Today was a moving day and in the morning I took the New Delhi metro to the airport for the first time, for 64 rupees. The metro is pretty peaceful compared to the traffic up above and has relatively new carriages. The ride took 30 min and was followed by a 1 hour flight with Air India for €32 (3200 rupees).
On arriving at Udaipur’s small airport, I found there was no public transport and the city was 25 km away, so I negotiated a driver (unofficial taxi) for 600 rupees to 500 metres from the hotel, yes, because I stayed in the old part of Udaipur and in that area only motorbikes and tuk tuks are allowed, so I walked 5 min to the hotel.
When I got to the hostel, 2700 rupees for 3 nights, and after settling in, I went up to the terrace, because they were going to offer chai and a local snack, and I stayed up there enjoying the view over Lake Pichola. Around then some Indian tourists also arrived to fly kites from the terrace and I even helped launch a sky lantern.
Because today is the Kite Festival, celebrated on 14 January in India, and it’s an event that symbolises the arrival of spring, the end of winter and good luck. While the kites were flying, the sun was already disappearing behind the mountains where the Monsoon Palace is.
After a bit of socialising I ended up going to dinner with 2 French people I met, at Green Grotto, and I had a veg biryani, a fried rice with vegetables, tangerine and spices.
Before going into the restaurant I also watched a ritual at the small Limbaj Mata Mandir temple, which was full of incense smoke, with a deafening noise from the believers ringing bells, others were waving fans and there was even colourful lighting that looked more like a nightclub.
Then I went to see a Dharohar folk dance show, with puppets and balancing acts, with the performer dancing with a stack of pots on his head and stepping on glass.
Before going back to the hostel I took a walk around the surrounding area and went to find out about the exchange rate and the price of an Ayurvedic massage, and did some shopping for breakfast, because tomorrow at 6 am I’m going to watch the sunrise in the mountains.