View on the city
Early this morning we arrived in Bikaner, a city in the desert
of Rajastan. We visited the fortress. Inside the fortress was a beautiful and
luxurious palace with many exhibitions. When we were walking back to our
guesthouse we found a liquor-store. For the first time in weeks we could enjoy a
beer. Alcohol is often hard to find in India.
In the afternoon there was a short but heavy rainshower. It
made some of the smaller dusty streets change into pools of mud.
In the morning we visited a rat-temple. This temple was
located a few miles away in the desert. The rats in this temple are considered
as holy. At this moment there were not many rats in the temple. Most of them
sleep at daytime.
In the evening we took the night-bus to Jaisalmer. We were
the only tourists in the bus. At night we stopped near a tiny restaurant for
indian chai (tea cooked with milk and sugar). The bus went to several small
villages to pick up people. At some point even a small flock of goats entered
the bus.
Early in the morning we reached Jaisalmer. A lot of friends were already awaiting us. We chose a guesthouse that was listed in our travel- handbook. It was very cheap, only 35 rp, but this was because guesthouse owners in Jaisalmer expect you to book a camel safari tour. We did indeed book a tour here; First a short jeep-tour in the area around Jaisalmer and next a 2 day camel tour back to town.
View on the city
This morning we first went to sleep for a short time, because in the bus we'd had very little sleep. Later we visited the old fortress. Jaisalmer really has the atmosphere of a desert city. Even more than other cities in Rajastan. The fortress is a kind of labyrinth with many narrow alleys. Outside the fortress we saw a bhang-shop. This shop sold all kinds of food and drinks made with marijuana.
Bhang shop
In the morning we visited some other parts of Jaisalmer. We saw a couple of very beautiful old haveli's (large houses built by rich merchants). In the afternoon our desert tour started. With a jeep we visited a number of old monuments in the desert area. Later we went to the Sam dunes by camel, together with a guide. It was only a short ride, but after it my legs already felt stiff. Our guide cooked diner for us. At night we slept in the open air under a blanket.
This morning we continued our camel ride back to Jaisalmer. We traveled for about 3 or 4 hours with a couple of breaks to stretch our legs. The weather was nice. It was as if it was less hot on top of the camel than down on the ground. The desert had a quite diverse landscape. Sometimes sand- dunes and sometimes barren plains with rocks or small bushes. There were also parts were melons were grown. Around noon we reached a bushy area near a lake. Here we had lunch. At some moment a sheppard came by with a flock of sheep and goats. He milked one of the goats, so we had milk for in our tea!
Lunch in the desert
After lunch we went to the lake to swim. For the camels this was a good place to graze. At the end of the afternoon we continued our tour. At night we slept in the open air again.
Hans on a camel safari
This would be the last day of our camel tour. Our guide told that it would be possible to be back at Jaisalmer before noon. This part of the desert was even more beautiful than where we were yesterday. We could already see the fortress of Jaisalmer from far away. Back in Jaisalmer we spent the afternoon hanging around on terraces of restaurants. Although we had already checked out from our guesthouse, we could leave our luggage there and even have a shower at the end of the afternoon. We had dinner on a rooftop restaurant near the fortress gate, with a nice view over the city. In the evening we took the nighttrain to Jodhpur.
We had planned 1 day to visit Jodhpur. Our main target here was the fortress. The fortress of Jodhpur is very massive and heavilly fortified and is located on a hill. It is a kind of fortress that is not easy to conquer by enemies (at least that's what we think. There was no siege going on at that moment). Inside the fortress there was a beautiful palace, just like in Bikaner.
The fortress
In the evening we took the bus to Udaipur. It was a very old one which was trembling and shaking a lot. It was impossible to sleep in this bus.
Around 4 o'clock we arrived in Udaipur. As soon as we had found a guesthouse we went to sleep. Udaipur is a relativly quite and beautiful city. It lies in a hilly area with a couple of lakes. Our guesthouse was located on the slope of a hill near the biggest lake. Like most guesthouses here it had a roof terrace with a nice view.
View from the lake
Later that day we visited the palace. In the town we were several times approached by young guys who said they were artists ad who wanted us to have a look at their 'art schools'. They all claimed that they would soon go to Holland to have their paintings exhibited in the Bijenkorf (a department store) in Amsterdam. We went to one of those art schools but didn't buy anything.
This day we rented bicycles to visit the area around Udaipur.
This is a good place for bicycles, because the traffic is far less heavy and
chaotic as in other indian cities. We visited a couple of beautiful parks and
also made a trip around one of the lakes. Luckily the weather was not too hot
today.
When we were having dinner the guy from our guesthouse
asked us to help him with writing a love letter to a swedish girl that he had
met some time ago. It was very funny and sometimes hilarious. This guy was also
a great lover of western music, like the Beatles end Bob Marley. But he also
liked my tape of Bodycount, especially the 'explicit lyrics'.
The Lake Palace
Today we made a trip with a boat on the lake. We went along a
couple of ghats. That are places near the water where people wash their cloths.
From the lake we had a great view on the city. The boat also went near the Lake
Palace. This palace is build on a small island in the lake near the city.
Nowadays it is a hotel. It probably is one of the most beautiful and luxuriuos
hotels in India. We had been thinking about having dinner in this hotel. Then we
would have had a fantastic meal with many different dishes in a beautiful palace
with music and dancers etc. But it would be very expensive, at least 5 times as
much as we usualy spent on diner in India. However, later we realised that it
was not expensive at all if we compared it to the prices in dutch restaurants.
We had been stupid to miss this opportunity.
In the evening we took the nighttrain to Jaipur.
For Jaipur we had only planned 1 day. We were going to see the city with an organised bus-trip like we had done in Delhi. That had been a cheap and handy way to see many things in just one day. Just like in Delhi, the first thing we visited was a hindu temple. This one was a nice modern temple made from white marble. The next thing we visited was the famous 'palace of the winds'. But here the bus only drove by without stopping. We now went to a large astronomical observatory, with a couple of huge sundials. Then we went to the old mharaja palace. This was not very interresting for us, because we had already seen so many similar palaces in other cities. After this we went to the Amber fort, which was a bit outside the city. This was one of the nicest we had seen so far. The tour also went to a tourist shop, but we were not interrested in that and instead went to a nearby terrace. There we found out that indian cows really love banana-peels.
Wall in Amber palace
After the bus-trip we took the train to Agra, which was not too far away from here. There we wanted to go to the "Tourist Rest House", which we knew was popular with budget travelers. You had to be careful, because many riskha drivers want to bring you to other places like "Tourist Guesthouse" or "New Tourist Rest House", places where they get more commision money. But we succeeded. It was indeed a nice guesthouse where we could talk with other travelers.
The first thing we visited this morning was the Red Fort. It was a similar one as the Red Fort in Delhi, but this one was far more beautiful. It also was in a better condition. The next visit was an old mausoleum. It was a bit in the same style as the Taj Mahal, but this one was much smaller.
Mausoleum
In the afternoon I went to the post office to send some
postcards to Holland. It was very close to our guesthouse, so I decided to walk.
But during the whole walk I was followed by riksha drivers offering a ride. They
just didn't take no for an answer.
In the evening we went to the Taj Mahal. This is probably
the most famous building in India. It was indeed very impressive. Espescially
with the orange glow from the sunset.
Taj Mahal
This morning we first went to Fatehpur Sikri. This was once the capital of the Moghul empire, but now it is almost deserted. The old buildings however are still in good shape.
Fatehpur Sikri
In the afternoon we took a bus to Barathpur. This place is known for its bird park. Most guesthouses were located near the entrance of the park.
Banana market
In the end of the afternoon we took a walk throuh the park. There were indeed many different kinds of birds. But they didn't look as exotic as I had expected. I had expected colorful parrots etc, but most of them were just plain brown or black or white. We also saw some other animals like deer, apes, a moose and some jackals. At night there were many mosquitos in our room, but we had brough mosquito nets to sleep under.
Early this morning we went to the park again. We had heared
that this was the best time to watch the birds. We rented bicycles from our
guesthouse. Unfortunatly most paths in the park were unpaved and not very
accessible for bicycles.
In the afternoon we went back to Agra. There we were going
to take the nighttrain to Varanasi. There were a great number of people going to
Agra. Our bus was very crowded. And we had also seen some trucks fully loaded
with people. At the station we ate at the station restaurant. Almost every train
station has such a restaurant with usualy one standard meal: thali (a couple of
'dahl' sauces with rice and chapati-bread). When we went to our train we found
out that there were a lot of seats that were reserved twice. Many people were
argueing about seats. But we were lucky that our reserved seats were still
unoccupied.
The train journey lasted for most part of this day. We spent
most time by watching throug the window, listening at our walkman and laying on
our sleeping places. At some moment a guy in our compartment discovered that a
bag with his passport and most of his money was stolen.
At the end of the afternoon we arrived in Varanasi. This is
the most holy city for hindus. Many of them come to this place to bath in the
Ganges river. Also many dead people are cremated here.
At the train station we first reserved tickets for the
train to Bombay which we were going to take a couple of days later. This took us
more than an hour. Now we took a riksha to a guesthouse. We had read in our
travel guidebooks that the "Yogi Lodge" was a good one. However it was more
expensive than we expected and also not as good. Especially the restaurant was
quite bad. We had to wait for ages for our food and the quality was very
poor.
This morning we wanted to visit the ghats at the Ganges river. When we left the guy from our guesthouse gave us a card with the name and address of our guesthouse. He said that we would need this when we would take a riksha back. I wondered why because I thought that all riksha drivers knew the Yogi Lodge. When I looked at the card later that morning I saw that the real name of our guesthouse was "gold YOGI LODGE". We had been decieved. Later I found out that there are at least a dozen fake Yogi Lodges in Varanasi.
Cows in the streets
Varanasi turned out to be a rather crowded city with heavy
traffic in the streets and lots of holy cowes everywhere. Who did 'their needs'
wherever they pleased. On the one hand it was a nice city, but also one of the
dirtiest I had seen in India.
Near the Ganges river were a number of cremation ghats. We
didn't see an actual cremation, but there were rests of burned wood all over the
place, some still smoking. And lots of dogs searching for roasted human meat. It
was not allowed to take pictures here. We took a boat trip on the river, but
unfortunatly there was not that much to see at the ghats at this time of the
day. We also had some problems with the rower who was rather lazy and who wasn't
a good guide either. We decided to leave the boat at the next ghat and try again
tomorrow.
Ganges river
The ghat where we had left the boat was the most important one of the city. The place was swarmed with "friends" so we quickly left the place. We walked a bit through the old center of town with its many narrow streets and alleys. In the afternoon we went to the train station again to reserve tickets for Goa. This took us a lot of time. We were sent from one desk to another and back again. The queues at the desks were often very chaotic. But it was funny to see how the people behind the desks always kept very calm, even when 3 or more people were yelling for them at the same time.
Today we got up early because we had learned that the best time to view the ghats was after sunrise. We took a bicycle riksha to the river. However, the riksha driver, who hardly spoke any english, took us in the direction of the train station. When he refused to turn around we just jumped off and took another riksha. At the river we took a boat trip again. This time we had a better rower. This one also was a good guide. There was a lot to see along the ghats. Many pilgrims taking a bath in the river or meditating on the shore, but also people washing clothes etc. We had our doubts about the purity of the water, though. At some moment we saw a human corpse floating on the river! The rower told us that some poor families didn't have enough money to pay for a cremation.
Bathing pilgrims
After our boat-trip we visited to the old center again. At the
end of the morning we went back to our guesthouse, because we had to check out
before 12 o'clock. We wanted to take shower before leaving, but this morning the
water supply in this nasty hotel wasn't working.
We spent the afternoon waiting at the train station. At the
end of the afternoon our train to Bombay left.
We spent the whole day traveling. We talked a bit with the
other passengers, who were young indian students.
Late in the evening we arrived at Bombay. The station was
very crowdy and chaotic. Everywhere there were people sitting or sleeping. We
first had to change our tickets to Goa, because we had found out that the people
in Varanasi had made an error. We had to pay some baksheesh to get things
straight in time.
It was not easy to find a place to sleep. We first wanted
to sleep at the platform where our train would leave next morning, but here it
was very noisy and we didn't feel safe as well. Later we found a waiting room in
the station. Although this was very crowded too, we managed to find a place to
sleep there.
Early in the morning we took the train to Goa. At first the train was almost empty, but at the next station a lot of people entered the train. During the journey we talked a bit with a friendly indian family. They asked us a lot about ourselves and about our country. In the afternoon it started raining outside. There were heavy showers with thunderstorms. Unlike the other parts of India that we had visited, the monsoon period was not yet finnished here. In the evening we had to change to another train. At the station we had only a couple of minutes to have dinner. In the train we had to take 1st class seats because all 2nd class sleeper-seats were already occupied. It was rather expensive, including the baksheesh, but we had little choice.
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