Rest Day in Jodhpur

Wednesday February 7th - a day of rest in Jodhpur... that means sightseeing, laundry, doing the blog. Bless Ursula, she gets the laundry looked after while I'm hopelessly behind with the blog - that's a lame excuse for this being heavy on photos and light on explanation.

Last night was a trip into town for dinner at a restaurant that offered a view of the clock tower and one of the market gates. Trust me, the traffic, particularly motor scooters and cycles through the gate, was a lot busier than it appears in the photos.

The hotel was a bit out of town - ten or twelve kilometers - so it was well worth having an organized trip to the Fort and the market. We started at the Mehrangarh Fort. Not sure that comparing one fort with another is a legitimate or useful way to express one's impressions, but we were very impressed with this one, both externally, the immensity and the architecture, and internally the room and decor and richness of everything.

The new gate to the fort after the old one was destroyed in an attack by Jaipur forces in the early 1800s in a dispute over a woman who was to be married to a royal. Jodhpur forces held after the gate was broken down and eventually triumphed in the battle. The new gate celebrates the victory.

 

Amazing architecture, amazing construction

Women were allowed to see the outside world only through thee grilles 

The pearl room where the Maharajah met with his ministers. The Maharajah reportedly respected his five wives and wished their advice in these meetings but the ministers would not agree to that. The photo below shows three of five secret windows (the bright spots above the tapestries) that were hidden by fabric screens. The wives then sent messages by messenger.

  

dance hall

the nursery

No longer the case now, but back then, only persons of a certain caste and faith were allowed to paint their houses blue.

 

 

 Not far from the fort is the Jaswant Thada, a memorial and mausoleum for a maharajah in the early 1800s. His mausoleum is in white marble. Other family just get red sand stone tombs nearby.  

purple sunbird in the garden

 The into town to the market and its colourful chaos...

 

  That's it for Jodhpur. Tomorrow begins three riding days to Udaipur.