On route to Jodphur we visited Ranakpur, an ornately carved Jain temple. Over 1444 marble pillars, carved in exquisite detail, support the temple.
The pillars are all differently carved and no two pillars are the same.
Then onwards we trundled, me, Neil and our ever cheerful driver. Towards Jodphur the blue city and the epic Mehrangarh Fort that overlooks the city.
The fort is situated 400 feet (122 m) above the city and is enclosed by imposing thick walls. Here’s the view of the city sprawling below.
In the centre of Jodphur is the Clock Tower and Sardar Market.
It is a bustling, polluted, frenetic place full of sprawling alleyways and market stalls piled high with every possible item alongside a plethora of skilled craftspeople including this woman weaving baskets.
Flattening yourself against the wall in order to avoid being run over by tuc tucs is inevitable, being curiously stared at by shoppers is another.
Neil braved the mobile crisp cart, where the seller digs his scoop into a mountain of crisps, pops them in newspaper and shakes some spices over them. Here he is serving them up!
Here’s just a taste of the colours and sights of the markets. They really are a must to get a real flavour of the way people go about their everyday lives.
It’s noisy and very polluted though, I got a chest infection while here, not very nice!!
We spent New Year’s Eve at a home stay in Jodhpur and spent the night cowering in fear as fireworks displays, more like missile bombardment, rain over head.
While in Jodhpur we spent New Years day on a trek into the Thar desert.
Here we met members of the Bishnoi tribe, visited a pottery yard and spent time with a local family. Here’s some of the adorable kids at the potters yard.
Here’s one of the tribal elders taking his camels out for the day!
All in all another fantastic experience, but time moves onward and we had to be off to our next destination Jaipur via Pushkar/Ajmer!!!