I wish I was a poet then I could better capture the fullness of our journey in Agra, Jaipur and Udaipur. All are in “northern India, and yet very different. Our hotels there were all magnificent and the people and the food were amazing.

The Taj Mahal

Truly the most spectacular building in the world we’ve ever seen, the Taj Mahal was built by a Moghul Emporer for his beloved wife who died giving birth to her 14th child. They are both entombed there in the center of the central dome, while other family members are entombed nearby. The grounds compliment the buildings perfectly and we got the opportunity to visit it twice: first at sunrise with spectacular morning light and almost no people, and second, later that morning. Although we had just finished an extremely exhausting travel day from Varanasi the day before (with an early start and long air travel delays due to thick fog), I took full advantage of the special morning tour opportunity. Jim was exhausted so he slept in and enjoyed the second tour. No one knew if the weather would be clear enough, and we were worried the fog would be a problem in the morning, but our tour group has good Karma and the early morning weather was beautiful!

Marble and inlay work decorate every aspect of the Taj. After the tour, we went to see local artists train to create smaller marble creations with the same craftsmanship. The Indian government funds these programs to keep the ancient techniques alive for the future. We bought a small serving tray with the same incredibly fine detail to help us remember our visit.

Agra Fort

Red Forts are abundant in India. The Maharajas built them for protection from invaders but the Moguls captured almost all of them. Agra Fort is massive, built with the local red sandstone, and housed generations of Moguls and their harems. Eventually, the British took over the site and after India gained its independence in 1947, the site is now part museum and part military base. Agra Fort has multiple layers of defense, including two moats (one dry, the other flooded with river water and stocked with crocodiles), tall stone walls and a single, narrow, steep entrance that is flanked by tall stone walls.

The palace history includes some serious familial infighting, including siblings ousting their father (the King), and then murdering each other until only one was left (who became the new King).

Jaipur

From Agra we loaded onto our bus and headed for Jaipur, about 3 hours away in the State of Rajasthan (the largest of the 28 Indian States, but “lightly populated” with only about 70 million people). We met our new local guides Jai & Shailendra along the road.

We began our tour of Jaipur by driving into its downtown for a quick tour of the area in the evening late, navigating the traffic and getting a first peak at the bus old town. From there it was off to visit a remarkable Astronomical Observatory built 300 years ago by its Maharaja (King). With a population of only 3 million, Jaipur is a tenth the population of Delhi, much cleaner, and with less poverty. The buildings are beautiful and the city interesting.

One of the old Maharaja’s fascinations and interests was with the zodiac, the stars and keeping time, so he created these ancient wonders. The “sky stairs” are accurate sundials. The bigger the sundial, the more accurate, with the largest sundial accurate to within 2 seconds. The other structures help find Zodiac stars and other cool stuff.

From the Observatory we walked to the nearby City Palace. Part of it houses the current descendants of the Maharajas but most of it is now a museum open to the public. One of the former Maharajas was an enormous man with gigantism disease. His clothing is huge. He commissioned lots of art, including giant silver vessels that he used to drink Jaipur water even when he traveled to England. A big private party was setting up for the night with beautiful flowers.

From the City Palace we rode our bus to the Ramba Palace Hotel, for a dining extravaganza part that began with a procession of elephants, camels, horses and included a traditional Indian folk dance.

Needless to say we slept well that night at our hotel: the stunning Oberoi Raj Villas.

The next day we toured the the old town again in the morning light, crossed a crazy, very busy intersection. The key is to “walk like a cow”. Don’t run, don’t stop. Somehow the traffic weaves around you. Amazingly, in all the the chaotic Indian traffic we never saw an accident. It just works. But crossing the intersection wasn’t the craziest thing. A couple of us, including me, experience the snake charmer and his pet cobra. I’m assuming it was defanged, but strangely we didn’t ask.

Then it was back across the traffic and on to our magic bus for our next stop, the Amber Palace, a much larger and older palace on the outskirts of Jaipur that was protected by a hilltop fortress and a long stone wall that was miles long.

Back at our hotel, Jim napped while I walked the grounds and then we both enjoyed a truly delightful dinner under the stars at the hotel’s signature Indian Restaurant. We ordered a special chicken, wrapped in banana leaves, surrounded by dough, they buried and cooked for hours. It’s how the old hunting parties cooked and ate the game they caught when they were too far from the palace to bring it back. For dessert we had a delicious Kundalika cookie (warm crisp fennel cake steeped in sweetened extract and covered with edible silver foil referred to as “jalebi”), a traditional royal treat to end the meal.

We really wished we could have stayed here another night. The pace of the trip has been too fast for us up to this point, but when you travel in a group you have to follow the schedule.

Side note: Hotel laundry. We never pay for expensive hotel laundry, but we were pretty tired and decided to splurge. The laundry came back perfectly folded and wrapped, making repacking a breeze. I wouldn’t do it all the time, but it was definitely worth the splurge this time.

In Jaipur we had special packing instructions for our next adventure. Our bag pulls were the night before at 7:15 PM. The bags were going on the bus for an overnight 9 hour drive from Jaipur to Udaipur, while we would fly the next day. Our bus heroes were Arjune and our “Top Gun” bus driver Sarinder (who could weave our bus through the chaotic traffic, often with just an inch to spare on each side).

The next day began with a wake up alarm at 3:45 AM. We quickly got up, ate a few bites with our coffee and left the hotel for the airport at 4:30 AM.

Tina was nervous, because on her last tour the flight was delayed for two hours, then canceled (because of weather) and her group had no choice but to drive the 9 hours to Udaipur.

But our travel Karma was good again. We took off on time and landed in Udaipur two hours later without a problem.

Udaipur

With no delays in travel we headed to the Bougainvillea Art Gallery and restaurant for breakfast. The scenery here includes the oldest mountains in the world, the Aravali. The youngest are the Himalayas in northern India.

We picked up our local guides, Shakti and Jeevan along the road (it’s their way). Shakti’s wife needed the car. At the end of the Udaipur tour he used a scooter to drive home.

Although both are in Rajasthan, the scenery in Udaipur looked quite different from Jaipur. Udaipur has a lot more water, with lakes and green fields in the valleys, surrounded by small mountains and rolling hills that look like Northern California.

The Aravali’s art, trees, and background music created a “laid back” California vibe that we appreciated as we enjoyed our breakfast. The place is designed by a famous local who broke out of his “business caste” to successfully thrive in the art business. His family helps run and support the business side. The galleries also display stunning art from local artists.

After the art gallery we were in for a truly amazing and authentic village experience when our bus entered a small village that was just starting to celebrate a wedding! Instead of taking the direct freeway journey, our local guide (Shakti) asked our bus driver (Sarinder) to take our bus on a backroad through local villages and farmland. This is not a place where large 40 person buses usually go. The people we passed along the way seemed as happy to see us as we were to see them, and they waved and smiled and watched as we journeyed passed wheat fields and through simple villages, where women cary containers of water on their heads and there are plenty of cows and water buffalos.

And then the magic happened . . . a local village wedding blocked our road. “No Problem” as our amazing guide Tina says. Shakti, suggested we all get out to see the groom on his decorated horse.

The groom looked regal and was preparing to ride a short distance down the main village road to a special location for a ceremony. When we got there, we were all invited to join the festivities and draped with ceremonial orange scarves. Then the music from the giant “boom box van” started and everybody started dancing. The villagers, dressed in their finest clothes, loved that we were there with them and they embraced us, danced with us, took tons of selfies and none of us wanted to get back on the bus. Instead, we joined the procession to the bride’s house. The women of the village surrounded me and wanted to touch me, take pictures with me and dance with me. It was an amazing experience!

I really don’t think that anything on this trip will top the village wedding. We all had a blast.

Overjoyed, but exhausted and hot, we loaded back on the bus, drank cold bottled water and settled in for a drive to a smaller refurbished palace/hotel for lunch. This place, Devigarh, was purchased by an entrepreneurial Indian business woman and offers stunning views and a delightful lunch. Apparently, the building was in a state of extreme disrepair when she bought it and it took vision and a lot of hard work to reopen it as a small hotel and restaurant. In gratitude for its success, she built a small temple there to one of the female goddesses.

After Devigarh, it was on to a nearby 1,000 year old Hindu Temple that was filled with detailed carvings. Some of the carvings depict tantric acts that were supposedly designed to clear the mind of bad thoughts before praying. I’m not really sure that’s effective. However, many wedding couples come to the temple to take wedding pictures and we all enjoyed seeing the young couples, some very ornate, some more simple but all beautiful.

After that long fun day we finally reached the boat dock in Udaipur for the short boat trip to Lake Palace.

Normally, Tauck Tour groups stay at the lakeshore Oberoi, but it was booked for a big wedding so we got to stay at the Lake Palace. It’s all white marble, completely covering a small island so that it appears to “float” on the lake.

The Lake Palace epitomizes the paradox of India. Stunning, special, romantic and extremely quirky. The hotel rooms are all a bit different because the Lake Palace is over 250 years old. The staff is amazing. The boat ride to the hotel from the lake shore was delightful, and we really enjoyed the cooler temperature on the water and the fresh air. But once we got to our room, we were not allowed to open any of the windows. So sad! And then there are the birds. Tina told us a story about a past tour where a guest called her complaining that “she had to do something about the birds”. We laughed at her story, but that night after sunset and figuring out how to use the shower without flooding the bathroom (its a long story), the unbelievable cacophony of the birds started (and lasted for several hours). We cracked up. Check out the sounds in the video.

Instead of using roof nets to keep the birds out of the interior courtyard, large numbers of hotel staff constantly clean up the mess left by courtyard birds. We asked them why they don’t net, and they said, and I’m not kidding you, “we used to have nets, but the trees in the courtyard grew too tall, so we cut the nets down.” But no problem! The birds settle down around 9PM and we used our earplugs so they didn’t wake us at dawn.

Sari & Turban Fashion Show.

We loved Udaipur. The pace is slower, the town clean and safe, and the history interesting. We had a wonderful tour of the Udaipur City Palace, again part museum part home to the Maharana family. It was stunning as usual. Some of us did the long tour.

And we enjoyed another fantastic meal at a very nice local home owned by the descendants of a former high advisor to the last Maharaja of Udaipur. The experience is really special and they only do it a couple of months in the year, only for Tauck and Ambecrombie and Kent tours. The family sat with us in the foyer and chatted before we headed into the dining room where they served the most deliciuos and unusual meal, delicately seasoned and served family style.

Tuk Tuks in Jaipur and Udaipur.

Tuk Tuks in the city are just wild. The traffic in Jaipur moves with virtually no rules although there are traffic circles. Being on our big bus with our top gun driver feels a bit unsettling but we are safe, because we are the biggest vehicle out there. But Tuk Tuks are another story entirely.

In Jaipur we took them from the Palace, past camels, horses, elephants, cars, vespas, and lots of motorcycles to get from the crowded part of town to the bus to get to our dinner in an other part of the city.

On our last day in Udaipur, the Tuk Tuks were ours for the day. Jim was overjoyed. They took us through the old town to the market. Walking through the market early in the morning really gave us an idea of life in the city for most locals. Then we rode them to a special garden with water fountains that increase and decrease with the water level in the lake. From there we headed to the jewelry and craft area where we did some shopping. I got a beautiful filigree silver necklace, learned about rainbow moonstones and then headed back by tuk tuk to the boat for our last evening in the Palace. Tuk Tuks in the calmer traffic of Udaipur feel much safer.

Next blog will share our travels south to Kochi and Kerala, what a different vibe and experience.