Rajasthan Road Trip

First up, apologies my dear reader(s)…

As was inevitable, I've been too busy travelling and having fun to keep the blog up to date.

This entry covers a fabulous fortnight spent in Rajasthan. One blog post can’t really do this section of the journey justice.

Along with our two travelling buddies Paul and Kate, plus Sharma, our tobacco-chewing-and-door-opening-to-spit-very-regularly driver for hire, we spent 15 nights exploring the relics of the region’s ancient kingdoms.

We squeezed in so many sights, experiences and adventures in that it’d be impossible to mention the lot.

Visits to countless forts, palaces, temples, museums and more in Jaipur, Rathanbhore, Pushkar, Bikanher, Jaisalmer, Jodpur, Ranakhpur and Udaipur.

I’ll just list a few of my highlights…

The first thing that springs to mind is the we saw a wild tiger in
Rathanbhore National Park. This was cool, because there are reportedly less than 4,000 of the critters left outside captivity.

The odds were certainly stacked against us. Unable to get a smaller vehicle, we crammed into a 20-seater petrol jeep, the only white faces amongst excited and far-from-quiet holidaying Indians. Towards the end of the sortie, we were passed by several smaller jeeps ferrying beaming Westerners who had evidently just seen a tiger. 

Fortunately, after waiting around for an hour, a dirty great Tiger appeared under a tree a couple of yards from our jeep. It looked at us, I took a photo of it and it shirked off again.

Another animal related experience of note was visiting Bikanher’s Karni Mata ‘Rat Temple.’ 20,000 rats swarm there and are catered for and worshipped. Don’t worry, it’s lucky if one (or more) run over your feet. I do not envy the dedicated Hindus who permanently live there to take care of the rats. The place stunk.

Of the many forts we visited, Jodpur was my favourite. It has an extensive museum plus cannon collection. We took an audio tour and the coolest moment was when the narrator explained that the main gates are placed at a right angle to the path to prevent charging, barging war-elephants from building up momentum.

Also in Jodpur, we met Mr Egg. King of the omelettes. For the last 30 years, the man has cracked, whisked and fried 1,500 eggs per day. Up yours Heston, he really has the world's greatest omelette recipe. I ate there three times.

At the impressive Jaipur Fort, which still has 18km of intact perimeter walls, I tried my hand at snake charming. 



With grade 4 Oboe in the locker (rock and roll, dude) I was hoping to impress the gathered crowd (plus the snakes) with quick blast of The Simpsons theme tune. As it happened, the instrument was nothing like an Oboe and I sounded shit. Still, for a short time, I had a cobra placed round my neck and will never have to do it again to find out that it is pretty bloody scary.

Jaisalmer was a nice sandy change of scene. We entered the desert on camels and spent the night there in canvas tents watching the clear starry sky.

In Udaipur, we took an excellent cooking lesson at the home of Vijay Singh. Formerly 1989 butterfly stroke swimming champion of India and now a handsomely-moustached cooking teacher, I couldn’t help thinking as Dave and I learnt the recipes of paneer butter masala, veg kofta and chapattis under the watchful gaze of a portrait of Vijay in his speedos, that his life story could be a Will Ferrell movie.

With Hindus celebrating the festival of Diwali, we entered into the spirit of things by buying special outfits. I chose a T-shirt sporting an effigy of the monkey God Hanuhman until I was laughed at by a local since it’s a symbol of celibacy…