Stu - Christmas Day in Jaipur - this will definitely go down as one of the most memorable Christmas Days ever. After an early breakfast at the hotel (wearing Santa hats of course) we set off for the Amber Fort. What to say about this place other than it is stunning!
Quite reminiscent of the Alhambra in Granada, Spain, the fort was built in the 16th century and was the ruling palace for Rajasthan. Whilst there is the option of riding an elephant up to the fort we were told that the elephants aren't treated particularly well so opted against it. After all we'll get the chance to ride happy elephants in Chitwan, Nepal.
After a few hours exploring the fort we headed back to Jaipur and the City Palace. Like the Amber Fort this is another architecturally stunning building, the highlight (for us at least) being a courtyard with four beautiful doors representing the four seasons.
From the City Palace we walked through Jaipur, stopping briefly to admire the Wind Palace, and went to LMB restaurant for Christmas lunch...
Not a turkey, sprout or pig in blanket to be seen but a delicious vegetarian feast none the less.
The evening's entertainment consisted of a trip to the Raj Mandir Bollywood cinema to see "Dhoom 3". Now, even though we had missed Dhoom 1 and 2 and the film is in Hindi with no subtitles if was easy to follow and highly entertaining. Audience participation is a large part of the experience with lots of cheering the hero and wolf whistling the romance scenes. The highlight of the film was finding out that our friend Charlie had been carving out a side career as a major Bollywood star.
Just when we thought the day couldn't get any better it turned out that for the ride back to the hotel we had inadvertently caught the 'disco tuk-tuk' with everyone in Jaipur (probably) enjoying hearing Westlife's "Quit Playing Games With My Heart".
What a thoroughly different but amazing Christmas Day!
No comments:
Post a Comment