India - Jodhpur and Jaisalmer (3)

[Deleted]

I was looking forward to being in the desert. After Agra, anything else seemed like a better bet. So we arrived in Jodhpur at around 6am in the morning. I had hardly slept in that rickety, bumpy sleeper compartment, and hoped it would not be too difficult to find a suitable hotel here in this city. It felt good to be in the State of Rajasthan and I crossed my fingers and hoped this would be a better experience for us.

Just to give you an idea where abouts Jodhpur and Jaisalmer are situated. Here is the map again of the route we took:







and here is a map of the State of Rajasthan:





This time around we stayed in a guest house instead of a hotel. The difference being? The guest house was more 'homely', it was run by a family - parents and sons, and they were all very friendly and we enjoyed our stay there. There was a restaurant situated on the roof of the building, with a nice view of Jodhpur Fort. The food was varied and always freshly cooked.

[Deleted]

A bit about the city of Jodhpur:

'The city is known as the "Sun City" for the bright, sunny weather it enjoys all year. It is also referred to as the "Blue City" due to the vivid blue-painted houses around the Mehrangarh Fort. The old city circles the fort and is bounded by a wall with several gates. However, the city has expanded greatly outside the wall over the past several decades. Jodhpur lies near the geographic centre of Rajasthan state, which makes it a convenient base for travel in a region much frequented by tourists.'




Some photos I took of the city:










Entering the market area, it was very lively with lots of different kinds of merchandise for sale. Spices are are specialty in this area, so many varieties are available.







All kinds of shops or stalls can be seen:







And of course working camels. What would the desert be without them?










More scenes from around the city:



There were quite a few women motorbike riders in this town I noticed. In fact it was good to see, generally, so many women around going about their business and having a more active role in all walks of life here. They also wore very pretty colorful Indian dresses and outfits. Rajasthan is well known for these. This area just seemed happier somehow. I saw smiles and laughter quite often.



 





 





 





 


This is the roof-top restaurant of our guest-house. Here we would meet quite a few other travelers. One or two that we kept bumping into over and over again somehow, as we continued our journey. Julian was one of those travelers, a tall young African American man, travelling around Asia. Then there was the nice couple who came from South Korea, the man was a teacher from the US and his wife was Korean. We exchanged many stories while we sat on that roof-top and it was comforting to know that some of what we had been through and experienced, others had too.










The centre point of Jodhpur is perhaps the Fort.




Mehrangarh Fort- or better known simply as Jodhpur Fort.  'The fort is situated 400 feet above the city and is enclosed by imposing thick walls. Inside its boundaries there are several palaces known for their intricate carvings and expansive courtyards. A winding road leads to and from the city below. The imprints of cannonball hits by attacking armies of Jaipur can still be seen on the second gate. 
There are seven gates, which include Jayapol (meaning 'victory'), built by Maharaja Man Singh to commemorate his victories over Jaipur and Bikaner armies. Fattehpol (also meaning 'victory') gate was built by Maharaja Ajit Singh to mark the defeat of the Mughals. The palm imprints upon these still attract much attention even today.
The museum in the Mehrangarh fort is one of the most well-stocked museums in Rajasthan. In one section of the fort museum there is a selection of old royal palanquins, including the elaborate domed gilt Mahadol palanquin which was won in a battle from the Governor of Gujarat in 1730. The museum exhibits the heritage of the Rathores in arms, costumes, paintings and decorated period rooms.
The third of movie of The Dark Knight Trilogy The Dark Knight Rises was partially shot around the Mehrangarh fort. A few scenes included the prison well within which Bruce Wayne is shown to have been imprisoned. There is one particular shot when Wayne emerges from the Prison that actually gives a glimpse of the Mehrangarh Fort in the background.'



  




  





It's a huge Fort and I enjoyed exploring it.  We took a tuktuk up the hill to the top, but later on we walked down the windy cobbled pathway back to street level.  The views from the the top of the Fort are amazing.  From our rooftop restaurant, after dark,   the whole place can be seen, illuminated, it is quite eye-catching.




Taken from the roof-top of the guest house:







So the auto-rickshaw took us all the way to the top:




 





Some pics from the Fort itself:










Many tourists from around the world in this area:















































This picture of a man sitting on the very edge makes me shudder - (my fear of heights showing maybe?):








Even way up above on that hill where the Fort is situated green trees grow:











And so we make our way down, I'm glad we walked, so many things to see on our way:





















Locally made ornaments for sale:

[htmb]

Wonderful pictures, Deyana. Just when I think you can't possibly show us something different.....

I particularly like the photo of the fort all lit up at night.

[anshjain97]

Nice pictures, btw is Agra that bad?

[bjd]

The blue of the city's houses certainly stands out nicely against the brownish colour of the surroundings. The night photo is indeed good.

Are all those buses below in one of the pictures taken from the top tourist tour buses?

[Deleted]

That is one thing in India that I have always really wanted to see, even more than the Taj Mahal. The street scenes are as great as ever. It's funny, I never used to buy anything when I was travelling but now when I see the various stalls and carts of merchandise, I am more and more tempted -- but I absolutely hate carrying extra baggage. I am one of those people who plans to buy everything on the very last day and then (luckily?) nothing of what I wanted is available then.

That is a very pleasant blue colour that they use for the buildings, somewhat reminiscent of the blue used on buildings in Tunisia but a bit more pale.

The fort doesn't look like it was involved in too many battles -- but I suppose the location is more to impress and dissuade possible enemies rather than actually combat them.

[rikita]

hehe, my brother became a big souvenir buying fan when he visited me in india. well, it was his first overseas trip... when we were in varkala he bought lots of things, mainly small ganesha sculptures. then we went on to periyar and to his shock saw they all cost only half as much there - so he just had to buy some more. i had planned to give him already some of my luggage to take home (over half a year you accumulate a lot, and also the airline he used had a bigger luggage allowance i think), but in the end his backpack was already completely full with his own stuff...

[mossie]

A wonderful report, so colourful. You certainly cover some ground, I admire your energy.

[Deleted]

Thanks everyone

htmb, there is so much more to this journey yet, it will take me a while to write it all down.

The fort really was amazing at night-time.

ansh, Agra was pretty bad. I don't really know what to say to make it less so. I guess I can add that it might have been a different experience for someone else, in a different kind of circumstance than we found ourselves in. In the end a lot of things just boil down to plain old luck. But from what I had already heard about the City before we even got there, I knew it was not going to be the greatest place in the world to be.


bjd, I took the photo from high up io the Fort somewhere. Below us are the tourist buses, no idea where these people were from or where they were staying, must have been in town somewhere. There were a lot of tourists in town. We rarely bumped into 'tourists' as such, we were more around what I call 'professional travelers'.. and they were much more interesting to get to know, as they had done the real deal, walked the real streets and mixed with the locals throughout their extensive travels.

Kerouac, it's very wise to travel as light as you can, if you know you'll be out there for a while. I actually ended up getting rid of most of what I took (which wasn't much to begin with), and replacing it when/if needed. And yes, I waited until I got back to Delhi near the end of our journey to buy presents. Although I did pick up a few light things from different parts of India as I went along.

rikita, it's SO hard to tell yourself 'no, I won't buy that'. I wanted everything I saw! But then I told myself 'and how are you going to carry it, deyana?' Common sense prevailed. I enjoyed my shopping spree in Delhi though, just before we came home

mossie, thanks. I had a lot of energy during the journey, but once I got home I was completely drained! But that might have been because I was sick (tummy bug) and it took some time to recover from that. I'm all fine now though. Back to my usual self.

[Deleted]

We weren't in Jodhpur very long. After all our main destination was the Thar desert in Jaisalmer. So after a few quite pleasant days we set off on yet another private bus. The owners of our guest house had a cousin who owned a hotel come guest house in Jaisalmer and recommended we go there. And they even arranged for a taxi to pick us up from the bus stop once we arrived there. Sounded good, so we accepted. This time I took a seat instead and it was a much shorter distance to our destination. However being a private bus, regulations as to how many people are allowed to stand on the bus were even more lax. At least the government buses had some rules as so how many passengers were allowed to stand. Soon it was really crowded. Once in a while the conductor would make one or two of the seating customers shift over to make room for someone or another. Often a woman or a woman with a baby or small child. This of course resulted in people becoming even more swashed up than they were already.

The English man and his girlfriend in front of us refused to shift over.

"Please sir, move over, this woman needs to sit down"

"But there's no where to move over to, and my feet have a tendency to swell up"

The English man was right. There were only two seats (one for him and one for his girlfriend) and even they were not that big. I realized that this was the second time this couple had been asked to share their seats. The first time they did, the second time they refused. And so the woman was sat with someone else.

It was an uncomfortable situation, all jammed in like that. Whose fault was it? Why sell so many tickets to people who have no possibly of getting a seat? It seemed whoever owned the bus didn't give two hoots what the passengers were going through, as long as they could make as much money as possible from people. And the more people on the bus, the more tickets sold and more profits made. It made me wonder, wasn't there anybody around who wasn't on the make or trying on something fishy? It was getting tiresome very fast.

We arrived in Jaisalmer and were picked up by a car and taken to the hotel. I was happy with our room, it was very spacious, overlooking the street and this place also had a roof-top restaurant. I wondered if we would see Julian here, he had told us he was heading this way for the camel festival which was being held in a few days time in town.



Images from the roof top:






If I could describe this place in one word it would be 'hippified'. It was different in quite a few ways. I saw that most people liked to sit on the floor like this and just talk and relax or eat or whatever they wanted to do. Everyone seemed to know everyone else and many had been here for a long time.






Do you see the guy in the photo half standing, with the blue cap on? He was part of the staff. A handsome guy and a real charmer. I noticed that some of the women would take him to their room in order to get a massage. He was there to entertain, make feel at ease and please the guests. And he was very good at his job. I noticed that most of the people here were quite young, mostly under 30 I'd say, and many had been here before or were long term guests. And some of them lived on the roof. Sounds strange saying that, but some just put a tent up on the roof and lived in that. There was a shared washroom on that roof too.



Flowers just outside of our room, in this pretty pot on the floor:







The view from our room overlooking the street below:






The reception area downstairs. As you can see this whole town is geared towards encouraging people to go on Desert Safaris. All kind of packages are available. Half day, full day, and even overnight or many overnights stay in the desert.

[rikita]

i don't know how much the crowded busses are about making huge amounts of money, and how much it is about just making enough money to make the business worth while - as i suppose tickets have to be pretty cheap for most people to be able to afford them, and if they are cheap, you need more people to make the bus worth running... and then there is the question about the amount of busses doing a certain journey - the more there are (like, also different companies etc.) the emptier they will be. but if there aren't enough, and people aren't allowed onto the bus because it is full, they'd complain too... and i guess part might have to do with just what you are used to, space-wise? at least in those crowded busses i took, i always had the impression for me and mr. r. it was more difficult to deal with the lack of "personal space" that resulted, while everyone else seemed to think it as normal to be crowded like that... after all, we also took one auto riksha for a group of six people and similar things... (which of course also had to do with saving money)...

[Deleted]

Those are very good points, rikita. I never thought of it that way. I guess in the end, everyone is just trying to make money.earn a living any way they can.

Wow six in a auto rickshaw? I did see that more than a few times myself. Those rickshaws are made tough, no doubt about it.

Once in Aurangabad, just outside of the Ajanta Caves, a group of us got so sick of waiting for a bus (that even had room to stand in, let alone a seat), that we decided to share a taxi into the city. The weird thing was, we were all complete strangers, and the car just appeared out of no where. The taxi cost us less each, than the bus fare would have done! It was quite a long drive back into the main town, so much nicer in a taxi than a government bus full to the top with people.

[Deleted]

The hotel in Jaisalmer does look like a pleasant place to stay, but "long term guests" often tend to annoy me, either because I am jealous of them or because they look like useless drifters (Yes I judge other travellers within about 5 minutes of sizing them up the first time I see them. Sometimes, if there is an interaction over the next days, I can make a revision. ).

In Laos, I took a bus that was so crowded that people climbed out of the windows for the pee stops. At one point I had a claustrophobia attack that I somehow managed to overcome, but if I had had a machete, I might have gone amok.

[Deleted]

It was a nice hotel, Kerouac. But it was to be the last place that I truly felt okay in staying in. Other hotels were nicer, more convenient, better located etc. and we even stayed in a very upmarket starred hotel just before we left India. (I will write about how that happened later on). But this one in Jaisalmer would be the one that felt the best out of the lot.

I understand what you mean, I kind of felt that same way when observing the occupants of that hotel. Drifters and hippies came to mind, and the question was 'why are they living like this? How can they live like this? How did they get here and why and where are they going and why?'. I guess maybe sometimes some people just need to put on a backpack and go and explore and try and discover what else there is in the world. Maybe they were even looking for some kind of higher meaning or purpose to life, who knows? They wouldn't be the first generation to do so and they probably won't be the last.

Or they could have just been a bunch of lazy bums looking for a way not to have to spend at least one winter in Europe!

[Deleted]

May 30, 2013 14:15:13 GMT kerouac2 said:

In Laos, I took a bus that was so crowded that people climbed out of the windows for the pee stops. At one point I had a claustrophobia attack that I somehow managed to overcome, but if I had had a machete, I might have gone amok.

When in really crowded or stressful situations I sometimes wondered what would happen if some nutcase suddenly freaked out and went berserk. Thankfully, it never happened.

[bjd]

As I recall, the only awful incident on a bus happened in Canada, when some guy beheaded another passenger on a Greyhound bus a few years ago.

I figure those third-world buses are so crowded that even if someone goes berserk, they wouldn't have room to raise an arm and do any damage. Kenyan buses are like that too -- the bus leaves when it's full with not even standing room and then more people get on at every stop.

[anshjain97]

Or other people will subdue the berserk person before anything can be done.

There are of course many bus companies with their different regulations. Some companies will not oversell- of course, these tend to be more expensive tickets.

[nycgirl]

Nice photos of the Blue City and the Fort, and interesting fact about The Dark Knight Rises. I loved that movie.

[mossie]

I suppose the reason one gets so many young travellers/drifters is the modern phenomenom of the "gap year". In my day those times were sometimes voluntarily as in my case, or compulsorily, as for the majority, taken up by military service. Also modern day parents have too much money so as to be able indulge their young in such pursuits.
Or am I a bitter old fuddy duddy ;D ;D

[Deleted]

I approve of these gap year travellers but only as long as they keep moving to discover new things. If they say, "we've been here a month because it's cheap and sunny and there's a swimming hole down by the river," then they have become lost souls in my book. (Unless of course they are using the time to write their own book, but usually all of that spare time is just used to smoke ganja.)

[rikita]

oh i think spending some time of one's life doing "nothing" can be an important experience... it all depends...

[Deleted]

bjd, I recall that incident on the greyhound bus. I think it was determined that the guy was severely mentally ill?

How do you find these more organized bus companies, ansh? I couldn't figure it out. There didn't seem to be much choice as far as I could see.

nycgirl, thanks. I will now be looking out for the fort next time I see the Dark Knight rises again

Not a fuddy duddy at all, mossie. I guess there are different reasons why people just take off for such great lengths of time. Personally, I would find it boring to stay in one place too long. I was intrigued by what was going on around me, I like to observe, people fascinate me. But my boredom level being as it is, I couldn't do the same thing day in and day out without going crazy.. unless I was in a position were I had to use my mind, initiative and abilities in some way.

Kerouac, I'm sure the fact that it IS cheap and sunny to boot, attracts many of these travelers.

rikita, I think that's what I was doing for 10 weeks. It's good to just veg out and do nothing once in a while. but for me, the novality of that wares of all too soon.

[Deleted]

Some images from the city of Jaisalmer.


Jaisalmer Fort.






Do you see the camel sitting at the bottom of the photo? The photos came out with a blueish tint, not sure why.

A bit of history behind Jaisalmer Fort:

'Jaisalmer Fort is one of the largest forts in the world. It is situated in Jaisalmer city in the Indian state of Rajasthan. It was built in 1156 AD by the Bhati Rajput ruler Rao Jaisal, from where it derives it name. The fort stands proudly amidst the golden stretches of the great Thar Desert, on Trikuta Hill, and has been the scene of many battles. Its massive yellow sandstone walls are a tawny lion color during the day, fading to honey-gold as the sun sets, thereby camouflaging the fort in the yellow desert. For this reason, it is also known as the "Golden Fort".This fort, popularly known as the 'Sonar quila' by the locals, is located in the very heart the city, and is one of the most breathtaking monuments in the locality.'



And a bit more about the City itself:

With the advent of British rule, the emergence of maritime trade and the growth of the port of Bombay led to the gradual economic decline of Jaisalmer. After independence and the Partition of India, the ancient trade route was totally closed, thus sealing the fate of the city. Nonetheless, the continued strategic importance of Jaisalmer was demonstrated during the 1965 and 1971 wars between India and Pakistan. Although at one point the entire population of Jaisalmer lived within the fort, it today has a resident population of about 4,000 people who are largely from the Brahmin and Daroga communities. They are mostly descendants of the workforce of the Bhati rulers of Jaisalmer which was permitted to reside within the fort's premises. With an increase in population, people gradually relocated to the foot of the Trikuta Hill and the town of Jaisalmer spread out from the fort.

[Deleted]

Some more images seen while out and about in the city:











The man who owned this place was constantly after us to 'do' one of his desert tours. We told him we'd think about it.





The desert women like to dress in typical Rajasthan fashion, of flowing colorful clothes:







The market place:















This mother and daughters were out begging from tourists in the street. I gave her some money and then as soon as I did the two girls wanted more and wouldn't go away until I gave them some too. It is sad to see people like this in the street, but after a while you kind of become hardened to it. You see you many day in, day out.






This city had it's fair share of all kinds of animals, animal mess and garbage in the streets, just as Agra had done. But for some reason, it didn't have the same impact on me as did the sights I saw in Agra. There seemed to be a lighter atmosphere here somehow. It didn't feel oppressive in any way.










My sons really enjoyed their time here, and while we were travelling around India, they sometimes asked if we'd have enough time over at the end to come back here again. But it was not to be.



So many interesting buildings in this city and in India in general. You can tell that they hark back to another era, perhaps a time that this area was more vibrant and important and definitely more busier:















Interestingly enough this building and it's grounds was quiet and quite tranquil. A place perhaps to medicate and relax away from the hustle, bustle and crowds of the market place?

[anshjain97]

Deyana, I'm talking about bus services like these: gearheads.in/showthread.php?3321-Luxuria-Bus-Bangalore-Chennai-Luxury-redefined

ANd online booking services such as www.redbus.in/ will usually sell a definite amount of tickets, no more.

[Deleted]

A few photos of the town:








It was up this street that our hotel was located. The drain you see to the right (and there would have been one to the left too) is where the waste water flows, and it has a smell to it. I wondered what they did during the monsoon season when it would all spill out into the streets and maybe into the houses as well. In this area, sometimes the monsoons only come once every two years:







Other streets:











A saw a Japanese man taking photos of this family and wondered why. Then I saw him hand over a wrapped sweet to the woman. Her payment for letting him take her photo? Then he asked the man who was with her "Is that you wife?" and the man replied "yes". I guess her and her kids were begging, while he looked on. they probably made more money then he would as a single guy.





There were even more tourists here than in Jodhpur. You could spot them just about anywhere while out and about.

[Deleted]

Thanks for the links, ansh. I guess a person would have to book those buses way in advance? I very rarely saw them, maybe they are destined in between the bigger cities and major attractions only?

Sure look nice though!

[anshjain97]

These mainly run between main cities- and yeah, I guess they need to booked say 2 weeks in advance or so.

[bjd]

Does the owner of the car in the second last photo have to wait for the cows to go away to move his car?

Did you have any language problems, Deyana? Did everyone you spoke to speak English or do you speak any of the Indian languages?

[rikita]

as for the blueish tint of the photos - could it be that you by mistake changed the white balance setting of your camera?