The Blue City - Jodhpur

Jodhpur, which is also in the state of Rajasthan, was our favorite city we visited in India, but unfortunately it was cut short due to transportation issues.  Since India is such an enormous country, we really wanted to see as much of it as possible in the 11 days we were there, but that meant we were only able to stay in Jodhpur for two days.  And because we were traveling by train, that meant a number of things could go wrong, including being unable to get a ticket - which caused our two days to change to one.  Looking back, I would have been happy spending all 11 days in Jodhpur.  

We arrived by overnight 3rd class train at 5:30 in the morning and had to get an auto rickshaw to our hotel.  For background, India has a population of about 1.3 billion people, and the state of Rajasthan is estimated at about 56 million.  That means that people are EVERYWHERE - no matter what time of day it is.  And that also means that you will be aggressively confronted and hassled by dozens upon dozens of locals trying to get you to take their auto rickshaw, taxi, or to convince you to go to another hotel because yours is 'closed'.  By the end of our trip, we were completely worn down and had absolutely no patience.  After haggling a bit with some rickshaw drivers, we agreed on a price, and we were on our way to our hotel.  He admitted to me later that he was a bit nervous during our ride.  It was still dark as it wasn't even 6 in the morning, and we appeared to be going down one dark, filthy alley after another.  We made it safely to our hotel, and we realized when it was daylight that all of the roads in Jodhpur are actually small alleys.

After napping for a couple hours in the little reception room, we went up to the rooftop of our hotel for breakfast and this was our view: 

Mehrangarh Fort

Unfortunately it was foggy everywhere in India, so the pictures didn't come out the greatest.  Oh well!

At the center of Jodhpur is beautiful Mehrangarh Fort, which sits high above the 'Blue City'.  Traditionally, blue signified the home of a Brahmin (a member of the priestly caste), but that is no longer the case; many non-Brahmins have painted their homes blue as well.

Mehrangarh Fort was our favorite fort (between the Jaisalmer Fort, the Amber Fort in Jaipur, and the Agra Fort) for a few different reasons.  First of all, the fort had an incredibly interesting, well put-together audio guide that gave us a great mix of history, information, and stories.  We could actually picture ourselves walking around the fort centuries ago.  In addition, the fort has an impressive 7 gates that need to be crossed before reaching the fort.  The gates are purposely located after a sharp right turn which prevented elephants and soldiers from having a proper ramp to run and break the gate.

One story from the audio tour stated that in order to build the fort, the Rathore ruler, Rao Jodha evicted a hermit living on the land.  During the eviction, the hermit lay a curse on any future building constructed on the hill.  To avoid the consequences of this curse, Jodha had a man named Rajiya Bambi buried alive in the foundations of the fort (and Bambi actually did this willingly).  In return, the Rathores have looked after Bambi's family ever since.

Mehrangarh Fort

Below is a photo of a shrine encompassing small handprints left by the wives of Maharaja Man Singh before they immolated themselves on his funeral pyre.  This practice was known as sati, and it was outlawed by the British in the 1820's.

Below is a view of Jaswant Thada, a memorial to Maharaja Jaswant Singh II, from the fort.  Jaswant Singh II was Maharaja (King) of Jodhpur in the late 1800's.

A view of the Blue City from the Fort

Cannonball imprints on one of the gates from the attacking Jaipur army

An ornate elephant howdah (a carriage positioned on the back of the elephant)

The highlight of our time in Jodhpur (at least for me) was the zip-line tour around the fort.  It was my first time doing a zip-line, and I was definitely nervous.  But Oh. My. Gosh.  It was absolutely amazing!!  We did a total of 6 lines all around the fort and the surrounding canyon.  We timed it perfectly, as we were flying through the air during the sunset overlooking the Blue City.  It was absolutely breathtaking.

Below is a photo of the zip-line at Mehrangarh Fort taken by Tim Dellmann (I found it on Wikipedia).  I didn't carry my camera with me, so I was unable to get photos of us.