Sunday, January 17th, 2016
I was surprised that I was only feeling a little fuzzy instead of experiencing the aftereffects I deserved for drinking so much as I made my way downstairs. Anita had made all of us corn salad and toast for breakfast which was delicious given my limited appetite. After freshening up, we met outside to hop into some rickshaws to take us into Jodhpur.
Trevor spotted a super pimped out rickshaw which we shared with Nick. Our driver blasted some intense club music and we about died when he “dropped the bass!”
Most of our crew headed inside to check out the Mehrangarh Fort. The rest of us would tour it later. We were going ziplining instead! I was pleasantly surprised that the zip lines were right outside of the fort rather than another drive out of town. I don’t know what I was expecting, but I didn’t think we’d be so close. There were 6 lines total and we all had a blast! Poor Verena kept getting stuck in the middle, and at one point, I was still hooked in as another guy was flying full force at me. They didn’t leave much time in-between people. Sorry no pics!
After flying around all morning, we went on the audio tour of the fort. You could still see dents from the cannon balls in the fort walls.
There were huge spikes on the doors to prevent elephants from knocking down the gates.
There was also a museum which had decorative elephant howdahs, art work, reconstructed rooms of the royals, and even an old guy falling asleep next to a hookah for the opium display!
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The fort was active for over 600 years and had never been taken over by force.
It was time to wander the “Blue City” which gets its name from the blue-painted buildings. Why blue? It apparently keeps the city cool from all the heat. We passed a Ganesha shrine as we wandered down the stone streets into the main square.
We were on a mission for eggs! One of the Golden Girls had told us that there used to be an omelette shop by the marketplace that made some incredible food. We had no such luck finding it. We only saw one vendor cooking eggs and they were suspect, so we gave up.
Trevor picked out a place to eat with a rooftop view called the “Mangal Haveli Guest House and Restaurant.” It had a nice view, but only one table.
After placing our orders, a firework went off which sounded more like a bomb. It scared the shit out of us! The waiter said, “Don’t worry, we’re a long way from Pakistan.” Trevor and I both got banana lassis (which were delivered upstairs via plastic bag), rice, garlic naan, and I ordered Paneer Butter Marsala while Trevor went with his favorite, Palak Paneer.
We found a couple rickshaws to get us back to the guest house, but before returning, we made a stop at the liquor store so I could replace Pat and Ray’s bottle of rum that I ended up completely consuming overnight.
I started getting a migraine from being so dehydrated. I really wanted in on the cooking class, but when I get migraines I’m pretty much immobile, so I tried to rest it off. I would wake up later to experience the brief power outage as I joined the others for dinner, then I’d go to bed earlier than usual to finish recovering. The strangest thing happened in between though, and I can’t explain it. All I can say is this is what happened. I woke up from my nap to an unfamiliar man’s voice saying, “Your aunt is dead.”
Jump Back to Part 23: Girl Power, Backbends & Squeegee Farts
Jump Ahead to Part 25: Jainism, Spaceballs & A Labyrinth
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Start from the Beginning at Part 1: Don’t Forget to Pack Your Anxiety
Stubbs Rambles On 