Bharatpur, Rajasthan, India
Saturday, April 23, 2011
Leaving our bags in
Delhi we were off on a two night excursion to
Bharatpur, visiting the Taj Mahal on the way back. Bharatpur is in Rajasthan which translates as "The Land of the Kings", so what better place to stay than a palace. We weren't sure how palace-like this place would be, we had a quick look at the website and it looked like it had a swimming pool (which is usually a good sign) but it could have been a water feature, we set low expectations. On arrival however, we were completely taken aback by what we saw. This was a very well maintained or renovated palace, brightly painted with decorative motifs on the walls. Inside were traditional pointed archways and photographs of the royalty at various functions over the last couple of hundred years up to independence I guess (as this was when the maharajas stopped receiving the privy purse and they all run out of money). The dining hall (which was in its own dedicated building) had large chandeliers hanging from the ceiling a large banqueting table in the centre. The water feature was in fact a swimming pool, and a very clean one at that, it was also very cooling in the dry, high 30’s heat. Down the road from the palace is a national park which boasted the largest population of birdlife in Asia. We hired out bicycles and spent the morning riding around the park, we saw wild boar, deer, jackals, horse-cow (not sure of the actual name), and many birds including large cranes which stood at least a meter tall. After the park we took a cycle-rickshaw to the fort area and visited the dusty museum.
(LF: on our first evening we were in the palace had a few beers in the outdoor bar area and watched a Rajasthan puppet show which was put on by a father and his 3 sons. The eldest son was the puppeteer, the two youngest sung and played drums, and the father sung and played a piano accordion. We ended up purchasing 2 puppets – they are very cool)
