Ranthambore and Jaipur

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Namaste Readers! Alright, this is round 2 because the computer did not save round 1. I apologize in advance. I've got several days and adventures to catch you up on, so get ready to read!

After Agra, we had a 6 hour ride to Ranthambore National Park. It was nice to finally be out of the city, but the last hour and half was spent on roads washed out by the monsoon. Ranthambore is beautiful. Our hotel was cute, but they had 2 nights of folk dancing and fire breathing. Which wouldn't have been bad, except it was the same thing. Both nights. And we had no idea the story behind the dance. It was accompanied by an awesome pasta bar, so not all bad. While in the national park we had 3 jeep safaris. Going into the park on jeeps was a blast. There were so many animals:


• Langurs (monkeys)
• Spotted Deer
• Sambra Deer
• Crocodiles
• Gazelle (rare sighting)
• European Kingfisher(rare sighting)
• Common Kingfisher
• Parakeets
• Alexander Parakeets(rare sighting)
• Black Stork
• White Necked Stork
• Snake Bird
• Egret
• Heron
• Jackals(rare sighting)
• Peahens
• Peacocks (plentiful)
• Rufus Tree Pie
• 7 Sisters(birds)
• Leopard prints


We believe thats it. It was a blast. However, for being a tiger safari, we saw everything but the tiger. Paw marks, Claw marks, scat, a very fresh kill with blood and drag marks and alarm calls. We were close to every alarm call, so we could only assume the tiger was about 200 yards away, just over the hill. At the hotel though, we conducted a puppy safari and named the puppies Tooooonya and Tigerbait.

Yesterday we had a 4 hour drive to Jaipur. Our hotel here in Jaipur is beautiful and overlooks a lake with the Jal Mahal (water palace) in it. Today we went to the Amber Fort and took an elephant ride to the palace. It was sooo much fun and our elephant was speedy. After that we drove the observatory and the city palace. The observatory was built to help 17th century astrologers with horoscopes. It looks like a modern art sculpture garden. The city palace is were the current Raj of Rajasthan lives. It was really cool and we got to see paintings of the 8 Rajs' before they became just a place holder. After that we went to 2 shops, one that grinds and polishes gems and the other did block printing and rug making. It was cool!

Tonight is New Years Eve and the Indians look like they're ready to party. It's going to be another cultural experience. Have a good New Years everyone!!

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