Jaisalmer...and a camel ride in the Thar desert!

by Berit

Shades of camels in the Thar desert...

Our guide and me!

That's how it looks to ride a camel! Sometimes Vincent's camel wanted to itch his back but he was also sharing his sweat with him in the same time... 

Beautiful dunes

Waves in the dunes 

More beautiful dunes... 

Us! 

Walking on the dunes... 

On the way to the sunset and dinner place 

Jumping in the sand! 

Enjoying the sunset 

Preparing the delicious dinner 

Jaisalmer and its huge fort

The fort at sunset

The "Cristo Redentor" attitude by Vincent 

Streets of Jaisalmer 

A "haveli", a typical house from India

A nice site close to Jaisalmer

After a 6 hour bus ride where me, Vincent, a big Indian woman and a small Indian man shared two seats in the bus, we were very happy to arrive in Jaisalmer, a desert city close to the border of Pakistan. The most popular activity in this city, except getting lost in narrow, labyrinth streets, is to get on a camel and hump off into the desert. We didn't want to miss the main attraction, so we booked a "sunset trip" in the desert. After a short car ride, three camels, one for each off us and one for the guide were waiting for us. Vincent got to ride his own, while the guide was holding mine. I started insisting on riding on my own too, since I had just as much experience riding camels as Vincent (which is zero experience...) The guide explained in broken English that if I really wanted to I could, but he had bought the camel a few hours earlier that day, and he didn't know if it would be jumping, running or biting, or all of the three. So I stopped insisting and we started the ride.

The further we went the nicer the sand dunes became. It was really beautiful and peaceful. Vincent did quite good riding his camel, except he kept trying to make it move faster, but the camel refused. Slowly, and little by little we got to the end point of the ride, some nice dunes with a good view of the sunset. While we strolled around on the dunes our three (!) guides prepared dinner on a bonfire. Rice, curry and chapati (bread) on one little fire, everything made from scratch!(Something to learn for us norwegians with our hotdogs over the fire...?) Good food, bonfire in the desert and a sky full of stars; we were feeling very happy to be on holiday.

Jodhpur, the blue city

by Vincent

Jodhpur, seen from the fort. No wonder why we call it the blue city.

The fort of Jodhpur

Traveling by night bus in India is fun (or not).

Spices and rices...

The cow gang in the street!

Calling parents in the street from a small shop...

Berit with a lot of kids while visiting country side villages

Trying pottery. Not so easy!

Visiting a weaver community. It takes up to 3 weeks to make a carpet...

The opium ceremony in the Bishnoi family

Berit trying a turban. 

A guy smoking in the fort

Inside the fort, a lot of decorations

To go from Udaipur to Jodhpur, we traveled for the first time in India during the night and by bus. And of course, it's like nowhere else in the world. Instead of a seat, we had a kind of box for both of us, with a closing door. It looked a bit like the frozen food compartment of a supermarket. Obviously, night buses in India don't have any place to put luggages so we had to take them with us in the box. They don't have toilets either. So we had very little space left for us but we managed to be comfortable anyway. But the problem of traveling by night bus in India is not really the confort, it's the state of the road: the roads are so bad that we've been jumping in our box all night!

After 8 hours, we arrived in Jodhpur. You have to guess it because the driver will not announce anything. He dropped us in te middle of nowhere in Jodhpur at 5am. Fortunately, we found a rickshaw to drive us to the hotel. Close to the hotel, the rickshaw driver went out to ask for directions but he forgot to put the hand brake (I don't know if rickshaws actually have hand brakes...). The road was a bit steep so we started to move backwards. We started to wonder if we just had to jump out of the rickshaw or wait to hit a wall when someone coming from nowhere managed to stop it for us.

After sleeping a bit more in the hotel, we went to see the city, famous for its huge fort and the blue color of its houses. The city itself is not exceptional and we don't realize that it's blue when we walk in the streets but the fort and the views from it are really worth it. From there, we can see clearly why we call Jodhpur the blue city.

While we were walking in the steep streets, on our way to the fort, a guy invited us to his home. As usual, we didn't really know what he wanted from us but accepted because he was very nice. We sat on the floor in his living room and started to speak. "Which country?", "Married?", "Work?". Then he told us about his family and didn't forget to mention that his wife was doing beautiful henna tattoos. When we left, he invited us to see the money collection of his son. He had notes and coins from all over the world and from very unusual countries like Liberia, Bolivia or South Korea but, strangely he had only two missing: Euro and US Dollar, so he asked us if we could complete his collection...

The second day, we went on a tour with a guide in the country side to see life and communities in the small villages. It was really good to see other things than cities in India. Every community is specialized in a type of work. We visited shepherds, muslim pottery makers, weavers, as well as Bishnoi family. Bisnoi people live with 29 principles such as being vegetarian (not even eggs), protect nature and animals, etc. We call them the "first ecological people". They also drink opium by the way. The guide, who was from one of these villages, was very good and explained us a lot about life in the country side of Rajasthan.

Udaipur

by Vincent

Train station in India - some garbage problems...

Textile shop using the latest technology

There are real tigers in India!

The Lake Palace, seen in James Bond movie "Octopussy"

One of the many Sadhus we meet in India. Sadhus are renouncers who have chosen to live a life apart from or on the edges of society in order to focus on their own spiritual practice

Women washing clothes in the water of the lake

Udaipur seen from one of the island in the lake

View from a bridge

The wonderfully carved Jagdish temple 

We hesitated a moment about going or not to Udaipur. It would have been a big mistake not to go. Beside the lake Pichola, Udaipur has a lot of charm and a romantic touch with its nice, narrow and crooked streets on the hills. We finally found a quiet and peaceful place in India. Yes, it's possible!

The number one sight of the city is obviously the beautiful lake. We took a boat ride and could see and stop in the islands. One of them is a world famous luxury hotel, "Lake Palace", which appears in the James Bond movie "Octopussy".

We spent two nice days relaxing in the city, spending some time in rooftop restaurant and cafes with views on the lake, as well as some time in... the toilets! The famous Indian diarrhea had finally got us, like probably  every western tourist traveling in India.

Jaipur and Pushkar

by Berit

City Palace of Jaipur

Vincent in the City Palace

Life in the streets of Jaipur

Making of the famous Indian textiles

Hawa Mahal, Jaipur

Relaxing days in Pushkar

India, a country full of colors!

And a country full of colorful people.

In the streets of Pushkar. Women of all ages often wear a lot of jewellery. 

The holy lake and the ghats in Pushkar.

Fruit market

View of Pushkar from the nearby hill. Rajasthan is a very dry region. From above, Pushkar with its lake looks like a small oasis in the big desert.

After busy days in Delhi and Agra we were longing to get away from the big city life and see more of the "spiritual" India. So we headed towards the holy city Pushkar. On the way we did a stop in Jaipur, the capital of Rajasthan (the state in India were we would be traveling the next weeks). We didn't plan on staying long, as it is another big and busy city. But when we arrived late one night the rickshaw driver taking us to our hotel, took us to a very peaceful neighborhood with empty streets. So we reached to the only logical conclusion: we are being kidnapped! Of course this turned out to be not completely true. It was simply a peaceful neighborhood... A bit paranoid one may think. But well, it was the first time we had seen an empty street in India, no wonder we were worried.

We spent a nice day in Jaipur, visiting among others the City Palace and the funny looking Hawa Mahal (see picture) and wandering in the bazaars. Again we were overwhelmed by life of the bazaars, all the things they sell, the smells, colors, sounds...

The next day we went on to Pushkar. Inside the city it is a holy lake surrounded by bathing ghats. Hindu pilgrims come here to take a bath in the sacred water. The "spirituality" of the city was a bit hidden behind touristy shops and fake priests tricking people to do some kind of ceremony by the lake and then charge for it (yes, we did it...). But it was still a nice little city were we spent a few relaxing days. Specially nice was a walk to a temple on top of a hill, with monkeys jumping around and a good view of the city and the lake.

On the way to Taj Mahal

by Vincent

Meeting "papa et maman" in Delhi!

4 on a motorbike, usual stuff in India

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Waiting on the side of the road while the taxi driver is repairing the wheel... Lucky!

The Taj Mahal

Playing with lights...

A Japanese tourist liked so much our photo that he wanted to take the same one. Berit the model, making of!

A guy praying in Taj Mahal

That's us! Taj Mahal: checked!

Market in Agra

Taj Mahal is an unmissable stop when you travel to India. It is one of the seven wonders and is often referred to as the most beautiful building in the world. This monument was built by the Emperor Shâh Jahân in 1644 in adoration for his third wife who died giving birth to their 14th child.

On the morning of the saturday the 18th of february, we met my parents at their hotel in Delhi to travel together to Agra, city of the Taj Mahal. They had arrived during the night from France and were about to start a two-weeks holiday in North India. We had planned to spend that day together before they headed to Varanasi.

Even if there are only 200km between Delhi and Agra, we needed 7 hours to get to our destination instead of the 3 or 4 announced initially by the taxi company. Except in very few places, it seems that cities and villages never stop along the road. It is so busy everywhere! Is it impossible to get away from the chaos of Delhi? Will it be always like that in India? Well, we have to accept it after all. But when on top of that you have an unexpected event happening, that's different...

While we were on the highway (not sure we can really call it a highway though) 100km away from Delhi, we suddenly heard a noise from the left back of the car and the vehicle started to go left on the other lane of the road. The driver couldn't do anything about it. We started to see ourselves falling on the side of the road when the driver miraculously managed to control the car to stop it on the side, with half of the car still on the road. We went immediately out of the car and were so happy that nothing happened to us! The tire had exploded and was completely destroyed. What would have happened if it had been another vehicle on the other lane? The taxi driver took the situation with a constant serenity that only Indians know the secret of. He repaired the wheel and we continued our trip slowly, very slowly...

At 5pm, we arrived in Agra. My parents went to visit the Taj Mahal quickly on the same day because they had a train to Varanasi in the night. On our side, we took our time the day after to enjoy the visit better and see the Taj Mahal at sunrise. Not much to say about Taj Mahal, photos say more than words. Yes, it's beautiful!