After Agra, Mr S, G and I headed off by car to Jaipur. On the way to Jaipur we stopped at Fatehpur Sikri. This is a fortified ancient city, about 40km out of Agra. It was the capital of the Mughal empire between 1571 to 1585 and while no one now lives inside the city, the mosque in there is still used. Briefly, the story behind the city is that Emperor Akbar consulted a Sufi saint, Shaikh Salim Chishti, in the area who told him that he would have a son. When one was born in 1569, Emperor Akbar decided to build the city in the place of the saint. As often seems to be the case with ancient Indian cities, the city did not last for long. It was abandoned shortly after Emperor Akbar's death for reasons that are unclear.
Like many of the sites in India, this is a "shoes off" attraction. After paying the obligatory 10IR to a kid outside the site in order that he not steal our shoes, we went inside. It was beautiful. Unfortunately, Mr S managed to talk us into using the services of his "friend", a guide, to see the site. This meant that we were raced through it at a breakneck speed, presumably in order that our guide could quickly head off to meet his next tourists and earn his next 100IR.
Inside the city is the white marble tomb of Shaikh Salim Chishti (pictured above). Surrounding the tomb are touts, trying to convince tourists to purchase coloured bits of cloth, string and flowers. "If you put these inside the tomb, whatever you wish will come true. Guarantee! There is a 100% success rate!", boasted one.
After our brief tour of Fatehpur Sikri it was off on the 6-hour drive to Jaipur. The road to Jaipur was crowded, and cars competed for space on the road with elephants carrying goods, rickshaws, donkeys and bullocks. The driving style in and around Jaipur led G and I to wonder, quite seriously, whether there is such a thing as a driving license in India, or whether anyone is allowed to drive a vehicle. This was particularly so when a child of seemingly no more than 8 years old pulled up next to our car driving a motorcycle. Generally, there also don't seem to be any road rules, or at least any road rules that are obeyed, as cars drive on the wrong side of the road, the wrong way, and overtake on both the left and right hand sides of the road. The only rule that seems to be followed is that a driver must toot their horn at all times; whether they are overtaking a car/animal/vehicle or even, simply, if they see a car/animal/vehicle. In case a driver forgets this basic rule, most vehicles have painted prominently on them "use horn".
Thankfully, when we finally arrived at our hotel, the Hotel Meghinwas, we discovered a clean and (compared to the hotel Sheela) luxurious room, with heating, hot water and fresh towels. We slept like logs, waking early the next day ready for a full day of site-seeing.
After Agra, Jaipur seemed a luxurious city. We found restaurants which had bathrooms containing both water and soap (a rarity in Agra). We were also served meals which could be eaten without first scraping mould, bugs or dirt from them. Our standards at this point weren't high, and Jaipur certainly met them.
Jaipur is the capital of the state of Rajasthan and currently has a population of around 4 million. It is a heaving, thriving metropolis. It's known as the pink city by many tourists, as in 1853, when the Prince of Wales came to visit, the whole city was painted pink to welcome him. Large swathes of it remain coloured pink. Within the old city, the site most tourists stop to see (on the recommendation of all the guidebooks) is Hawa Mahal. This is described by the Lonely Planet as Jaipur's most distinctive landmark, as a remarkable five-story delicately honeycombed pink sandstone structure constructed in 1799 by Maharaja Sawaj Pratap Singh to enable ladies of the royal household to watch the life and processions of the city.
It is pretty but, to be honest, I couldn't really see what all the fuss is about. Judging by the expressions on the faces of other tourists about, I wasn't the only one who wasn't particularly impressed. Although perhaps all, like me, had just come from seeing the Taj and were therefore difficult to impress.
I was more impressed by Jantar Mantar, a consevatory begun in 1728 by Jai Singh. It houses an impressive collection of enormous sundials and devices to determine time, the sun's longitude and horosopes.
Then it was off to see the Amer Fort, just outside of the city.
This used to be the capital of Jaipur. Construction was begun in 1592. Even more impressive (in my view) than the Fort itself is the city wall surrounding it.
This is an ancient wall which has been built over and around steep mountains. G and I spent some time pondering it, and trying to work out how on earth it had been built. We asked Mr S whether it was possible to walk around the wall and he looked at us as if we had gone mad and told us that "no, it's only safe for goats!".
On the way back to town Mr S took us by the water palace. I still don't know what this is, or what it's historical significance is, but it was pretty.
That night, back in our hotel, we confronted the truth that we are not intrepid travellers. We are western, conservative middle class tourists. Not being able to face another bowl of dahl, ghee or naan bread, we therefore headed off for an Italian meal at the town's finest Italian restaurant. The only concession we made to being travellers and experiencing the local culture that night was to try some Indian wine. We regretted that move the moment the glasses of ribena-tasting wine arrived.
The next morning Mr S arrived nice and early to drive us back to Delhi.
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