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Published: March 27th 2005
Ranakpur overview
One of the five holy Jain temples in IndiaWe were at the Udaipur bus stand at around 3:15 p.m., trying to catch a bus to
Ranakpur. We had seen photos of this fantastic Jain temple in coffeetable books in Udaipur and considered it worth a visit. For the first time since our arrival, we booked a hotel in advance; firstly, because we had not found anything that suited us in the guidebook (there was pretty little in) and secondly we wanted a special place for a special occasion, Stephan's birthday. We were told that a bus would come at 4 p.m. but this one did not turn up (due to the Holi festival) and we had to wait for another hour. Finally, the bus left at 5:15 p.m., and our journey through beautiful landscape could begin. We were on the best roads so far in India, rolling hillocks kept passing by and the bus was winding its way up through narrow curves. We really had a nice time, until, 20 km from our destination, darkness set in and at the same time we were heading downhill again. Of course the curves were as narrow as the ones uphill, due to the limited visibility and our driver's urge to stretch
Ranakpur detail
Already from the outside, the temple's grandeur is seen the bus's performance to its limits, we were feeling like on a roller coaster. Klaudia could not decide whether she would get sick, fortunately she decided against it and we were not completely sure to arrive in one piece. Either the driver was better than we thought or we were merely lucky, we arrived safely, only to be thrown out of the bus in the middle of nowhere. Still quite dizzy, Klaudia stepped out of the bus, into two nicely put heaps of cow dung she had not detected in the dark. There were only a small restaurant and an even smaller shop on the other side of the street and Stephan had to find a phone to confirm our arrival to the hotel, so that somebody could pick us up. He went away, leaving Klaudia with the luggage and her smelling shoes. All of a sudden, a taxi arrived and offered to take us to our hotel. Klaudia refused the offer, trusting Stephan to find his way. Then Stephan came back with the good news that a jeep would soon arrive. Somebody once told us that one can never get lost in India, and although this time we thought
Flags
Jingle bells jingle bells jingle all the way... the saying would prove wrong, it once again turned out to be true. What a strange wonderful country indeed!
The manager of the
Ranakpur Hill Ressort himself picked us up and we did not drive long. We had chosen a lovely hotel, in a beautifully kept garden, with a huge swimming pool. In addition to that, we were to sleep in a tent because there were no rooms free. Forget about camping, this was luxury (at least to us)! It was rather big, with a soft bed, several beautiful chairs and other pieces of furniture. But the bathroom topped it all! It was only impeccably clean, but also disposed of the most modern and well working fittings, believe us, we have seen shabbier bathrooms in Europe. There were also three huge mastiffs, one of them a "small" puppy. They were extremely friendly and Klaudia immediately fell in love with them. Anyway, we were reasonably tired and Stephan had not completely recovered, so we went to bed fairly early.
March 28 HAPPY BIRTHDAY STEPHAN!
Klaudia put on her best dress for the occasion and spent the biggest part of the morning in the pool. Unfortunately, Stephan did not
Entrance
An outstanding place to rest feel very well and contented himself with watching her from the edge. Around 12 o'clock we decided to go to see the Jain temples. There were neither auto rickshaws nor taxis around and we had no clue about the buses' timetables, so we decided to walk. It was quite far and hot, too, but not boring. We realised that we were in the middle of a wildlife park and on huge signposts deer and leopards were painted, we were on the constant lookout for them. The only "wild" animals we encountered were some monkeys, though. We had a small bite in the restaurant where we had got of the bus the evening before. From there, we saw a wonderful bird in black and white with a bright orange belly. When we entered the temple complex, we spotted it again and sat down to watch it and other birds. The rules for entering a holy
Jain temple (this being one of the five holy Jain complexes in India) are very strict. Shoes and socks must be removed (nothing unusual so far), black clothing is not permitted, neither any leather article. Neither women nor men are allowed to show their legs, this
Hall
In this complicated structure, every bit was carved day we were both doing so, that's why Stephan had to put on light blue pyjama pants and Klaudia a long white dress in which she looked like the high priestess of an obscure sect.
Already from outside, this temple (completely in white stone) was impressive; the central shrine is within a 100 sq m raised terrace and the sanctuary is enclosed by a high wall with 66 subsidiary shrine lining it. The whole, including the extraordinary array of engraved pillars (1144, and all different!), carved ceilings and arches are intricately decorated, often with images of Jain saints, friezes of scenes from their lives and holy sites. The beautiful lace-like interiors of the corbelled domes are a superb example of western Indian temple style. At the outside, many small red and white flags were hung, fluttering in the breeze and at the same time moving small bells to a constant tinkling, almost like in Tibet. We spent many hours there, relatively undisturbed by the priests or the other tourists. Although we do not belong to this religion, its mythical spell did not leave us untouched.
We were not in the mood of walking back, so we took a
Ceiling
After the visit, we had stiff necks, no wonder considering such beauty overhead taxi and Klaudia did other rounds in the wonderful pool. This evening, we ordered chicken and finger chips, which is their expression for chips, what we got was chicken with potatoes. It was served with a tasty sauce and the manager invited us to some local whisky, which was not bad. We had spent a nice day and hopefully Stephan enjoyed his birthday.
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sunita Jain
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Ranakpur Hotels
We were there to see Ranakpur jain temple, after visiting temple we were going to Jodhpur by road, and we saw a Palace (just about 4-5 km from temple) and it was very good hotel their it is known as Fateh Bagh. http://www.fatehbaghranakpur.com