Jaipur - Pink City and Mosquito infested!

Jaipur Travel Blog

› entry 13 of 15 › view all entries

May 31st, 2007 – by: vvicy1

View ove the pink city

Made it to Jaipur and found a hotel by lunch time, and went sight seeing for the afternoon. For a place with no water I can not believe how many mosquitos there are here!! I saw Nagarh Fort and Jaighur Fort both by day and night.

I had booked at ticket to Agra the following morning, but on Thursday I found all rail and bus travel had been suspended due to riiots and protests over the state. Have included news clip.

A lot of the tourist places and Jaipur were closed during this time, and due to having no way to get out of the city due to the road blocks I tried to just see what I could.

I went to all the forts again, including Amber Fort, the gardens at Jaighur Fort, the central park where they have a beautiful musical fountain that flashes different colours, and plays music to the cascades. I also headed to the local swimming pool, for a dip that evening.

Hawa Mahal - Palace of the winds

Was still stuck in Jaipur Friday morning, and starting to panick as my flight was leaving Delhi on Sunday night.

Saturday I took my chance and went on a public local bus to Delhi - fortunatley with no problems, made it there by Saturday evening.

I don't have high opinions of Jaipur, I have seen too many forts and temples by this part, and I'm not a touristy person, I prefer natural beauty and an adventure. the only adventure I ran into in Jaipur was running into the local mafia who befriended me and wanted me to smuggle semi-precious stones back to the UK!! I changed hotels and left the next day!!

Clip from my diary:

A group called the Gurjjas have started riots all over Rajasthan, parts of Delhi and Agra, over 22 people have been killed, and they have blocked all the roads to Delhi and Agra from Jaipur.

Lucky me, I'm in Jaipur.

Me at Nawalgarh Fort

And now all surrounding states are refusing to send any transport to rajasthan, all trains and buses are cancelled. So cant even get to Bikaner or Jodphur to go via through to Delhi. I was going to go to Pushkar, but they have started fighting there also.

It's been terrible, shops are closed down, tourist areas have been shut, and there has been no help or advice available to any travellers, so a lot of people are stuck here. People are starting fires everywhere, setting lorries and petrol tankers alight, and are blocking up the highways with their dead people, and taking up the train tracks.

The army have been given orders in over 7 districts to 'shoot on sight', so trying to stay in my hotel and stay off the roads.