped out of the darkness on camels. These were our mounts for the next 2 hours!! My beast was called Rocket but happily showed no explosive tendencies and l loved the experience but don't think the camel is my symbol of love as it is for the people of Rajasthan. Off we sloped to the Sam sand dunes and imagined we were extras in Lawrence of Arabia as we ploughed up and down the dunes. We dismounted to take sunrise photos and walk around and then went to have chai at the boys' camp. A group of these boys camp together with their camels for 9 months of the year and make their living from tourist safaris. They return next month to their villages as the temperatures rise above 50 degrees!!! We saw lots of villages being constructed out of brick as we drove back to the city, goat herds and herders and we stopped at a carved Jain temple.
To round off our Rajasthan sojourn, we spent the night in the majestic Samode Palace, an hour outside Jaipur. This was a welcome break after our 12 hour trip on the Jaisalmer Express train back to Jaipur arriving in the early morning. A former palace, it is now a luxury hotel with all the original furnishings still in the royal rooms.The staff give all the guests a tour of these. A highlight was sitting on our own, drinking gin and tonic in the Maharaja's entertaining room, all the walls intricately painted in blue, green and turquoise, watching the arrival of Indian guests for a private party. There were 2 lovely pools , courtyards and great food. We wandered into Samode village and found a row of blacksmith shops. There was a lakh bangle workshop so spent a happy 20 mins watching and then buying some pretty bangles. We were accompanied by a local boy and couldn't shake him off despite our best efforts. He wanted to sell us some miniature paintings but he was too late as we had already bought our fill of these.
So now, our final week in Agra, Delhi, Amritsar and Shimla in the northern hills approaches. Tune in for the next instalment.... X