Given my experiences in and around Bangalore, I'm justifiably leery of road trips in India. Even so, when we were faced with the choice of waiting in an Indian Airlines at the New Delhi airport lounge for six hours for a delayed flight or getting in a taxi and driving to and reaching Jaipur within five hours, we chose the latter.
Everyone (including the Indian Airlines customer service desk attendant who was happy to refund us the air fare rather than have us wait for the flight) assured us the roads were good. They were.
The roads were wide, very well paved, well maintained, and devoid of traffic. Suffice to say, it was one of the best drives I've had in India (the drive from Jaipur to Ajmer to Pushkar and back is equally good).
As we entered Jaipur around 2 pm, we caught our first of many glimpses of Amber Palace sitting majestically on top of a hill to our right.
Amber Palace
An elephant gets ready to ferry people back down from the palace.
There are three ways to get to the top of the hill – walking up a winding path, by elephant, or by car. With the April sun beating down on us and with me less than two months away from having a baby, we decided trekking up the hill was not the best option. And apparently, the elephants are mighty popular. They were all taken by 9:30 am – all twenty-five of them!
Amber Palace is a wonderful combination of brute strength and delicate beauty. The kings and queens paid incredible attention to art and architecture within the walls. The walls and the exterior of the palace are themselves foreboding and somber. The road leading up to the palace is lined with imposing, ancient houses in which ministers and courtiers lived.
Once inside the palace, you will find the structures are a marvelous coming together of form and function. There is an intricate, latticed vent through which air and water flowed to keep things cool – a sort of an ancient cooler.
Article comments
1 - Joan Hunt
Nicely done! Thank you for the tour of Rajasthan.
2 - SFC SKI
Great photoessay. I really need to get to India someday. I'd probsbly need to live there for a year just to get a feeling like I'd seen enough.
3 - diana hartman
I am pleased to tell you this article is being featured in the Culture Focus today, August 31st, and tomorrow, September 1st.
Diana Hartman
Culture Editor
4 - sujatha
Joan, thanks and welcome!
SFC, you should. And yes, it does take that long at least to get a flavor of the country.
Diana, thanks!
5 - Mayank Austen Soofi
Neat pictures Sujatha. I hope I could be as good as you someday in the field of photography.
6 - Dan Nissley
Thank you for the web page...we visited India in early March of 2006 and spent a memorable day in Jaipur, Rajasthan...the elephant rides were wonderful...many of your photos are of the same places we visited...except your pictures are better! :) Thank you...
7 - Dan Nissley
Sorry I meant to give a 'link' to me travel web page. www.ontheroadphotos.com
8 - sujatha
Mayank and Dan, thank you! Dan, I'm glad you enjoyed the trip. We wanted to visit in March as well. I'm sure the weather would have been a tad cooler than it was in April. Thanks for the link to your web page. Will check it out!
9 - Nancy
Wow! What super photos; being there must be incredible.
10 - sujatha
Nancy, thanks. The Indian tourism department will be very happy you used the word incredible to describe India because their slogan is "Incredible India!"
Dan, checked out your photographs. Really cool. In the one with you on the elephant, there's a sign in the background that says. "Elephant Booking Office"! Only in India!
11 - GAURAV
PLZ WRITE A CONLUSION OF YOUR RAJASTHAN TOUR