India - Through Chris's Eyes

Thursday 22nd April

Unfortunately the time had come for us to leave Ranthambore and head off to the city of Jaipur, just a short 2-3hrs away by train.

We had booked into a fairly expensive hotel called the Umaid Mahal. As we'd experienced mixed service almost everywhere else there wasn't much reason to expect any different. A quick ride in a little mini van and we were there.

As we walked into the foyer everything looked very posh, even an indoor swimming pool which looked very clean and a few people were having a bathe. This looked to be something a little different than anything that had gone before. We walked to the reception to check in and we were right, things were very different. The guy on reception was very smart; the porters were ready to take our bags to the room. All good!!!

Bloody Hell, wrong hotel . . . I should have realised it all looked too good to be true.

Our place was 200yds away, and luckily the other hotel was run by the same concern and was equally impressive with big gold doors flanked by two elephant statues. Our room was very nice as well. Most of the staff were from Nepal and seemed to have a totally different attitude than most Indians and were always ready to offer their assistance.

After unpacking we decided to take a little walk out, as we needed to get a few little bit's and pieces. We were quickly pounced upon by a rickshaw driver, who wanted to take us here, there and everywhere. We brushed him aside, but he seemed friendly enough and pointed us to a little supermarket just down the road.

A little later after deciding what we were going to do the following day and taking a swim in the hotels pool, we took another stroll 100yds down the road to have some chai. The same rickshaw guy was still there and I offered to buy him some chai. He insisted on getting ours and introduced himself as "Super Salim".

After sitting on the corner of the street talking for about an hour or so, it was time to go back and get ready to eat. A loud racket was coming from up above in the rooftop restaurant and we was a little reluctant at first to go up. We also had a choice as the hotel had another restaurant downstairs by the pool. We gave it a go and it turned out to be a Rajastani band consisting of 4 guys & two dancing girls. They encouraged Serena to have a little dance followed a little later by me, only my dance cost us 50 Rupees, could have been worse they wanted 500. The food was excellent, a very enjoyable evening.