Sightseeing in Udaipur

LINK TO FULL UDAIPUR PHOTO ALBUM

With a relaxing late start to our day, we ventured out into the city for some sightseeing. We first went to the City Palace complex. This Palace was built by several different generations of the ruling family. While it looked beautiful from afar – the interior of the palace has been poorly conserved and is in need a good scrubbing throughout the entire grounds. This palace, unlike the others we have seen, is more compact and stacked up high which created a maze of rooms and tiny passages. The best part of the palace is that each floor has a view of the lake. The passageways are very tight and rather than being able to wander around at our leisure like the other palaces, here, we were forced to tour in a set path along with hundreds of other tourists. Needless to say, the experience was very hectic given the holiday time and the large amount of tourists visiting the attraction. We skipped a lot of photo opportunities here just to get out of the crowded areas.










You can see our hotel from the palace.


After emerging from the City Palace relieved that we had finally made it out we made our way up the street to the Jagdish Mandir. Located just north of the City Palace is a fantastically carved Hindu temple built in 1651.








View from the top of the temple steps.


After sightseeing we wandered around the area looking at items in shops and just enjoying the afternoon. It was nice to be on our own since in other cities we had a guide with us the whole time. We bought a couple of handicraft items as souvenirs and although I negotiated my best, I’m sure we probably paid too much.

Some nice sunset and night photos.








That evening we ate at the hotel restaurant, Sheesh Mahal.




While the cuisine was a mix of all regional Indian food we tried the specialty Rajasehani dishes suggested by our server. As a nice touch the dining experience included several different Rajasehani ceremonies throughout the meal:

When we were seated, the host was sure to place me on the left of Abhay. It is a Rajasehani tradition that the women sit to the left of the man since your heart is located on the left side of your body. After being seated, warm rose water was poured over our hands to cleanse them for dinner. At the end of the dinner, our server tied a string tied on my left arm and another one on Abhay’s right arm so that we will return to the city. When signing the check, Abhay was presented with a camel bone ink pen and ink well to sign with. Maharajas used to sign important documents this way and I think he had fun writing with the pen. Finally, each table was named something different – ours was the peppercorn table and they gave us peppercorn to take with us as a souvenir.



Altogether, it was a wonderful dinner under the stars while we enjoyed the beauty of the city and lake.