Ed in India - Days 8&9
Day 8
We had another Jaipur tour on day 8, including visits to the Jaipur City Palace, Hawa Mahal, Jal Mahal and Jantar Mantar.
As with all of the Indian architecture that we had seen so far, the Jaipur City Palace was beautiful. It was interesting that in the ‘Pink City’ of Jaipur, all palace buildings were yellow rather than pink.
Hawa Mahal, Jal Mahal and Jantar Mantar were also very impressive. Particularly impressive were the calculating instruments on show that were used to tell the time. Our guide was able to tell the time to within 1 minute, just using the sun and these instruments!
After a nice group lunch we then had an afternoon rickshaw ride with the Pink City Rickshaw Co.
This was a great experience for the group, as the Pink City Rickshaw Co has been set up to give local women jobs to help them support their families. It was good to see them enjoying their work whilst giving us a great tour of Jaipur at the same time.
A highlight for me was a local man blowing bubbles into the rickshaw that I was in. Us West Ham fans do get everywhere…
In the evening we were taken by jeep to the top of Amer Fort to see Jaipur by night, followed by a Rajasthani dinner with local entertainment. Our group enjoyed sharing an Indian rum & coke looking over the city lights!
Day 9
It was time for us to head to Mumbai for the final leg of our journey. We had our first internal flight of the trip with Indigo. The flight went smoothly and we were even fed on our short flight of just over an hour!
Once we arrived we were transferred to our hotels and we had the remainder of the day at leisure. Gary and I spent our evening organising everyone’s tickets in preparation for what was a massive game in England’s chances of qualifying for the semi finals!
We were very lucky in that the South Africa team were staying at the Trident Nariman Point with half of our group. The England team were then staying with the other half of our group at the Taj Hotel. It’s not everyday you wait for a taxi with David Miller. I also shared a lift with Shaun Pollock and Michael Atherton!
