Jodhpur

Arrived at 5.20 am in jodhpur, india seems to be full of early mornings! We were picked up by the rickshaw driver and taken to the Blue House hotel where they gave us a spare room to sleep until our room was ready. We spent the rest of the day getting to grips with this medieval city. The tiny twisted streets get us lost in minutes but perfect to really explore. Once again, the people are so inquisitive and friendly. As we had gotten ourselves so lost, we needed a tuk tuk to help us out. We paid 100 rupees to be taken to the fort...yes another one! The view from this was spectacular, you can really see why they call it the blue city, so many houses are painted a sky blue colour once signifying the home of Brahmin but also apparently repelling insects too. (Maybe i should cover myself in it?)Truly stunning views.

The next day was another shopping day, we ventured towards the clock tower and the famous market. It was a saturday and it seems that all the families were doing their weekly shop. It was amazing. Think wellsebourne indian style.Families stopping and greeting us and coming to shake our hands. We didnt buy anything from here shockingly, we haven't yet felt the need to buy illuminous socks or sieves. Beyond the clock tower however was a array of little craft shops and boutiques, once again, Carly had to reign me in as i go mad buying thousands of door k*** for cupboard doors that i just don't own since i came away. Ill need them one day...

Early doors again as we found ourselves a tuk tuk to take us to get our bus to udaipur. Jodhpur has been short but sweet and we are excited to get to the town that we have heard so much about. Buses here are interesting with there being the normal seats which are placed slightly lower than normal and then above you where your luggage would normally go, are large compartments where people were asleep. A good use of combining day and night buses. I dont know what it is but i really enjoy the travelling aspect of our journeys...especially the food! The places where they stop along the way serve amazing street food, prepared just in a hot pan on a stove at the side of the road. Todays speciality, a samosa served in a banana leaf bowl served with 3 different concoctions of sauce. All for 10p. Delicious. Arrived in udaipur after 7 hours, A holy city based around the lake, we had booked ourselves a little luxury with views of the lake for £6 each. Paramount hotel. The view was definitely worth us pushing our budget. Our room with balcony (a stark contrast to our many rooms without even windows over the past 8 months) looked right over the lake and was stunning.

As usual we spend our first day walking around investigating, apparently its rather a good place for shopping... Excellent! We bumped into scott and alice, one half of the australians we had met in Bikaner, and arranged to meet up with them along with Jo and Matt for the culture show that evening. Udaipur has been filled with way too much money being spent on presents (mostly for ourselves) but everything is so incredibly beautiful here. The culture show was inside a museum, right on the lake and cost £1 to get in. It was one of the best things we have experienced in India. The music, traditional Rajasthan dancing and some amazing puppetry, we loved it.

As part of our shopping tour of Rajasthan, as it seems this is what we are here for. We stopped by a sign saying 'palm reading'. Not knowing what to believe, we enquired and were told that we only paid as much as we thought it was worth. Sucked in, we both had our palms read which ended up with us both being on the quest for coral and emerald stones to wear as rings to save our 'weak heart lines' in our hands.

We decided to add a little culture to our time in udaipur and visited the city palace. It makes a change from a fort at least! Its getting very, very hot in the day now (around 35 degrees) and the pushing and shoving and the apparent rudeness of the indian people was starting to irritate us so we escaped. Not before meeting an over excitable older gentleman called Ghandi. He was sat extremely hot and bothered, clearly having been dragged there by his wife. Our overall views were that the city palace was beautiful, but much prettier being enjoyed from the outside. Tonight we enjoyed spending some time with Holly, Polly and Amy. Girls staying at our hotel. Holly and polly are just starting their trip with a three week whirlwind tour of Rajasthan before heading towards south east Asia. Amy was a Scottish girl from Aukney and kept us entertained with anecdotes of her Two month stay in India. We were also made massively jealous with tales of their cooking course which they had booked with Shasis (we had tried to book with them but they never replied to our email) we had gone on a cooking course booked through our hotel and were really disappointed with the 600 rupees we paid. The course entailed us standing in the kitchen of a family home watching a lady cook while we wrote down the recipes. Just imagine the behaviour crisis we would have if this was how we planned our lessons at school! In comparison, our newly aquatinted friends had their own cooking station, aprons and even a Graduation bracelet. We did get to eat our food though, which was delicious but a very expensive meal to say the least! Onwards in the morning to Pushkar!