Monday, April 15, 2013

RTW Trip: Day 45 (4/9) - Jaipur



Day 45: Jaipur, Again


Today posed an interesting dilemma. Since the next stop on our trip (Udaipur) wasn’t reachable by direct flight and only through either Delhi or Mumbai, we decided to make the trip to Udaipur by train overnight (more on the actual train journey later). This particular train was scheduled to leave Jaipur at 10:30 PM. We had to checkout at 1 PM. The problem was how to fill the time in between, and while we had no solid ideas, this gave us a good excuse to go to places reachable by (air conditioned) car. The only real highlight we hadn’t yet seen in Jaipur was the Amer fort itself (we ‘saw’ it in the Sound & Light show, but from afar), and being that it was about a 40 minute drive there and 40 minutes back, it worked as a perfect way to spend some time.

We left the hotel early at 9:00 AM, hoping to get there early and get back early enough to still check out in time and reach our lunch spot (Handi restaurant) by 1:30, when our car service ended. The drive out to the Amer fort was uneventful, as this time we weren’t whisked away to visit some tourist trap with overpriced goods and fly-ridden restaurants, but taken calmly down to the Fort. The only strange occurrence was the cab driver pre-booking a guide for our tour. We were quite skeptical of this, but when he picked up the guide, the man spoke good English, looked legitimate and when we reached the Fort he seemed to know people, proving to us that he wasn’t some strange outsider who didn’t know bunk about the place he was giving a tour of. The Fort was a bit less grand during the day, but since weddings are at night, who cares?

There are a few ways to go up to the fort. First, you can walk. Considering who we are and the heat, this wasn’t a particularly likely option. Next, for 150 rupees, you can have a car drive you up to the entrance of the Fort. Finally, you can ride an elephant, which costs 950 rupees. This seemed to be by far the most popular option, and because the ride is quite lengthy, it wasn’t even that pricey. We chose the elephant, and soon we were seated on our elephant, painted in the normal Indian way, and soon after we started our trek up the hill to the Fort base. It is quite a stunning sight to see elephants ahead of you, behind you and across from you, all while on your own elephant. It was a great experience, only sullied by our extremely moody elephant. The elephant always wanted to overtake the ones in front of it, sometimes turning that desire into a successful action. Also, because of the heat, the elephants took to spraying itself with water from its trunk. All the elephants did this, but ours did it more and more violently, and undoubtedly the spray would go around the head and hit us anywhere from the face to the foot. We were told that it was just water, but all along I had the feeling that that particular response is just to assuage the passengers.

One of the few elephants our one didn't stop to have a chat with.

We finally reached the top and got our guide to take some pictures for us, a sad but common circumvention of the protocol where hired photographers take pictures and then sell them to you (we did end up buying one of those). We disembarked from the elephant in the entry courtyard, and made our way up to the Fort. The entrance to the fort was adorned with a frescoed elephant, a nice little introduction to a very nice building. The fort itself was really just a large courtyard broken into three distinct sections which served as the living quarters for the Raj and his two wives during the three seasons. The Monsoon, Winter and Summer palaces all had nice little features to increase/decrease the heat with built in cooling and heating systems. The best was probably the winter palace, which was basically a room covered with small mirrors on the outside and inside. The guide was good and efficient, and the tour also gave us some great views of the land underneath, and the nearby Jagarh Fort, home to what they claim to be the world’s longest cannon. When we were done, we met our driver at the top (you can’t take the elephant down the hill), and left Amer Fort behind, finishing up our sightseeing in Jaipur.


 We drove back into town and checked out of the hotel, as the amiable cab driver convinced us to take his services for the full day, giving us the comfort of an air-conditioned van until we had to leave for the train. We returned to the Old City Bazaars for more shopping (sadly, no coasters for me). First was lunch, where Handi looked like a hole-in-the-wall place, and with the flies buzzing around, my Mom was against going there. Instead, we went next door, back to Copper Chimney, which was as decidedly average the second time around as it was the first. After lunch we went back out to the bazaars for more shopping (there really is little else to do, but the shopping is good anyway in Jaipur) until my Mom get tired from the heat and we sought the cool comfort of LMB. Yes, we were basically doing a replay of yesterday’s afternoon, but sometimes you do the same thing over again because it was good the first time. This time LMB was more of a snack than a meal, so I got a dosa and a banana lassi (surprisingly good), while she got Jelabis and Fresh Lime Soda, the most uniquely refreshing Indian treat.

After the shopping reached its conclusion (and only because my Mom grew concerned over we had the spare weight in our luggage to take the stuff, not because there was any shortage of stores), we went back to the van and headed off to our dinner spot, The Spice Court. It came from a recommendation from the driver, who told us about a good non-veg restaurant in a courtyard near the Train Station, but without telling us the name. In the meantime, I looked up some restaurants in the Lonely Planet book and was about to tell my Mom that we should go to Spice Court, but for some reason decided against it, trusting the driver’s place. In the end, his place of choice and mine were one in the same. Spice Court is an idyllic little restaurant built in the courtyard of a hotel, with indoor and outdoor seating. Since it was night and as there was live entertainment going on outside, we chose to sit outside. The menu was typical Rajasthani food, and we ordered a Moghlai Chicken Curry and a Lamb Kebab dish. The lamb was extremely good but even more extremely spicy, so in fear of potentially being sick on the train (not a good thing given the state of Indian train bathrooms), we didn’t finish it, but the Chicken Curry portion was large enough to fill both of us (a large bottle of beer helped). We had time to kill so we sat under the Jaipuri moonlight listening to nice, if a little too loud, music. These little moments are the times that you are glad you are on vacation, thousands of miles away eating nice food in an open courtyard.

The beginning of the train journey was one of the times that you are wishing you were no longer on vacation, especially when that vacation includes a trip on an Indian train. Train travel in India is now cheap enough that almost anyone can travel on the train in some capacity. Air travel is now cheap enough that almost all middle-class people can travel by plane. This leaves a strange sector of people that take the train, but also leads to the train stations being some of the most decrepit places in India. The whole Jaipur station smelled like a urinal trough. There are hoards of vagrants littered around the station platform. The train, with no explanation whatsoever, came about half an hour late, so we had to stand amongst all this squalor even longer than what was necessary.

The worst part was our tickets had one person comfirmed in 1st AC (the best cabin – but really nothing special), and the other confirmed in 3rd AC (like 1st AC, but six to a room instead of four), with the 2nd also being waitlisted on 1st AC. This opened up a score of issues as to how we would contact each other when we arrived in Udaipur? How I would get the luggage out in time? Who would sleep where? Thankfully these questions were all answered as Udaipur was the last stop on the train, allowing us to take as much time as we want to get out of the train. Then we were given a gift from God as the 2nd ticket was confirmed and we could be together in 1st AC. When the train arrived, we hurriedly entered into our cabin, wanting to close our eyes and escape the fact that we were traveling this way. I should mention that this is my perspective of the whole situation. I love aviation in all its forms, from airports and planes, and after this train ride, I love planes even more.

This fort is from Centuries ago, and it is about 100x more modern than the Jaipur Train Station



About Me

I am a man who will go by the moniker dmstorm22, or StormyD, but not really StormyD. I'll talk about sports, mainly football, sometimes TV, sometimes other random things, sometimes even bring out some lists (a lot, lot, lot of lists). Enjoy.