Bit of a nothing sort of day today, the main objective being to get from Jaisalmer to Jodhpur. Kerry and I went for a bit of a wander after breakfast to swap a scarf she’d bought yesterday for one of a different colour. After that we found a coffee shop just beyond the first internal gate and sat there for a while watching the proceedings of the day along the road.
Check-out was at midday so we returned to the hotel to do that and then loitered at the rooftop bar until 1:30pm when we all gathered in the lobby for the beginning of the next journey - we’ve got a train to Jodhpur at 3:30pm. ETA in Jodhpur is about 9:30pm. The train ride would have been very unexciting except for the interaction with the locals. A bunch of excited children aged between about 8yo and 13yo decided that our compartment would be a better place to hang-out than with their parents. They all gravitated towards Anna, the youngest in our group, and had a great time with her for a couple of hours.
After the kids retreated the group of young adults in the next compartment stepped up to fill the void. They were all from one family, either by birth or marriage, who had been to Jaisalmer for a long-weekend sort of getaway. They were super excited to be hanging out with foreigners on the train, happy to share their stories with us. We reciprocated by spending some time in their compartment and sharing our stories with them.
We reached Jodhpur station more or less on time, I think, pilled into a couple of tuk-tuks and made our way to the hotel for the next two nights. The street-scape in which the hotel sits belies the interior of the hotel itself. Along a poor dirt road, behind a great big green gates lay a green oasis. At the centre of the hotel is a small marble courtyard, fringed with with greenery, surrounding a small fountain. Beyond the courtyard, through French door is a lounge/dining room full of plush, comfortable chairs with artifacts from a bygone era adorning the walls and the other furniture. This hotel is apparently owned by a chap with some links to Rajisthani royalty although I’m not too sure how long or distant those links are. His great-great grandfather was the chap who invented Jodhpurs, the leggings that the British aristocracy wear when they go horse-riding…. so he said.
When dinner was finished it was very late so we all headed for bed.
No comments:
Post a Comment