Holy Pushkar and Camel Safari

Another early start for a 6am train which meant it was trusty breakfast biscuits again although I did make it even less healthy by adding a bottle of Pepsi and packet of salt and vinegar crisps that I bought at the station.

The TukTuk ride in the dark was quite a scary experience - at least the driver seemed able to predict and swerve the potholes!  The train was more like our first train ride and assigned seats and more room.  

4 hours on a well worn seat did make me glad to be off although the station was almost more crazy than Delhi with and I think our taxi driver fancied himself as a getaway driver overtaking cars to skip through what appeared to be a roadblock!

We arrived at our very nice hotel and ordered lunch and settled in - I had another shower as my hair is still full of oil from my massage yesterday!

Lunch was pleasant enough, but more basic to some of the food that I've become accustomed to and was a very mild palak paneer and vegetable Biriani.

At 4pm as it started to get cooler we headed off for our camel safari.  I was nervous because I've never ridden a Camek before and they are so tall! It was actually great - my camel - Maharaja was so placid and well behaved (until his few detours on the way back to eat flowers) and it was much easier to get on and off than I had anticipated - the key is to lean back when they stand up or sit down.

Our safari took us through the village into sand dunes where we stopped so that the camel handlers could start a fire and boil up some chai.  We all had a little cup of chai and a biscuit whilst the camels had a rest and some gypsies who'd spotted us came over to play us some music.

We set off again to get to Pushkar and have a city walk.  We stopped briefly to visit a very holy temple of Brahma which was interesting, but strictly no photos and then we walked through streets with many weapon and clothes stalks as well as some selling creepy looking dolls!

Pushkar is a holy city which means no meat or alcohol and the most holy place is the lake.  

To get back to our hotel the quickest route was via the lake, but we had to take our shoes off to walk past it and cross a footbridge!

I took another shower before dinner and signed up for a voluntary early start for a sunrise hike tomorrow.  Dinner was a bit disappointing as the "kebab" I ordered was more like a dry veggie burger, but the Gulab Jalam dessert was delicious!

Palm reading

Today didn't start as planned, my second  bout of DB meant that the prospect of Yoga first thing was not going to happen which was extremely frustrating.  I rested some more before getting up for the cooking class at 10am.

The cooking class was attached to our hotel and run by the owner who had a very witty style and unusual tone to his voice.  The first thing we learned to make (after smelling all the spices first) was masala tea which Joe was tasked with preparing.  We all got to sample the tea which was very tasty.

We then moved onto the next recipe, but unfortunately at that point I started feeling  quite faint and so ended up lying down on the floor on a tiny corner of the room before deciding to head back to the hotel for a lie down - one of the class helpers walked me back which wasn't far and I came away with the recipes to try out back home... Although I was really disappointed to have missed it.

We met up again as a group at 2pm and organised which order to go in for Palm reading.  Raj also arranged a massage for me first - it was certainly an experience!

I love having massages - mostly due to the amount of exercise I do there is usually at least one niggly bit that benefits from some pummelling and I also find it very relaxing.  I've had massages in a few different places around the world and having had a very "thorough" massage in Nepal a few years back I wondered in this would be the same!  

The massage place was just a few doors up from the hotel and was tiny and had only 2 massage beds.  The lady I don't think spoke much English at all, so I did as I would for a UK massage and stripped to my underwear and lay on my front on the bed.  She unhooked my bra, which didn't alarm me as that's happened before during massages and I had a good back, arm and leg massage.  She then she instructed me to "turn" and I imagined she would place the towel over my chest and continue with my arms and legs.  "Nice" she declared (although not quite sure what she was referencing so I'm going to assume my shoulder tattoo) as she then proceeded to spend a good 10 minutes massaging my chest (even more thorough than Nepal!), but I wasn't quite sure how to communicate that I was fine with the full body massage not being that "full" so I just went with the flow. I then had a fairly painful stomach massage and a more pleasant Indian head massage (when in Rome...) and she used lots of oil.  I then got dressed and paid 1100 rupees including a tip for the "experience".

Back at the hotel it was time for my palm reading which took half and hour and was extremely thorough - here is a summary:

- my palm was apparently the best he'd seen all day with a strong life line predicting I'll live to 99 - 101 years old (my Grandad was 33 hours off being 100 so this isn't totally unreasonable)

- I am a good person whose greatest skill is communication and that is how I make my money and it could be either in business or as a teacher.

- I'm a helpful person, but people haven't always helped me in return and do lots of charity work which should continue

- my brain line was strong, but he said despite having lots of ideas I struggled to put them into practice.

- he said I'd had several previous relationships and separations, but it wasn't my fault because they were Librans...

- he said I will have one fulfilling relationship in the future and I will meet that person between the 19/08/2016 and 19/09/2017

- I will have one daughter who will be very wise

- I have a teacher like relationship with my Dad and my Mum and Dad quarrel often (this is definitely not true!)

- my lucky colours are dark blue and black

- I should therefore wear a blue sapphire on my middle ring finger and also an a green onyx on my pinky finger

- I should fast every Tuesday and only have one meal and fruit and liquids

- I should meditate for 5 minutes every morning

- I should worship the sun every morning by climbing onto the roof and taking a copper pot filled with water and pouring everything but the last drop into a plant pot and the last drop should drop onto my middle finger.

- my luck line breaks up from ages 28-48 so anything I achieve I can achieve, but through my energy rather than luck.

- I have lots of energy at 85 I will have the energy of a 35 year old

- my lucky years will be 2016, 2017, 2019, 2021 and 2022

- at 32 years old a guardian angel came into my life

- I will never have any problems with money

Some unusual ideas!  Even if none of it is accurate it was an experiences do he gave me his email address in case I have any questions.  He was gentle and earnest in his demeanour and I think even if it's absolute rubbish he probably offers calm to some people.

I then went and did some shopping, accidentally queue jumped a German family at the ATM who were very unimpressed and managed to eat some chips.  I picked up my tailor made dresses which fit perfectly and are amazing quality for less than 24 hours work.

We went for early dinner at Charcoal on the rooftop of our hotel and I managed paneer and vegetable skewers and more chips.  Rather worryingly the 16 year old waiter knew my room number without asking and was very chatty pointing out the location of The Best Marigold Hotel.  An early night as up early to catch a 6am train!

Beautiful Udaipur

Raj our guide is pretty awesome - he's had a word with the staff at the homestay and we had banana fritters for breakfast! I also played safe with some toast and also tried a masala omelette which was delicious!

We set off in private cars to drive us to Udaipur and Raj had told us we could stop for a toilet break during the c4 hour journey, but it would be in the bushes!  Fortunately we managed a very swift journey and didn't need to stop and I manage to finish reading "Dark Places" as we drove.

Our hotel Pratap Bhawani is a bit more olde world in decor, but lovely and we were welcomed with marigold garlands.

The man who brought my bags to my room advised that I should keep the curtains closed at night because of "naughty boys"! 

After a quick settling in, we met downstairs and were taken on our orientation walk and Udaipur is the first place we've visited where it's not totally manic and I feel comfortable walking around by myself.  We stopped for lunch in a cafe just as the heavens opened and treated us to another monsoon shower which stopped after 45 minutes whilst we were eating lunch.

And guess what was first in the visit list....a tour of the City Palace!

This palace was really beautiful - lots of brightly coloured glass windows and amazingly detailed paintings and painted rooms.

After our palace tour we had a quick visit to a Hindu temple where they were singing and all being served dinner.

Raj predicted that today would be less rainy than tomorrow so recommended we do as much outside as possible and so we took a boat ride around Lake Pichola and marvelled at the lake palace and how beautiful the city is from the water.

After our boat trip a few of us went along to Lord & Tailor and went clothes shopping with a difference in that we picked a design and a fabric for tailor made clothes!  I debated getting something "sensible", but then inspired by the wonderful colours of India I chose a shift dress pattern to be made in an orange patterned fabric and then a pleated dress in a green fabric with a marigold print.  They will be ready tomorrow which is unbelievable and both together cost the equivalent of £49!  Bob in our group choose a lined tailor made suit and two shirts for the equivalent of £270.

A quick dash back to the hotel and then we met for the cultural dance show.  The show was about an hour long and packed with tourists - a novelty for this trip in the low monsoon season.  It started with an odd dance that involved fire heated balls being moved from one bowl to another by mouth and a man dressed as a tiger being ridden by another man.  There were lots of brightly coloured saris spinning around and a puppet dance which involved some audience participation from a couple of children.  The most impressive was the final dance where a lady balanced a ever increasing amount of pots (until the stack was taller than she was!) on her head and danced on broken glass and a tray that she "walked" across the stage on.

We then headed out for dinner at Rainbow restaurant and I had a fairly gentle meal as once again I was starting to feel dodgy.  I had a barbecued stuffed potato, vegetable jalfrezi and a chapatti, and a dessert of mango ice cream.  It all tasted really fresh and delicious.  We made our way back to the hotel, but I opted for an early night as I think I'm tackling DB round two despite being as careful as I can.

Yoga, Henna and Education

My alarm went off early today so that I could start the day with an hour of yoga in a class taken by the feudal lord for the sum of 500 rupee (£5).

The feudal lord is 68, looks very good for his age and clearly knew he'd be better than all of us in the class.  In fact when he discovered I've been doing yoga (about twice a week) for 10 years he kept pointing out how I wasn't as flexible as I should be!  The class was different to my normal class based out of the gym and started with lots of joint mobility work on the ankles and knees before moving onto hip stretching.  We did a shoulder stand, but no sun salutations and learned about parts of the hand and what organs of the body benefited from applying pressure there.  The relaxation part at the end was amazing and I started the day feeling extremely calm.

Breakfast was included so I saved my biscuits for another day and had marmalade on toast, a banana and a paratha with a good serving of decent coffee!

We met for our village safari in 2 jeeps with the first stop a school for tribal girls. Education is free in India, but for distant tribal people the time and cost of getting to and from school can be too much so we visited a free all girls boarding school set up to address this issue also supported by the Feudal Lord.  In India literacy is 77% for men and 51% for women so these schools will be vital in addressing this.  

The school was tidy and had a sense of organisation about it, but the most amazing part was how happy and well behaved the girls were.  They beamed with smiles as we entered and greeted us with whatever English phrases they knew, but carried on dutifully waiting for their breakfast or serving it to their classmates.  They had what looked like a delicious breakfast of chappatis, dhal and rice and when they'd finished they each washed up their own plates.  

Joe in our group is a teacher and he'd been carrying a book with him to try and get a good shot of him reading in an exotic location to promote reading to children and so he got in amongst the girls to read them "Mrs Scatterbrain goes on holiday" - they seemed to really enjoy the novelty of a new teacher!  We took a look at their classrooms and where they sleep as well as looked at the trophies the school has won before heading off in our jeeps and all the girls ran up to the rooftop to wave us goodbye.

Our next stop was to look at some graves, and then a beautiful waterfall, before being taken on a brief tour of some farmland where we saw peanuts, soya, gourds, peas, aubergine, turmeric, chilies and corn being grown.

We stopped briefly at a dairy and then crossed the road to another school where they were practicing for a procession.  

If it wasn't monsoon season we would have spent last night in a "permanent tent" on a campsite also owned by the Feudal Lord, so we went to visit, look at the beautiful lake and enjoy a cup of chai with the Lord who is incredibly charismatic and passionate about India and Rajasthan.  We also saw all the vegetables being grown at the campsite which are used by the restaurant in the castle that we are staying in.  

We returned in the jeeps for lunch and despite the covers the heavy rain meant some of us got rather wet!  I was certainly grateful for my panic buy of an umbrella at the airport!

For lunch back at the castle I again succumbed to a western craving for chips, but also had a delicious cashew nut curry and a couple of chapattis before a relax with my book and a nap.

We met up again as a group with the intention of playing cricket, but the rain was still strong so we went early for our henna tattoos.  The lady doing the tattoos was a teacher by day and was so quick to apply and extremely intricate brown henna powder design to my foot.  After an hour I washed it off and the skin underneath is now a vivid orange.  It was a mostly floral design, but she included the words "kiss" and "love".  At only 250 rupees (£2.50) it was a bargain!  

For dinner I had grilled vegetables with paneer and Dum Aloo - potatoes in gravy.  I'm slightly worried as now my stomach has settled I'm being a bit braver with my food choices in that I've had a couple of "saucy" curries as I've not gone for obvious "dry" dishes.  I'm hoping I'll be ok for the last few days of the trip - I'll keep my fingers crossed!