Hotel Kohinoor Jaipur

... path. Flamboyantly painted elephants are available to ferry the less energetic up to the entrance, although we decided not to use this form of transport due to concerns about the elephants’ welfare. The fort is very large and it took us a couple of hours to look around the maze of rooms and courtyards. Mandy was particularly impressed by the mirror mosaics and we both appreciated the stunning views from the fort.

After a cheap and delicious lunch in an ...

... not a Hindu then! There were only a few monkeys around, apparently they all come out at dusk (along with the mozzies) but it's not safe there as a lone female then, so I was warned. I also went to Amber Fort, which is the ruin of a massive Moghul fort- I'm becoming a bit of an expert in these forts!! Had lots of fun laughing with kids on school trips and again being photographed by everyone. I also discovered that women are not expected to queue- excellent!!

Jaipur, Rājasthān, India steph_holland

... and all.
Our hostel in Jaipur is lovely. The rooms are all really bright colours and there's Indian scenes painted on the walls of our room. It's really big and very pretty and the staff are really nice and friendly.
Jaipur seems much quieter and a little cleaner than Delhi so it's a welcome relief from the crowds and the noise! There's a few things we want to see here but for the moment we're going to wait until Lucy feels ...

... when we finally got to the city of Jaipur, the traffic was unbelievable. Not just because of the number of vehicles, but it was even crazier than Delhi! Cars, mopeds, and other "home-made" vehicles going literally every which way. At one point, there was another bus heading right for us (oh yeah, direction on the road seems to be irrelevant too) and we pulled onto the side at the very last minute. It was *scary*. We got to the hotel (haveli) at 2:45 pm finally ...

... The site was incredibly peaceful, not only for its tranquil surroundings but for myself, and Chhotu had an immensely calming effect on me that induced a spiritual satisfaction that I haven't been aware of since I was in Mexico 5 years ago. It never crossed my mind not to trust him after he waited for us at the Palace, and that was seemingly rewarded. I would do a lot to spend more time with him and explore the city with him.

... not doing to well. She crashes hard, we both nap for about 2 hours, then go back out for dinner. Get in car for dinner and there is another guy there, I'm thinking "this is it, we're gonna get mugged" but no, he's just a cousin getting a ride to pickup a car from the mechanic. I kept expecting this guy (Dev) to throw us some kind of curveball, but he keeps being totally legit. We are totally recommending him to all of our friends, we'll post contact info at some point ...

... See what I mean about the suspicion. They slide a beer in my direction but I decline this too. They're surprised because they felt all Scots and Irish liked to drink. We do, but I'm not falling for his sales patter. Dara does decide to buy a gift for her Mother and I end up buying a pair of ear rings she liked but, we leave after about 45 mins. Dara wonders why she wasn't offered a beer too. We ask Mr Singh to take us to a rooftop Italian restaurant recommended in the Lonely ...

... truck, the entire bumper came off so they spend another hour hookin it to the axle..by the time it was all done, i couldn't start the freakin bike...i wasn't worried..pulled it to the side and checked up everything i knew..cleaned the carberuettor, checked the spark plug, checked compression, etc etc..no luck.. so here i was around 48 kms from jaipur city. called up the jaipur enfield service guys and they said no way they sending somebody down in the rain...have to ...

... take any pictures or video since cameras were again not allowed at this place.... on the way back to our taxi I was the lucky one to be a poop target for one of the birds on the tree right above our heads... I was really lucky the target was my arm and not my head, but still, u-r-g-h!!! From there we stopped at the Hawa Mahal or Palace of the winds, which is the building that I most wanted to see in Jaipur. It is ...

... finding the 2AC carriage, we just hopped on at the closest carriage as the train started to depart. We very soon realised on boarding that we were far from our seats, mostly with help of some very nice Indian middle aged men. The door between the carriages were blocked so we could not walk to our carriage through the train. The Indian men told us that we had to wait an hour for the train to make a five minute stop at a particular station giving us enough ...