Tuesday October 26

Breakfast at the Hotel
Service B+
Food B-

Went siteseeing by car, some of the highlights are:
Guda Lake
Bishonoi Village area
We saw Black buck, Indian Antelope, and cranes.
Went to Mogra village which is famous of handmade dhuris. A husband and wife gave us a demonstration on how they are woven. The were all beautiful and Sudip couldn't resist buying one.



The next was Bishnoi Village where we saw a demonstration of opium ceremony and quite a ceremony it is.



The next was Salvas village, which was an all Muslim famous for pottery, where we got an idea of the skill required to make these simple items.

For lunch we came back to Jodhpurs and decided on On the rocks. The service was slow and the salty lassi bland but otherwise the food was reasonably good

Service - B
Food - B.

Next on the agenda was the main attraction of Jodhpur, Mehrangpur Fort.
This fort was built in 1459 and is one of the largest in India. It sits 400 feet (122 m) above the city and is enclosed by imposing thick walls and winding road leads to and from the city below.

The imprints of cannonball hits by attacking armies of Jaipur can still be seen on the second gate. There are seven gates, which include Jayapol (meaning 'victory'), built by Maharaja Man Singh to commemorate his victories over Jaipur and Bikaner armies. Fattehpol (also meaning 'victory') gate was built by Maharaja Ajit Singh to mark the defeat of the Mughals. The palm imprints marking the "sati" committed, still attract much attention even today.

Today it is possible go the first 120 feet by elevator then the stairs.

This is by far my favorite fort on this trip, it is the picture perfect fort from Bengali literature, specially Tagore's "Hungry Stone".

There was informal local music in the Fort, it had a haunting melody and we stopped and listened for a while.

We then proceeded on to Jaswant Thada which wasBuilt in 1899.

Dinner was compliments of Compass, and was at Pal Haveli. This restaurant was a terrace set high above the city with a view of the Fort. We were hoping that the fort would be lit but unfortunately it was not. The ambience was wonderful none the less.

Service - A
Food - A
Ambience - A

We took our time enjoying our meal and after we were finished Raghu turned up like clockwork and accompanied us back to our hotel.

A very enjoyable day for sure.