Hi again!  So continuing on with our Rajasthan adventures, we traveled to Udaipur after Pushkar.  We had high hopes for Udaipur, not only from things we had read online, but also from a well-traveled British expat we had met in Cambodia.  He claimed that it was his favorite city, not just in India, but in the entire world, which is a pretty big endorsement.  After having been there, I don’t know if I would say it is my favorite city in the entire world, but it is a close favorite when compared to all the cities we’ve visited in India.  It is the cleanest city we’ve been to so far and has a romantic city feel with several lakes and even a fancy palace turned hotel in the middle of the largest lake!  Fun fact, the 1983 James Bond film Octopussy was filmed here.

We took a local bus from Pushkar to Ajmer and from there took the train (a chair car this time) to Udaipur.  We arrived just in time for a late lunch.  I found our guesthouse based on the fact that they offer morning yoga on their roof top along with cooking classes.  Hoch obliged and I think we were both pretty happy with our decision.  The location was perfect, we could pretty much walk everywhere, and the guesthouse and family were really nice.  I took advantage of the yoga class one morning, but we ended up not trying a cooking class.

We were debating how long to stay in Udaipur, since we had skimmed through the first few cities faster than we had originally planned and had a couple of days to spare.  We decided to just stay in Udaipur for 5 nights rather than trying to fit in another city.  And.It.Was.Everything.  Not having to repack our bags and travel for that long was a nice respite from our usual travel grind.  And to be honest, we did not do a lot during our time there other than relax, hang out with fellow travelers that we had previously met in Pushkar, and stroll around the city.  We did make a trip to the City Palace one day which was really beautiful, but besides that we did not do too many touristy things.  Something we found amusing: when walking around our first day there we came across a nice park.  We walked through it and saw it had a zoo.  Guess what we saw inside the zoo from the outside?  Deer!  They have wild monkeys wandering around the park and deer in the zoo.  The complete opposite from the States.  We cracked up about that one.

Unfortunately, we did get sick and were out of commission for a couple of days at the end of our stay.  I don’t think it was the food though it started out with stomach problems and then lead to a head cold (kinda weird, but maybe due to the colder temps at night).  During that time, I took a miniature painting class with a German girl while Hoch was sleeping off the fever and then of course, I became sick the next day.

Here are some random photos from our time in Udaipur:

Here are a few photos from the City Palace:

After Udaipur, our plan was to go to Jodhpur next.  We decided that on our way we wanted to stop and see a popular Jain Temple that was located 2 hours outside of Udaipur.  We talked to our guesthouse about our options and waited to see if anyone else was interested in sharing a taxi ride to Jodhpur with stops to the temple and another fort along the way.  Our other option was to take a bus and skip the temple.  Though the bus was much cheaper, we decided we really wanted to see the temple and paid the pricey fee for a taxi even if no one else was interested in sharing.  Unfortunately for us it was low season so we ended up footing the bill solo.  To top it off, Hoch was still a little sick and when the taxi driver asked if his brother could ride along, Hoch almost bit his head off (I should’ve started a tally for the number of times I’ve had to tell Hoch to be nice on this trip).  Anyways, I think both the fort and temple were worth it and it was a nice way to break up a travel day.

• Kumbhalgarh Fort: Another UNESCO World Heritage Site, this fort is the second largest in Rajasthan and the wall of the fort is the second longest in the world after the Great Wall of China. The size of the fort was really impressive, though I think we’ve seen better forts in India overall.

• Ranakpur Jain Temple: For those that do not know, Jainism is an ancient Indian religion.  I did not know anything about it before we went.  An audio guide was included with the ticket, so we listened and learned a bit about the principles and vows of the religion while walking through the beautiful and intricate temple.  Construction of the temple took close to 20 years and was completed in 1458.

After visiting the temple, we had another 5-hour ride in the taxi to Jodhpur.  The roads were pretty horrible and cows were everywhere!  We finally hit a major highway with better roads and I was able to take a cat nap before arriving to Jodhpur.

Well that’s it for this post!

Until the next one!

Kimberly

P.S. ABC Trek Training Journal:

Udaipur Day 1 (Travel Day) – Walked 6.5 miles to a sunset spot and around town while getting familiar with the city.

Udaipur Day 2 – Walked less than 2 miles around town.  I took a yoga class in the AM.

Udaipur Day 3 – Walked less than 4 miles while sightseeing.

Udaipur Day 4 (Hoch Sick Day) – Walked a little more than 2 miles.  I did a Tabata inspired workout in the room.  It consisted of 3 different 4 minute tabata sets.  Round 1 – 20 sec squats, 10 sec jump squats, repeat 8 times.  Round 2 – same as R1 but with lunges and jump lunges.  Round 3 – same as R1 but with side lunges and side lunge jumps.  In between rounds, I completed pushups, planks, and v-sits.

Udaipur Day 5 (KR Sick Day) – Walked about 2.5 miles.  Slept and pooped the rest of the time.

Travel Day – Walked 5 miles while visiting the fort and temple.

Our “trek training” has slowed a bit, we definitely should’ve walked a lot more, but getting sick hindered us a bit.  I will say the plyometric moves in my hotel room workout kicked my butt and I definitely felt it the next 2 days.  The yoga class was more of a stretch session (similar to the one in Pushkar).