Our train ride to Jaipur was extremely efficient – much more so than I expected given the delay en route to Agra – and we arrived right on schedule…to the minute. Since we had arranged a ride from our hotel before we left, we fought off the other tuk tuk drivers and made our way to the Anurag Villas. (The drivers who wait for the train to arrive will tell you anything to try to get you in their tuk tuk – some said our ride wasn’t coming, a few told us our hotel was undesirable and others took a more complimentary route and told me I looked like a good Muslim with my beard!) We were both exhausted and fell asleep quickly after checking in.
For our two full days in Jaipur we decided to hire a tuk tuk each day to drive us around to see all the sights. There are clusters of tourist attractions within walking distance of each other but, like other cities in India, the streets aren’t great for walking. Our hotel set us up with Abdul, one of their regular drivers. Abdul is generally a good person, but even good people (it seems) can’t escape the lure of trying to take advantage of tourists in Jaipur…
Our first stop was the City Palace, a combination of an old palace and museum. It was an interesting way to start the day, but neither the palace nor museum were particularly outstanding.
Sarah posing by one of the palace gates.
These “guards” offered to take a picture with me…for a tip, of course!
Jaipur is known as the “Pink City.” We think it looks more orange-y than pink, but a lot of the buildings were decorated with this same color palate.
Peacocks are also a big thing here. They are the national bird of India but because so many can be found around Jaipur, there were many peacock-inspired designs in the buildings we saw here. Sarah kicked some European tourists out of the way to get a solo shot in this peacock-themed door.
Another gate in the palace. Like I said, the locals are very into peacocks!
After we strolled through the City Palace for an hour or so, we headed across the street to Jantar Mantar, a collection of old astronomical instruments. This is one of five centers like this across India that showcased the country's astronomical skills in the 1700s. The grounds contained many instruments that did one of two things (from what we could tell): tell time or measure the distance from the Earth to the Sun. We saw 20 or so people making sketches of the structures – given all the unique angular designs, I can see why it would appeal to the artistically inclined.
This is the world’s largest sundial behind Sarah. It is accurate to the second (apparently).
After a lunch break, Abdul took us to Hawa Mahal, a.k.a. the Women’s Temple. This whole structure was built so royal women could observe festivities in the City Palace without being seen (by men) from the street. We happened to be visiting on International Women’s Day and we saw a group of Indian women doing a photo shoot to mark the occasion. Though much progress has been made toward women’s equality since this temple was built, India still has a long way to go (it's hard to ignore all the bad press the country has gotten regarding attacks on women over the last two years - even this week there was controversy around the government's decision to censor the documentary India's Daughter).
There was a lot of stained glass like this throughout the complex.
Sarah standing in front of the screens the women of centuries past were required to stand behind.
Looking out a Jaipur from the top of the temple. You can see the world’s largest sundial in the background.
Abdul took us on a bit of a detour we didn’t sign up for at this point. The tuk tuk drivers get kickbacks from certain shops, restaurants, etc. for bringing tourists so, naturally, they try to get you to go there. Sarah mentioned she wanted to see some of the shops we’d driven past earlier in the day. Abdul’s response: tell us we’re going to shops, take us to the outskirts of town where fabrics are being made (as in, factories of workers producing large spools of cloth). Magically, right when we pulled up a tour guide for one of the factories appeared and offered to show us around. (Which tourists actually fall for this stuff, I don’t know…) We scolded Abdul and headed back to the center of town, stopped at one other shop we directed him to, then called it a day and headed back to the hotel.
We had another unfortunate experience at our hotel on Sunday night. No need to get into the details, but Anuraag Villa turned out to be one of the worst hotel experiences we've had on our entire trip and we had to move to another hotel on Monday morning.
Settled into our new, much nicer digs, Abdul took us to Royal Gaitor for our first stop today. We’d never heard of this place, but it turned out to be great – the marble structures were beautifully carved with intricate designs and we had the place practically to ourselves to explore. A very worthwhile stop – score one for Abdul.
This first courtyard was dedicated to Madho Singh II, who died in 1922. He had about 50 wives and 50 concubines that bore him "around 125 children." Wow.
Looking back on the first courtyard as a flock of pigeons took off.
Inside the main building of the second courtyard, dedicated to Jai Singh II, the founder of Jaipur.
Look at the incredibly detailed carvings in the ceiling.
One of the mausoleums in the third courtyard.
We strolled around Royal Gaitor for about an hour, then met up with Abdul to continue on to Amer Fort, the main sight we wanted to see today. Amer Fort is considered one of the most famous in India and we can see why – it’s huge!
Abdul stopped on the way to Amer Fort so we could snap a picture of the whole structure.
Working our way up to the gate we stopped to look at one of the many gardens throughout the fort.
Inside the main courtyard (about a 20 minute hike uphill) it was time to quench our thirst with a couple of Diet Cokes.
Despite most other people respecting the photograph queue at this beautiful archway, the couple behind us could not have cared less. So it’s a picture of us with two disgruntled Indian tourists!
Deeper inside the fort we came across this beautiful courtyard, which was probably our favorite part of the whole complex.
Check out the detailed mirror work on the main building in the courtyard.
After about two hours in the Fort, we met up with Abdul again and headed to Jal Mahal for a quick picture. As you can see, it's in the middle of a lake - so this was as close as we got.
I can see why it's known as the "Floating Palace."
It was mid-afternoon by this point so we headed to Anokhi Café for lunch. This place was great – an oasis of small, healthy dishes in a sea of the heavy Indian curries available in the area. We liked the food so much that we ended up going back today for lunch! (They also sell beautiful clothes and accessories so Sarah was finally able to get her shopping fill!)
After lunch, Abdul tried to take us to another kickback shop he knows but after we refused he decided it was time to just take us home…at which point he changed the price he agreed to with us that morning. I’m getting pretty frustrated that literally every day we are forced to have tense conversations with people trying to take advantage of us. We bid a harsh farewell to Abdul and decided to spend the rest of the afternoon relaxing by the rooftop pool at the new hotel. (The pool turned out to be closed, but we didn’t care.)
We didn’t end up doing much today. We walked around a few shops and got cheap massages at the hotel before heading to the train station. I’m writing this from the train to Delhi – we have a quick stop there before flying down to Chennai tomorrow. We’ll be staying with the family of one of our friends there so we’re excited to feel more like we’re at “home” than we have over the past week and a half in India.