As mentioned in the previous post, to Udaipur we arrived just in time to see a gorgeous sunset over the lake Pichola from the rooftop of our hotel.
Indian graffiti/advertisement :-)
Here, Dima was insisting on being photographed with this cow and got poop all over his pants. On the photo he doesn't know it yet. :-)
At the city palace there were tons of people and the line to the ticket window was very long. We even had a thought to skip visiting the place altogether, but one of the guards told us that if we bought a ticket for just the gardens (separate ticket window, no people) then we can still buy the normal ticket inside. The garden ticket was 10 cents, and we could go inside 5 min later instead of standing in line for an hour.
Another city view...
The rooms are as beautiful as in other palaces we saw already...
... but the Indians seem to love it and usually spend a long time looking at every detail.
This is how it all stays so beautiful. On the way out, we saw about 25 workers restoring one of the palace's courtyards, and one guy ordering them around.
Those royal guards are considered tall by the Indian standards, but not compared to Dima :-)
We walked by when we saw this women and we saw her mask on the wall... Find which one :-)
View of the main square from the temple's steps.
Next stop were the Ghats, where people still wash themselves and their clothes. When we saw some clothes being washed, we instantly remembered that we gave some of ours to washed as well... Now we can only hope that they were washed in proper water, but the chances are quite slim...
When going up the street from the Ghats, we found a place where we could finally enjoy some dissent cappuccino! Dima said that he almost forgot how a good cup of coffee tastes like. Strange, because they do grow coffee in India and you would expect it to be great, like in Vietnam.
From here we decided to go to the new part of the city that was suppose to have a very colorful local market, but we forgot that it was Sunday and most of it turned out to be closed.
While walking, we did get to see the palace from the water, though.
In the evening we went to see the folklore and dance show at the Bagore Ki Haveli, which tutned out to be e very interesting hour and half. Great pics too!
Here, she started up with just 2 pots and ended up with 10! Good neck muscles :-)
Our room at the hotel was by far the nicest room we had in India, with 24/7 hot water and an awesome view, making us really feel at home.
In Udaipur we were spending an evening and the whole next day. For dinner we stayed at the hotel, as its restaurant had very good reviews and the food was great. I even got to choose an Indian dish, because they cook from scratch and can make sure that nothing spicy is added. While we were having dinner it got dark and we decided to walk around a little to get to know the place.
There wasn't much to do, as everything was closing and we turned back. Indians in general are not "night" people, and tend to go to bed quite early.
The next we had plans to go to the city palace, to walk to the second lake and to take the rope car to the top of the hill to see the views.
In the morning we noticed how white the whole city was, so we called it just that.
After the palace we walked to the main square and the temple. The streets in Udaipur's old city are very colorful and interesting to walk around.
The Jain temple on the main square is quite similar to other ones we saw before, lot's carvings, columns and colorful looking people hanging around it.
After the walk to the new part of Udaipur, the only place left to visit was the rope way to the nearby hill where you could see the whole town. The tickets were available as standard Rs75 and VIP Rs450. Considering the difference we went for standard. When we got to the line, the guys working the rope way saw us and let us go with VIP because we were foreigners. Nice, because this was the only time so far where we profited from positive discrimination :-)
After the show we headed back to the guest house, arranging a taxi for the next day to go to Chittorgarh, a small town 130 km away where we were planning to spend the day and then take a night train to Agra.
Conclusion: another highlight on our trip, Udaipur is a pleasant and relaxing city, not too big and not too small. Not that there are plenty of things to do here, but it's a good base point for possible travel in the area. We liked the town's atmosphere as well, which is very friendly.
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