The City of Blue

I arrived in the blue city late in the evening half asleep, after the hike at Ranakpur and following a long bus ride. I decided to take the advice of some fellow travelers offered to me as I was getting on the bus at Ranakpur, to try Heaven Guest House in Jodhpur. In the traveler circles of India and most other countries, you end up criss-crossing routes with lots of other travelers, many of whom you’ve already met, from destinations of places you’ve been to or are going. As stories are told and advice is given, inevitably, common topics surface such as what to do, what to see, where to eat and particularly, where to sleep, and the business owners are privy to this (at least the smarter ones). So, in an attempt to secure future business from the mouths of paying guests, and hospitality heads attempt to give ultimate care and pampering, often and not surprisingly, right at the end of your stay near check-out. At this point, business cards or small brochures are given out and it’s kindly asked that you distribute these to travelers coming their way. It’s really a great and cheap approach to advertisement and the best form of accountability for the guest house owners. Everyone wins! So when I was given the card for Heaven and told how great the service and kind the family was, I felt compelled to try and was rewarded!

I was actually disappointed to learn that there were no rooms available at Heaven when I plodded up the stairs to the office with my large backpack. But my fortunes quickly turned when I was offered the bed on the ornamental rooftop under the stars, and later to find out, under the strikingly colossal Megerangarh fort, rising out of the desert practically right overhead! All of my aches, pains and fatigue vanished as a full enough moon lit the clay-colored fort abright in an ochre-colored brilliance. I can’t believe I didn’t get a picture of it from this vantage point!

The inside of the fort was no less impressive than the outside, complete with everything you’d imagine to necessitate such a mighty structure. In an effort not to excessively bore with insignificant names and details, I’ll just let some of the images I was able to capture do the talking.

Aside from the fort and a few of the other monuments around town that I didn’t get to, Jodhpur was just a smaller, albeit much smaller, version of Delhi. Lots of traffic, honking and people. I never did learn for sure why “blue” theme dominated Jodhpur (the guidebook said something about it being Brahmin-blue), but this amalgamation was pleasing, particularly when viewed from high above in the fort.

Two nights in Jodhpur did the trick and the deep desert town, teeming with camels is calling. Jaisalmer is the next stop…