Jaipur is so close to Delhi that we completely take it for granted. I mean we always treat it as a place that can be visited anytime. I have been to Jaipur many times but somehow never explored it properly. In November 2008 I went to Jaipur again with my 18 year old, over six feet tall nephew. We had planned it as a weekend trip. We took the Ajmer Shatabdi up to Jaipur on a Saturday morning and took it back on Sunday evening from Jaipur.

Pic : Mridula D

Our plan was to hire an autorickshaw (because of this recommendation by Arun) with Gopi as our guide. I called Arun and asked for Gopi’s number and got in touch with him. Gopi assured us that he would be at the Jaipur station to pick us up. I got a call from Gopi as the Shatabdi was nearing Jaipur and that was quite reassuring. However, it took us quite some effort to figure out who was who once we got down at Jaipur. Once we met each-other, the first task was to find a hotel.

For our budget hotel we went with Raju (00 91 9829900473) and his friend Gopi’s (00 91 9352540301) recommendation and stayed in Hotel Banipark Palace which is a clean place. We promised Raju and Gopi that we would come out in 15 minutes and go for sightseeing and that is what we did.

Pic : Mridula D

Gopi told me then that he had an accident with his autorickshaw so his friend would show us around this time. When I asked him for a quote for the autorickshaw for the day, I was told I can pay whatever I wanted, as I was there guest. Try as I may, they would not give us a quote.

It was past eleven and Sunil and I wanted to have a brunch first. I wanted to eat Dal Bati Churma and Sunil normal Indian stuff. So Gopi took us to place (near railway station) where we got both. I feasted on Dal Bati Churma and would recommend it highly to all of you.

Pic : Mridula D

Then it was time to head out for sightseeing and Gopi took us to Jaigarh Fort first. The first thing that hit us was the vastness of the fort, I mean we are so used to cramped city life that open spaces tend to take the breath away. Within the premises is the biggest canon on the wheels and there are lot of things to explore. Puppet shows are held within the premises and there are a lot of monkeys to keep you company.

The next stop for us was the Amber Fort and I have been there many times before. There was a lot of restoration work going on at the Fort. Still, the gardens, the palaces within the fort and Sheesh Mahal particularly were the highlights of the day. On our way back Gopi stopped the auto for a while near Hawa Mahal but both of us were so tired by now that we clicked a photo from inside the auto and refused to get out! We did spend quite some time near Jal Mahal though.

Pic : Mridula D

After that we had dinner at Chit Chat (not too great for Indian food but they had very interesting room rates and quite popular with foreign tourists) and then I simply crashed. The kid kept watching for an hour or so but I was so tired that I was asleep within 10 minutes.

On day two, we explored bits of Jaipur that I had not seen before (and all popular places too, imagine how badly planned my previous trips were). Our first stop was Gaitore ki Chattriyan, which was very peaceful when we went there. Our next stop was City Palace which I thought was the highlight of our trip. The palace is really beautiful and worth spending a lot of time with. Audio guides are also available at Jaipur now.

Pic : Mridula D

Unfortunately we tried it only at one place in Jaipur, at Albert Hall Museum and that too Sunil’s insistence! After a little shopping (I love Lac jewelry) and a visit to Birla Mandir, very soon it was 4.00 in the evening and time to head back to the Railway Station to take the Shatabdi Express train back to Delhi. We thoroughly enjoyed our trip and we paid Gopi Rs. 500 per day for his services.

Pic : Mridula D

We travel to Bangalore almost once a year if not more. Up to the last year we always thought it was a great idea to catch a low cost flight and reach there in two and a half hours flat. However with the economy being what it is, this time we had to rethink. We usually do our tickets for this trip in advance (after all you can’t just turn up and catch a bus to Bangalore from New Delhi, like we keep doing when we go to the hills). So, around September 2008 when we looked (for a December 2008 trip) the fuel and hence the air ticket prices were quite high.

Entering Bhusawal Station on the way to Delhi, the Karnataka Express Train behind my coach

We decided to book our tickets in Rajdhani Express and brave it out for 36 hours. Don’t get me wrong, I love to travel on a train, it is only that the last time we took a Rajdhani it was so late (fog in the North and rains in the South) that we had cancelled our return tickets and booked a low cost flight instead. Our return tickets this time were in Karnataka Express, AC III both ways. Mercifully there was no side middle berth (which we saw on Mangalore Express) on any of these trains.

So what is your guess? The journey must have been comparable, right? I don’t think so.

The biggest advantage of traveling by the Rajdhani Express to Bangalore, is the time saved (though I wonder what we do with the amount of time we try to keep saving, sometimes it feels it is better to spend that time on rain, rather than in my mundane activities). It takes 36 hours to reach Bangalore by Rajdhani and 42 by Karnataka Express. The tickets of the Rajdhani Express are a bit more expensive but then they serve you meals throughout and that is included in the ticket price.

Now before you read any further (I teach college kids, that is my day job. You can imagine a very teacher like voice saying these lines) it would make a lot of sense to listen to the video first. Listen because there is not much of a video there, the still photograph of the train is all you will see. My elder nephew did all these tricks so that I could upload the MP3 on Youtube which I am told is otherwise not possible. In the video after two minutes you can listen to a small sample of the tunes they keep playing on the public address system of the train.

How do you find the welcome after boarding the Rajdhani Express train? That cacophony continues for a good ten minutes when you board the train and it can send small children into a crying frenzy! They wake you up between 6.00 and 7.00 am in the morning to drink tea! Don’t get me wrong, I live on tea but at 6.00 am I like only one thing and that is sleep!

The sample song that you listened to (what? you have not listen to the soundtrack of the video even now?) they play it at all the hours of day and night. One of the things I am looking forward on a 36 hour journey is to catch up on sleep! It is impossible with the music blaring at all hours at a volume over which I have no control. It might have made sense to play music (for a limited period) in an era when music players were not in every device you could think of! Now if I wish to listen to a song I can with my mobile phone and so can almost everyone that is the target market of the Rajdhani Express. Then they have been playing the same songs since last 20 years or so it feels. We realized this time that there is a person in the pantry whose job is to play the songs. You can request him to play it down but whether he will comply and for how long is any body’s guess.

The sound system is pathetic. It just drives you nuts with the repetitive music in screeching tones at all hours. I wonder if there is someone who likes to listen to it, but then I am sure the Indian Railway is not going to conduct a customer satisfaction survey anytime soon. When I posted a shorter version of this post on my blog one of our friends (yes we know Ranjit) suggested that there is a knob at the side of the speakers through which you can turn the music down. Let me know if you could do this on the train.

Also Rajdhani being an important train the number of ‘official’ looking people is much higher on it than Karnataka Express. So, this time when I tried traveling on the doors* of Rajdhani Express (a first for me) quite promptly I was told that due to the open doors the coach becomes heated as hot air would go in every time someone came out of the AC section. Now had he told me that it was risky to travel at the door I could have got into an argument but what do I do if someone tells me that my foolishness would interfere with others’ comfort? I closed the door and so did another person hanging on the other side. But as soon as those ‘official’ people went ahead, he opened the gate again. So did I but not for long, as I was in no mood to play this game again and again. No such hassles on the Karnataka Express, much less ‘official’ looking people and much more acceptance of traveling at the door.

Now would you blame me if I wish to avoid the Rajdhani Express train the next time around even though if it means sitting for longer in the Karnataka Express but mercifully without a public address system?

However, when I posted my experience of Rajdhani at Indiamike, not too many people seem to mind the music. On the other hand, people have done more outlandish things than just traveling on the door of a train.

*Traveling at the door is very common on Indian train but by no means encouraged by the railway staff.

It all started with a picture I saw of Prashar Lake on the web. I was completely bowled over! I wrote to the website owner Avnish Katoch and he put me in touch with the photographer Yash Raj. Gradually, I learned that to reach Prashar Lake one can take the famous Delhi-Manali route up to Mandi. From Mandi, one can hire a jeep up to Prashar Lake or one can take a bus from Mandi to Bagi (and not Baggi, which is in the opposite direction) and then trek the rest of the way.

Pic : Mridula

Both Sesha and I have motion sickness on the mountain roads and never drive in the hills. But I know of people who have taken their own vehicle up to Prashar Lake from Delhi (for basic driving information explore the Indiamike link at the end of this post). We are also very fond of walking. So, for us it was a bus to Bagi and then trekking up to Prashar Lake. At Bagi, there is one Dhaba where we had bread omelet and tea for breakfast. The young lad running the place told me it took him 1.5 hours to reach Prashar Lake. It took us five hours to cover that distance and let me warn you the way is all uphill.

Pic : Mridula

There is only one place to stay there, the forest department guest house that has to be pre-booked. After walking for five hours the people running the guest house were not very keen to believe us about our reservation. I simply told them that they have to give us the room as I was so tired after walking, I would not go away anywhere else. That worked.

The cook at the forest department guest house has to use wood to make food. So, you get either rice and dal or Chapattis with vegetables. There are two canteens at the lake where you can get tea and Maggi and basic food too if there are enough people at the lake.

Pic : Mridula

If by now you have started questioning why anyone in their right minds would head to such a place, then the answer is the because of the peace and tranquility and the uniqueness of the scenery. The lake on weekends is visited only by a few locals. During the weekdays you can have it entirely to yourself. And take a look at the picture, who would not be tempted to have such a place all to oneself, even if for a few hours!

Pic : Mridula

However, when it was our turn to come back, we refused to contemplate the steep trek route even though this time the walk would have been downhill. We managed to arrange a ride back with a jeep that had come to deliver supplies to one of the canteens.

If you wish to go, here are some useful resources-

A discussion on Indiamike, which I started to gather information before the trip and updates after the trip

My earlier article on Gonomad.com about the Prashar Lake.

Some stunning pictures of the Prashar Lake taken in December by a colleague