Interesting IndiGo flight yesterday! The Indian guy sitting next to me asks me where I'm from so I ask him. I didn't understand what he said so I got my India map out and he showed me. Then he says "How old are you?" I say 71. I ask him: He says "hmmmm". He asks me 3 times if I have my own business and I say "no". Then he asks me how much I paid for the air tickets; my reply "I don't remember". He owns his own business, his son is a tech guy age 41 and goes to the USA 7 days ever month or two to Chicago, NYC, Los Angeles, San Francisco and more.
So - arrived at the hotel and these are the grounds. In my life of travel I have never seen places like we have seen here but I'm guessing the alternatives and quite different and good choices are fewer.
City tour for several hours today and we visited the Fateh Prakesh Palace and it was super awesome. We could take the short tour or a bit longer so 5 of us out of 24 took the longer - not Ross. It was narrow passageways, lots of stairs that were a bit challenging but good exercise and well worth it.
The long tour went all the way to the top and all the way across from left to right.
I was really just taking a photo of this shop and people here seem to like to have their photo taken but this guy I'm not sure!
They bring in wild tigers for wedding celebrations and then return them back to their normal abode. The weddings here cost an average of $70,000 and in December a wedding here cost 100 million dollars and it lasted 3 days and Beyonce sang for 3 hours - Holy Tiger!!!
The police and security people here are so sweet and helpful and yes they are all over the place.
The owner lives in the apartment at the top of this shop and of course no elevators.
This is all marble and it's all over the place and so fantastic. Our guide says this is cheaper marble than the Taj Mahal.
This is a Hindu shrine, one of 4 we circled past, and we did enter a Hindu temple and just had to remove our shoes and there was a ceremony going on so interesting.
Small section of the tall marble building and these are telling a story and apparently some are yoga poses.
This is the whole building and of course all hand carved marble.
There are a few people sitting my shrines but they do not beg and the way to help is to go into the shrine and there is a "depository box" where the money will be shared as in a charity.
Click to enlarge. Beautiful entry to the Castle and it has the Sanskrit Indian swastika which is religious, faith, satisfaction, devotion and all good. In googling I find that Native Americans in the USA have a similar sign. It faces a different direction that the hateful Nazi swastika.
Every day they bring these beautiful well tended horses up to the palace horse stalls for a few hours so people can see them and then they head back home.
I think the carrier pigeons were before drones right? I remember reading stories about trained carrier pigeons.
My story is I felt something drop on my head - it wasn't raining and I put my finger up there and it came back with green stuff on it. I bent over and showed our guide who says "It's your lucky day" and smiles and then tells me to let it dry and it will come off easily. - It worked after a few hours.
Beautiful glass and jeweled rooms in the palace like I've never seen before.
This was a huge room all handpainted floor to ceiling and a memorial from a royal for his wife who died. Since they have cremation here they don't have cemeteries or big tombstones that we are familiar with.
View from the top of the palace - not bad! The square in the middle near the restaurant umbrellas is where we started the walking tour and the 5 hearty souls made it to the top!
This is an "office" in the palace. I see these low tables and couches all over and it doesn't look comfortable but it is all in what you are used to.
This is just another beautiful room in the palace used for entertainment and maybe playing with the concubines?
This is one of the kings and he fell off a horse and was paralyzed - this is just a photo not the real guy!
And his wheelchair and it looks like a regular house - well a little fancier than our house but not all glitter and gold in every room.
This is the Sun we see all over as it is the motto for this area of India called Rajasthan.
And this beautiful peacock is thousands of little pieces of glass set to perfection.
And we got to the top of the castle and all the way across from left to right and there are trees growing up there - how does that work?
The Indian Army has a high presence and they look very peaceful and friendly and guard a lot of places.
Day 10 on the terrace after group lunch. We are the longest married couple at 46 years on the tour and I think Ross might be laughing at the pigeon poop on my head!
Another yummy tasting menu and it was fried ricotta - awesome. We have had a lot of Indian food but there is a lot of variety so not like Morocco where we had almost the same food every day for 10 days.
After lunch we got on these little boats and had a tour of Lake Pichola and a ride to our hotel which was just across the lake.
Like in Varanasi on the Ganges this lady was doing laundry but the water is so much cleaner.
A little guest house on the water. I'm not sure how easy it would be to get to some of these and I can assure you we would never drive in India.
Bath and hair shampoo time for the young boys and it's a typical sight.
They call this city the "Venice of India" and I looked over and this does look a lot like the Rialto Bridge in Venice.
And the bathing area for the women.
Entrance to our hotel and it is full of green grass and trees and flowers all over.
And lastly as it is 6pm and time to get ready for dinner - the temperature today is 90 degrees Fahrenheit but not too humid so "not bad" compared to the 31.5 inch snow record we just received in Minnesota for February.
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