Ok ok, still no photos but this time it's actually not my fault- I've tried unsuccessfully twice to upload them in this wee hoaky internet cafe and I keep getting a message about it not working and having to contact the server so unfortunately it will have to wait again....as many indian men in shops say when you try to have your haggle hat on and say a price that they think is too low 'ahh it is not possssible'!so, until I get on the net again I'm afraid words are gonna have to do again!

So anyway, from where we left off last time, so we'd just arrived in Pushkar and although John and Jacquelin were staying in the Seventh Heaven hotel as they'd pre-booked, the only rooms they could offer us there were in the 'budget wing' which was up about 20 flights of stairs and in an annex so decided to stay in the Kanhai Haveli Hotel opposite- pretty basic, but only up about 6 flights of stairs which is a major bonus when carrying all your worldly posessions on your back!We had a tasty spinach pizza and a garlic naan for dinner then early-ish to bed, and we used our mossie nets for the first time as there were quite a few suspicious holes in the wall in our room where there used to be light fixtures... woke up several times in the middle of the night with a proper sweat on, fans don't really cut it in the early indian summer heat but a/c is pretty pricey for cheapies like us so we're having to put up with it!

Anyway, Wednesday was a great day, we had a teeny bit of a lie-in then strolled through the dusty maze of Pushkar's little streets largely unhassled by shop owners and annoying guys wanting to talk with the wanton westerners(a real treat after Delhi!) and (eventually) found Honey & Spice, a lovely little breakfast place in a crumbling old building recommended by our guidebooks of course! Because Pushkar is supposed to be a very holy place for Hindus, there's a ban on all meat in the town as well as eggs and booze (though the skinny little man at our hotel desk informed us when we arrived that if we wanted we could have a 'nice cold Kingfisher'!) and Honey & Spice embraces healthy living wholeheartedly with lots of yummy museli and fruit concoctions ( I had lemon and cinnamon iced tea and brown toast). We shared a table with a lovely woman from Philadelphia called Emily (who is 34 and worked as a photographer for 9 years but looks about 26!) who travelled South East Asia for 6 months 2 years ago so we got lots of tips off her and some good recommendations for places to stay in Jodhpur and Udaipur as she was travellling in the opposite direction to us. We invited her to come with us to see the Brahma temple which is perhaps Pushkar's most famous Hindu temple (and apparently the only Brahma temple going) to escape from two ageing American hippies (one of them had an emboroidered umbrella for no apparent reason and they were in full hippie attire, dreads, piercings the works- and both at least 60!) who had met her in Kerala, and we spent a really nice couple of hours wandering about the little streets and the temple (though we had to go in separately so we didn't have to leave our bags with the dodgy looking 'bag and shoe minders' outside). We shared a drink at Rainbow restaurant (lemon and mint tea, so refreshing) and promised to meet up at the same place for dinner (they'd given us sample forks of their yummy pasta in homemade pesto sauce and it was just too good to ignore), and Jade and I spent the rest of the day walking around the unfortunately empty lake (they've had to drain it as all the fish died so there's only a very little water) and the Ghats (little waterside areas where Hindus make pujas which are offerings to their chosen gods). we also ran into some rather scary looking wild boar and loads of cows as usual!!

Dinner at Rainbow was great, I had the pasta with pesto of course then we all tucked into desserts- hello to the queen for jade- a kind of banana crumble type thing, emily had apple crumble and I had what the waiter described as a 'full power' portion of bannoffee, which was in other words just a massive slab of super sweet banana-y goodness, though I couldn't finish it all due to the large amounts of condensed milk involved!!just as we were finishing up we heard the noise of a band outside the window, and heard them outside our window earlier, we were keen to investigate. As they rounded the corner into view we could see lots of lamps and lots of people, and a horse. so we paid and raced outside to check it out, following the procession through the streets with cameras at the ready. There was also a very dressed up guy on a white horse and lots of people dancing about- we asked one of the crowd and it turned out to be a wedding party!!we followed it all through the town for about half an hour as more and more people joined in with us, and the party stopped every five minutes or so so that the groomsmen and family could dance about indian style- arms everywhere, a real celebration!!we eventually left them as the procession came past our hotel but not before Emily stood in cow poo twice.gross! What a sight to come across though, a real treat and I got some good pictures (that will get put up sooner or later!).

Next morning we were up early to pack then over the Seventh heaven to get our arms henna-ed by a lovely girl from the beauty parlor down the road who was very skilled but unfortuately didn't speak much english so we sat patiently in silence for the most part while we were being drawn on-again more pics to follow!Back to Honey & Spice after that where we bumped into Emily again and had a nice breakfast together and swapped details so we can keep in touch. As I know Jade has already said in her blog, it was great having a new friend for a couple of days to chat to and hang out with as it's very intense just the two of us all the time and can get ever so slightly boring as we know pretty much everything about each other! Anyway, we got a jeep (not a fancy one, one like you'd get on safari with no doors...) back down the hills to Ajmer station then got the thankfully on time train to Jodhpur, a journey of about 5 and a half hours.

The train journey was pretty uneventful as we tried to chat to other girls who we'd seen in Pushkar but they weren't having any of it!! We got into Jodhpur last night at about 8pm and were met by the lady owner of our guest house, the Hill view,who we have now dubbed a 'warrior princess' on a motorcycle!She greated us with a great big smile and a motion to come over the where her bike was (cue looks of horror as we think the three of us are going to be balancing on this thing, bags and all- not an uncommon sight here!) and then thankfully she began jabbering in hindi to a couple of rickshaw drivers about taking us to the guest house- obviously we couldn't understand a thing but I think the gist of if was pretty much 'take these girls to my guest house.don't rip them off or make them pay anymore than I'm going to give you or you'll feel the back of my hand'. and then we were off. ducking and dodging in the heavy evening traffic with our warrior lady weaving in and out of cars, other bikes and rickshaws so she could direct our driver. we got stuck behind some procession for a festival for the god ram's birthday (with apparently about 330million deities in the Hindu religion, I sense the constant festival traffic jams are going to get pretty old by the end of our time here!) and then eventually we were told to get out and our lady stopped her bike. 'ok' she said, 'now you walk. it is very big hill and you have very big bags so you go slowly slowly and I will go fast fast because the bike won't make it otherwise'.we look up, and sure enough a MASSIVE cobbledly cow poo covered hill awaits us...

about 15 mins later and I'm lying spread-eagled on the bed red faced, panting and feeling like I'm sweating from every part of my body humanly possible- it didn't help that as I was struggling up the hill behind Jade there were little kids laughing and doing impressions of my heavy breathing either, oh dear!After that we had a nice dinner of spicy dahl and I learnt to play Uno with Jade and the warrior princess as my teachers. a surreal but fun end to the day haha!

Today we had another lie- in and finished reading our various books (I've just finished Holy Cow by Sarah Macdonald- I'd definitely recommend it) then around midday we were going to head up the the nearby fort, which came highly recommended by Emily. though we ran into a bit of a problem in the form of two skinny but scary looking dogs that were sunbathing across the stairway... both of us are pretty surpised at the amount of dogs there are here in India, and especially mangy ones (though there were two lovely ones in Seventh Heaven that were obviously well cared for and actual pets) that look a bit like they could go for you. These two creatures weren't really making any dangerous moves on us, but rabies isn't a joke so we were pretty much trapped until some pluckier travellers staying at the guest house climbed the stairs and the dogs decided to move!We've decided that both of us are massive scaredy cats but you never can be too careful!

And so we face ANOTHER massive climb to get up to the fort, at least with no large backpacks weighing us down though.We paid the pricey 300R charge each to get in (about 4ish pounds) which did include a very snazzy audio tour of the massive 16th century fort. It was definitely worth it to hear the history of the place and learn about the various different areas in the massive fortress, as well as the bits and bobs of armour, weaponry (including a rather terrifying looking double pronged dagger) and the panniers used to carry royalty when they were atop elephants which were housed inside some of the fort's many rooms. We spent the late afternoon playing Uno again (I'm getting good at it!) with a couple of the kids from the guest house (though we're convinced they were helping each other cheat!) and wandering by the busy clock tower area where there are lots of market stalls as well as the usual traffic and cows...

Up for our 7am train back to Ajmer (a pain but it's got to be done) then on from Ajmer to Udaipur which is apparently india's most romantic city so definitely going to be very relevant to the two of us then (or not!), and I'm looking forward to a lovely chat later at 11.30pm our time (about 6pm at home I think) with mum and dad who I'm missing loads.

More soon,

love from Jodhpur xxx