The Hill station town

Location: Udaipur
Country: India

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The last night in Jaislamer I went to a puppet show. Apparently the puppetry in India originated in Jaislamer, so I figured that a puppet show there would be really good, I was wrong (“The lonely goater” in “Sound of music” was way better).


The bus ride from Jaislamer to Mount Abu was really rough. 11 hours on a local bus is very hard, it is just so uncomfortable. There is no point in trying to get comfortable, as it is an impossibility. There were no other tourists on the bus, so that made it even more fun. The only comfort I had was my mp3 player, and wouldn't you know, it decide to not work. So apart from the fact that it made my trip that much harder, I was in a state of panic that my mp3 player was dead (yes, it made me panic). Later it turned out that the battery was just finished, the "on" button must have got pressed at some point without me realizing.
The one good thing I can say about the ride was that they stopped often enough for toilet brakes (sometimes they stop only every 5 hours).
After 11 hours of me almost going insane, we finally got to the destination, or actually, not. Apparently the bus doesn't go all the way to Mount Abu, it only goes to Aburoad.
So I had to get another one and a half hour bus, which was that last straw...
But at least the last part of the journey was on a comfortable bus and with a lovely view on the way of green hills (was almost as nice as driving up the Carmel).

Mount Abu is a small town with not many tourists about (unless you count Indian tourist, which I don't). It is a Hill station town, which is where the rich people retreat to in the summer, as the weather is a bit cooler there.
There is not too much to do there, 2 days of site seeing was enough.
It is quite a pleasant town, rather clean (compared with the regular filth one encounters here), and not too many cows about. The people there aren't as pushy and I could actually walk down the street without being harassed every 2 minutes.
I took an organized bus tour thingy, as it was the easiest way to see all the sites.
The one place really worth mentioning is the Dilwara temple – it is a Jiani temple made entirely out of marble, with loads of beautiful carvings and statues, very impressive.

There are many rules when going in the temple – no shoes, no cameras (the picture you see above, I took of a postcard), no water bottles. But the following one I found most amusing:

I was hoping that on the tour I would meet some other tourist, but they were all Indian.
During the tour, I had Indians falling all over me wanting to have their picture taken with me, so I could only reach the logical conclusion and I have decided to embark upon a modeling career.

The trip from Mount Abu to Udaipur was a piece of cake. It was only five and a half hours (a pop around the corner), on a comfortable bus with a functioning MP3 player.
Udaipur is quite beautiful, with loads of lakes all around.

Apparently the James Bond film Octopussy was shot here, the direct result being that the film is shown in at least 10 different restaurants around town on any given evening (and yet, I have managed to avoid seeing it so far).

There is quite a lot to do and see around here.
The other day I went to Shilpgram, which is an artist’s village (of course I am known as a great supporter of the arts). It was touristy as they come, but very nice to walk around.

Yesterday hired a jeep (a real jeep, comfortable and all) with another 6 Israelis and went on a day trip, which was great.
We went to Kumbhalgarh fort, which was beautiful. In it’s whole history it was only conquered once, and after walking up the hill to the fort, I fully understood why.


We then went to Ranakpur temple, which is another Jiani temple made out of marble and was magnificent.
I don’t know much about these Janis, or however they are called, I just know that they are a group of tree hugging hippies. They don’t believe in killing any living creature (including the small annoying ones, such as bugs), and their diet is very stricked, they don’t eat after sunset for fear that the may eat a bug by mistake (and not because of the obvious reasons that it is disgusting to eat a bug).
The one thing I can say in their favor is that I have now seen 3 of their temples, and they are the most impressive that I have come across.
The Tibetans can learn a thing 2 from them; their temples are so plain and boring.


I have another week to spend in Udaipur and from what I have seen so far; it should be a pleasant one.