Sardargarh - First Afternoon

Thursday, 13 November 2014, Sardargarh

This morning Pati and BeeBee got up at 6 am for breakfast and departure at 9 am. They had a quick sandwich lunch at a restaurant just off their route at  1:30 and arrived at their hotel, Sardargarh Heritage Hotel (a former palace), about two hours later. The roads they traveled ranged from level limited-access highway to steep single-lane with lower berms. On the way, they saw the exact local train that they will be riding tomorrow. Until 4 pm, when a young couple arrived, they were the only guests in the hotel. The hotel has free wifi that can be accessed in only one courtyard. Pati and BeeBee sat in a large opening in the stone wall to use the internet; the manager brought them cushions. The manager also brought them a dinner menu so that they could pick their meal for 7 pm. By dinnertime, there were 4 more guests, traveling together, from Holland., bringing the guest total (as far as BeeBee knows) to 8.

At 8:30 pm, Pati and BeeBee were picked up for their jeep safari. This involved driving 10 km (6 miles) from the hotel and then going off-road (and on roads that might as well be off-road) looking for wild animals with a searchlight operated by a young man standing on the tailgate of the jeep. They spotted deer (two kinds), 2 owls, 1 rabbit, a family of foxes, a small animal  bigger than a mole but smaller than a hedgehog, and a small herd of camels plus herder. The herder was surprised by the searchlight and had a friendly conversation (long distance) with the young man with the searchlight. The ride was the bumpiest so far in India. The night was cool enough for jackets, for the first time since Shimla. It was pitch black dark and very peaceful. The driver and spotter spoke in low voices only when necessary, and the driver maneuvered the jeep as quietly as possible. The two men had only limited English, reserving their conversation mostly for naming animals. The peace of the night, the darkness, and the late hour made it difficult to stay awake, even with the rough ride. Finally, Pati and BeeBee were returned to the hotel just before midnight.

Setting the alarm clock for an early start tomorrow, they fell into bed, exhausted.

Jodhpur -Touring

Wednesday, 12 November 2014, Jodhpur

Pati and BeeBee started their full touring day at 10am. First they visited Jaswant Tara - the royal crematorium- and the massive fort above Jodhpur. The fort is the best preserved fort in India; it is part of the national trust and is supported by UNESCO, the US, and Germany. The guide rushed through the fort so quickly that Pati and BeeBee lost him a few times when they stopped to take pictures. However, the guide provided buying opportunities in the fort's gift shop (although he steered them to the expensive part of the shop and skipped the parts that, from a distance, looked interesting to BeeBee) and later in a jewelry store.  After this, they made a short stop at their hotel, where their guide left them after collecting a review and his tip.

Their driver then took them quite a few miles out of Jodhpur to meet up with their jeep safari. The first part of the safari was a bumpy ride along dirt tracks and through a dry river bed. It was like driving in deep snow. They visited a private home very similar to the one visited on the jeep safari at Manvar. There is no electricity at this home, except for that generated by a solar panel mounted on a short pole: the exclusive use of this solar power is to charge their cell phones. (Except for some very remote areas, all of India has excellent cell phone coverage - even in the sand dunes.) This family had five children. The older daughter, age 22, was married and living in the next village with her husband and new baby. The younger daughter, age 14 or 15, was also married but living at home still; she is not old enough to live with her husband as a wife. The custom in that area is to have many marriages at the same time, coinciding with some event when many people would be together anyway, such as a death in a family. Such gatherings are very expensive, because possibly a thousand people have to be fed for many days, so it is an economic decision to get as much out of an event as possible This girl knows who her husband is, but does not have regular interactions with him. Two other tourists, older American women, also showed up for this visit, along with the guide for the safari. They all had a very nice Indian lunch while they were there.  One of the other women "thrilled" the group by describing other vacations she had been on in the dim past. That was certainly more exciting than being on vacation in the present.

After lunch, the two groups went together to visit a town of a few thousand. At this town, the "mayor," a Brahmin, invited them to witness/participate in a local ritual. After this, the two women went with Pati and BeeBee's jeep driver back to their drop-off point, while the guide took Pati and BeeBee to a very small village. Here they were surrounded by every child in the village as they visited the carpenter and the shepherd's penned-up lambs (but not the shepherd). They saw the shepherd's wife (who provides school lunches every day) when she took a long stick to chase the children away.  They were led around by the head man of the village, who was accompanied hand-in-hand by his small grandson. Leaving the village, they looked for wildlife along the road, without any luck.  By the time they got back to their own driver (Deepak), they had traveled 60 kilometers (36 miles).

Before they started back to Jodhpur, they visited two craftsmen in a small area near where they had met the jeep safari.  The first craftsman was a potter, whose largest product is the water vessel they had just seen at the private home. This pot keeps water cool even in the hottest weather, through evaporation. He demonstrated making many clay items, using a 100 kg (220 pound) wheel that he propelled with a sharp piece of wood. Once he got the wheel up to speed, he could make many objects while momentum kept the wheel turning. He demonstrated the durability of  a pottery lamp by bouncing it off a concrete floor (or mud and cow dung floor - they look pretty much the same).

The second craftsman stamped patterns onto cloth, using natural products, including mud. He was actually selling products made by his village, because his village was too far away for tourists to visit easily. These craftsmen were more genuine than those in the city, because they actually demonstrated their craft.

The drive back to the hotel took about a half hour.  Pati and BeeBee had dinner in the hotel restaurant, and then stayed awake long enough for their laundry to be delivered back to them.