23-25 July 2018

Jaipur, India  

We head out to see the sights in Jaipur, after a breakfast in the beautiful palace dining room.

Here are some pictures around the hotel and of our rooms.

The front entrance.

The inner courtyard lobby area.

Wish we had more time to enjoy hanging out here!

The pool.

The pool in the afternoon.

The pool at night, with the gym on the second floor.

Brian and my room is on the first floor.  The kids are upstairs, with Hayden on the second floor and the girls up a spiral staircase on the third floor.  Not family friendly, but elegant.

Brian and my room.

Our sitting area.

Hayden’s room.

The spiral staircase up to Eliza and Lydia’s room from Hayden’s room.

The girls’ room.

Our first stop of the day is the Amber Fort and Palace.

Construction of the Fort was started by Raja Man Singh I in the year 1592. The Amber fort was built by Raja Man Singh in the 16th century and was completed by Sawai Jai Singh in the 18th Century. 

As part of the tour, we took an elephant ride to the entrance of the fort.  After our time in Thailand, where the elephants refuges do not allow elephants to be ridden, we felt bad doing the elephant ride.  There were metal saddles strapped around the elephants’ bellies and they walked up and down the walkway over and over again all day long.  Not a good life for an elephant.  We actually tried to cancel the ride but the tour would not allow it, telling us it was the only way to get up to the fort.  

Once we arrived, we found out that we could have taken a car just like our guide did, and just how we got down from the fort.  It was a great view, but otherwise a little unpleasant.  

The elephant drivers were not allowed to be tipped, according to the signs as we approached the end of the ride, but the girls and my driver was signalling me to give him money and kept saying “tip.”  I finally realized what he was saying and gave him some money and he told me I had to give him more!  That was the most unpleasant part!

We started out in the area of the fort where the public was allowed to gather.

The entrance to the palace area was ornate and beautiful.

There is a hall of mirrors which was dazzling.  Our guide took a picture of us in the mirror’s reflection.

Upstairs, the women of the palace were able to see out the looking windows to watch the public gathering below.

We go upstairs and look out over the countryside.  The ancient walls are still standing, similar to the Great Wall of China.

The kids are hot and ready to move along (or not move at all).  Brian and I look around on our own for a few minutes before heading down the hill in a car to the air con of the van.

This is the Jantar Mantar, and Brian got out to take a photo (the rest of us were still enjoying the air con!).  It is an lodge, in the middle of a lake, for bird hunting.

Camel sighting!

We stop by to see, from the outside, the Hawa Mahal.  It is the famous hall of breezes.  This is part of the palace in the Pink City.  The women were allowed to look out from the windows down at the streets during celebrations and processions.  Another example of how the women were hidden away from all public events.  

The wall was designed at an angle with each storey coming out a few more degrees as you go up, so that the men could not see the women when they looked up from the street.  

Street weaving.

Street market.

The next stop is the City Palace, where the royal family still resides.  The King of Jaipur is a young man, in his early twenties, and he lives here with his mother, and younger sister and brother.  He is often traveling out of the country.  His siblings attend school outside of Jaipur.

We can see the section of the palace where the family lives, from the outside.

Then we tour through the areas that are open to the public. There is a gate for each season, winter, spring, summer and autumn (although India does not have autumn, just monsoon which extends from June until September end).

This is one of a set two of the biggest silver cisterns in the world (I think!).  To be honest, I didn’t catch a lot of what the guides said in India because it was so hot.

The inner palace is beautifully decorated with crystal chandeliers and pink walls!

We learn that there was a King of Jaipur who was called the Giant King.  We see a painting of him and his clothing.  He was close to 7 feet tall and 400 pounds.

After the palace, we visit the King’s astronomical gadget park, which is just across the street.  We are people watching as we wait for our guide to buy the tickets.

The King was fascinated with astronomy and designed a huge sundial.  

There is also a smaller sundial which we saw in action when the sun came through the clouds briefly.  It it had not been so hot, we would have stayed longer.

A view back toward the palace and Hall of Breezes.

The children were toast so we cut our visit short and headed to back to the hotel for lunch.  

We decided to have lunch after the touring because we were pretty sure the children would not be willing to go back out after they had a break for lunch.  

Our waiter friend welcomed us and we enjoyed a delicious dessert of brownies with peanuts and sorbet.

The hotel security was busy scaring away monkeys.  Namaste.

We enjoyed some downtime in the afternoon.  Katie took a nap. Brian went to the gym which overlooked the pool.  The kids had ipad time, which meanst they watched junky shows on youTube (oy!).

Then some fun in the pool, while Katie went to the gym.  I took this picture from the gym.

And dinner at the hotel restaurant. Salad for the adults and mac n cheese for the children.

The next morning, we stayed at the hotel until late morning.  A nice breakfast, followed by a swim in the pool.

A few more pics of the beautiful hotel.

Another view of our 3-story suite of rooms!

Then to the airport to fly to Mumbai.