2025: Northern India

2. Jaipur, and onwards to Ranthambore

The Amber Fort at Jaipur

Leaving the coach by the lake below the impressive Amber Fort, we transferred to smaller vehicles to continue up the steep narrow road. Some tourists made this part of the journey by elephant, but this was not for us. The Amber Fort was extremely impressive, and was just one of several forts guarding the area from the top of the hills.

Some tourists travelled up to the fort by elephant but we went by taxi		The main courtyard	The impressive audience hall	The tope of the pillars are in the form of elephant heads
The area enclosed by the Fort's walls is absolutely huge	The inner courtyard	The walls and ceiling of this hall are made of mirrors, to reflect the light of a small number of candles at night

Coming down from the Amber Fort, the traffic had come to a complete standstill. Everybody was blowing their horns but nobody (including the traffic policeman at the junction) was moving, so our tour manager Vishu walked on ahead and forced one car to back up by a few feet so that the traffic could move again. Thus we continued our journey, stopping to take pictures of the summer palace that had been built on an island in the lake below the Fort, and then proceeding to a carpet-making works..

Passing a richly-decorated elephant ...	... we reached the lake with its impressive summer palace ...	... and its impressive population of water-fowl

At the carpet works we saw demonstrations of block printing (Debbie had a go at this, and we were allowed to keep the result as a souvenir), of highly detailed weaving, and of unusual techniques including sculpting a pattern into the pile and also searing the back of the carpet with a flame. Needless to say, we were then shown a display of their fabulous creations, with ample opportunity to buy them.

We were shown the art of block printing	Debbie tries it for herself	Some fabulous carpet-weaving	Who wants to buy a carpet?

Our afternoon in Jaipur started with a visit to the Jantar Mantar observatory. This amazing centre for the scientific study of the skies was built in the 17th century, and includes both astronomy and astrology in its remit. It boasts many buildings, machines, dials, and displays, capable of measuring the positions and angles of the stars and planets to an incredible level of accuracy. It includes the world's largest sundial (90ft tall and incredibly accurate) and several structures which give astrological details for each sign of the Zodiac, I bought  the guidebook for the site, and was delighted to read in it the scientific explanation that 'The Earth is set in the midst of an enormous hollow sphere, on the inner surface of which the stars are situated. The whole celestial sphere rotates on its axis, which passes through the poles, once a day.'

This building is a small sundial, accurate to within 2 minutes	This 90-ft tall building is itself a huge sundial	This dial measures the sun's angle in a different way	This structure provides details for the sign of Aquarius

The rest of the afternoon was spent visiting the Maharajah's Palace. Parts of this Palace are still in use as a residence, but the parts that are open to the public include wonderful museums of fabrics, clothing, weapons, and so on (photography was not permitted inside the museums). The guards, both outside and inside the palace, were most impressive in their smart uniforms; indeed the whole palace was most impressive, though rather less impressive was the improvised scaffolding made from tied-together bamboo poles (the concept of Health-and-Safety has yet to reach India). We were intrigued by the sight of a huge silver sphere, about 5ft diameter, which was apparently just one of three 4000-litre water carriers that were made at the end of the 19th century. It was in these 'Jaipur Jars' that the Maharajah took his own drinking water with him when he went to England  for the coronation of Edward VII, because he was afraid that drinking British water would turn him white!

The guard outside the Maharajah's Palace	Debbie found another elephant	Bamboo scaffolding at some renovations	The Maharajah's water-carrier

Debbie stands with the guards at the Maharajah's Palace

We had a relaxing 9am start the next morning, for the coach would take us from Jaipur to Ranthambore. Originally it had been planned as a rail journey, but this train was proving to be extremely unreliable (running up to 10 hours late at times) and so the coach was used instead. This gave us a fascinating opportunity to observe the chaos that is road travel in this area. Our guide Vishu summed it up perfectly by telling us 'Here in India we have exactly the same traffic laws as you have in the UK - but we choose to ignore every single one of them'.

So, how to describe Indian traffic? Well imagine the most chaotic traffic scenes that you've ever seen in the UK, and multiply the level of chaos by 10; now perhaps you're getting close. The biggest difference is that the use of the horn: in UK is generally regarded as rude; in India it would be rude and dangerous not to hoot at the other drivers to announce your presence (it is highly unlikely that they will have seen you in their mirrors). As a result there is a cacophony of noise wherever you go, especially in the cities. Now, add to this a total lack of lane discipline; people simply drive on whatever part of the road they prefer; on dual carriageways this may be any lane so that overtaking traffic will weave its way past by overtaking, undertaking, or whatever, while at the same time people will have parked on the verge (or nearside lane) for a rest stop. On smaller main roads vehicles may travel at the edge of the road or the centre, so again faster traffic will, after hooting, overtake or undertake as appropriate. It is normal to overtake in the face of oncoming traffic (everybody moves briefly over to one side or the other  so that collisions are rare). Now, scarily, to this you must add the fact that people will happily drive in the wrong direction along the verges of busy roads and even along one-way sections such as motorway exit-ramps; plus the fact that there will be various animals wandering about in the road (apparently most village families own a cow, and when it is too old to supply milk they will simply turn it loose to roam because of course the cow is a holy animal which must not be killed - we were told that this idea of holiness was deliberately created in the days before refrigeration as a way of discouraging people from killing a cow for food since most of the meat would be spoiled after a day or two in the heat and would therefore be wasted).

Animals found wandering on the roads included cows, horses, sheep, goats, dogs, cats, squirrels, monkeys, elephants, camels, and others

Of course, with all this random overtaking and undertaking, it would be useful if, when you hoot at the car you are about to pass, they were to flash their indicators to show which side they would prefer you to pass. This does indeed happen, but the problem is that in some areas they will indicate the direction in which they will move aside (as they do in UK) whereas in other areas they will indicate the side on which they wish you to pass. If you don't know the convention for the particular area in which you are driving, the possibility of confusion is huge.

Finally, the cities. The best I can say is that not one single square inch of road is wasted! The slightest hint of a gap will immediately be filled with part of a vehicle - which may be a car, lorry, motor-bike with 3 or 4 passengers, a rickshaw with 4 or 5 passengers, or a tuc-tuc with up to 11 passengers (yes, they are licensed to carry 11 plus the driver!). Everybody pushes in, in front of everybody else (after hooting, of course); all the intersections are permanently blocked, traffic lights are ignored, there may be 7 or 8 lanes of traffic squashed into a 4-lane road, with the occasional vehicle travelling in the opposite direction, and after 2 weeks of observation we still could not work out who was supposed to have priority at the roundabouts. As a result, progress is extremely slow; for example it took our coach two-and-a-half hours to travel from Delhi station to our hotel just 5 miles away, and this was regarded as normal.

Most lorries display a sign reminding you to hoot at them	Evening traffic in Delhi

Despite this, our coach trip to Ranthambore passed comfortably without incident. We all reckoned that our driver deserved a medal, as we settled down for a relaxing afternoon at our comfortable hotel on the edge of the National Park. Our room there was excellent, with a balcony that looked out over the swimming pool with its elephant statues in each corner, as we readied ourselves for the next morning's early start on our safari adventure.

The beautiful fountain at the entrance to our hotel at Ramthambore	The hotel swimming pool had a statue of an elephant at each corner

All pictures on this site are © Allan Jones unless otherwise stated.