Following another 8 hour bus journey, but thankfully less exciting, we arrived in Udaipur- the Venice of India. This is a very lovely town built on many hills with lots of winding streets. An excellent place to shop and as a result my rucksack is now even harder to close!!

Our hotel was close to the lake and we took a boat ride to watch the sunset with the mountains behind. In the middle of the lake is a floating palace, where rooms cost around 4000 pounds to stay in. This place is known as the city of romance and it is clear to see why. The scenery is stunning and the place is a lot more chilled out, even with all the beggars and shop keepers determined to get in your way and constantly talking at you.

It is also famous for its art and we spent time in an artists' shop watching them create intricate drawings. To demonstrate their skill they drew, in a couple of minutes, on our finger nails a peacock, camel, lady and elephant - all by free hand. Absolutely amazing!

Our leader was from this town, so he invited us to his family's house for the evening. It is incredible how many people can fit into such a small space but his family have lived there for 450 years so I doubt they will move any time soon. They cooked us a home made Thali and we had drinks on their roof terrace. There is still the culture in India that the men earn the money and the women keep the house and this is apparent at Mayank's (our leader) house. The men were the people to entertain whilst we did not see the women at all.

Everywhere you go in India there is a temple/palace/fort to visit. Udaipur was no exception so we trundled off in a tuk tuk (a 3 wheel crazy driving machine- half car half bike) up a mountain to watch a sunset from the palace. Our tuk tuk driver was also crazy and decided he wanted to be a formula 1 racing driver so we hurtled down the mountain, taking the corners at ridiculous speeds to beat the other tuk tuks. Fine whilst on the mountain but extremely scary when in the town. I spent most of the town ride with my eyes shut as he nipped between other tuk tuks, cars, bicycles and pedestrians. Fortunately, the tuk tuks have amazing turning capability proving useful when our driver sped towards a turning car and avoided it only by a hair width! Very eventful.

For me, part of the highlight of Udaipur was getting a skirt made. This may not sound highly exciting but I guess you had to be there. It was a tiny shop full of sari material. You could choose what sari you wanted and then they would turn it into a skirt to fit you. They appear to be believe that old and used sari's are more expensive and so it was hard to find one that was not too worn but still looked amazing. Once chosen, the shopkeeper then drove off to collect his father, a 72 year old, who came back to do the sewing. Both were very interesting people and it was great to spend time with them. Two hours later the skirt was made and fitting well. It only cost ten pounds. Bargain I say!

Due to our bus rides having been so eventful, our leader decided to change the next part of our journey from the bus to a train to take us to Pushkar.