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Published: December 28th 2009
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Our hotel the Pearl Palace
Our roof top terrace where we spent our time eating yummy food,drinking delish cold coffees and watching the kites in the sky Hi Everyone... sorry for not posting sooner. We hope everyone is well and hope you are enjoying the Christmas hols. We moved on from
Delhi & Agra for Jaipur and Varanasi
Jaipur
My diary states that Jaipur was a breath of fresh air... literally. We were amazed that we could see the blue sky. We stayed at a lovely little place called the Pearl Palace which had a roof top restaurant from which we watched the world go by, drank lots of cold milk coffees and rocked on the little rocking chairs. Obviously we wanted to see what the Pink City had to offer so we rented an autorickshaw for the day and saw the Amer Fort which was perched on a hill side looking over lovely scenery. The highlight of the day for us was had to be the Jaipur Observatory known as the Jantar Mantar ('calculation instrument') which is a collection of architectural astronomical instruments, built by Maharaja (Ruler) Jai Singh II between 1727 and 1734. Each intrument measure something different - time, eclipses, star locations etc. We hired a guide who brought us around and told us about each instrument. Oh there was also a massive
Jantar Mantar - Observatory
Our obligatory cheesy tourist pic in front of the largest sundial in the world!! sundial in front of which we had to have an obligatory photo of course!! cheesy!
We had to stay a day longer in Jaipur because we couldn't get on the train (even though we booked the tickets 2 weeks in advance). Warning to anyone thinking of going to India, book your train tickets well in advance or you may be stranded! We left Jaipur on the 9th December for the Holy city Varanasi
Varanasi
It took us a total of about 19 hours on the train to get to Varanasi. We were so excited because we managed to get a AC 2 Tier ticket instead of a sleeper which meant that we had more space..wohoo.. and the toilets were a bit better although after 19 hours they didn't look so good! We passed the time playing cards, eye spying and chatting and of course sleeping and laughing (our fellow companion farted so loudly I thought he sneezed and we literally had to hold our breaths for like 10 mins, that's what curry does to you I guess!!)
Coming into Varanasi, the 'holy city' was a bit strange. The first thing we realised was that is was
Lis on the overnight train
The start of our 19 hour journey to Varanasi a bit of a tourist place with lots of shops.. It was the first time we saw a lot of foreigners which was actually quite nice.
We had an early start on our second day in Varanasi - 5am and we were on a little boat on the Ganges at 5.45am. It was nice to watch people going about their day - bathing in the Ganges, meditating and walking along the ghats. It was definately worth getting up for although it seems like everybody had the same idea! All in all it was worth going to Varanasi but like a lot of Indian cities you have to deal with the touts - offering you everything from head massages, sometimes weed and more often than not boat trips. We met a very entrepreneurial little boy selling floating flowers and postcards called Ajay, the first day he was selling them for 20 IRs per flower but when we went back the next day (we had promised that we would buy a flower then) the price miraculously rocketed to 50 IRS. I think he has a little place in our hearts now because it is the one memory we still hold of
Chris on his train bunk
Chris having a nap on our train journey - sporting his travel beard! Varanasi. He was so cheeky and mischievious - but you wonder what his future holds. We chatted to him about school and how important it was, a part of me thinks he'll turn into a little 'Del Boy' from Only Fools and Horses.
Like all major Indian cities Varanasi was tiring and by the end of our time in India we felt it was the natural time to move onto Nepal.
As stated in the Lonely planet -
"There are few countries on earth with the enormous variety that India has to offer. It's a place that somehow gets into your blood. Love it or hate it you can never ignore India. It's not an easy country to handle, and more than a few visitors are only too happy to finally get on their flight and leave the place
India is definately not a place to come for a 'holiday', it's tough, westerners are seen as money and unfortunately that does wear you down. Unfortunately it's hard to get under India's skin as a tourist, you feel like you've only dipped your toe in the water. But we did see glimpses of it through the people Our sunrise boat trip on the Ganges
We got up at 5am for this!!! An hour boat trip along the ghats. we met on the train. It was definitely an experience we will never forget and the Taj, the Ganges, the poverty will always be remembered.
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