Tales From My Indian Fam – Jaipur Day 3

And, not so surprising to learn, William and Kate stayed at Rajvillas when they visited Jaipur. Lovely though the standard rooms are, I imagine they stayed in one of the grand suites.

My breakfast choice was, again, a superb Indian breakfast topped off with a massive Dosa. So tasty and oh so healthy.

Our program for the day obviously included Jaipur’s red fort. We were also lunching at the Fairmont, then shopping, a treat for the girls, before returning to Rajvilas to change for a jungle camp dinner and camel polo.

Jaipur’s Amer fort is everything you would expect – a massively impressive structure on the hillside above the valley village. We discovered what is the not so widely known, and surprises inside and sheer scale were remarkable.

This was a fort built with the intention it could never be taken. The valley sides and opposite hill were protected by extensive battlements and an artificial lake and island provided food and water and significant deep water tanks within the main fort added more water.

But there were three surprises inside!

The engineering and design to provide air conditioning via natural air currents. The meeting space – an open “room” meeting space set in a massive courtyard that could be lit be a few candles and the 1135’s private dining space.

The technology/design for the natural cooling was way above what the West was able to achieve at that time.

The meeting space within the main courtyard was adorned with mirrors and other reflective material, it is said that a few well placed candles could light the courtyard.

1135’s private dining room allows you to dine off a small fortune and sit where royalty have sat. A table with immense & ornately carved solid silver frame with chairs to match.

Rose petals from above, and a 3 piece band welcomed us to lunch. Well lunch and a show round of Fairmont Jaipur. Aside from the drum I did not recognise the instruments – but altogether it was a right royal welcome.

We took a quick bedroom tour, and the rooms are delightful, plus a peek at meeting spaces (60K sq m of congress space).

We lunched in Zoya, the all day restaurant, an amazing buffet lunch with the chefs deciding to offer us some additional treats.

Stomachs full we moved into shopping mode. In part as we had to dress for dinner – as locals – and of course the ladies in our group loved to shop.

Shopping done it was back to base for a freshen up and to change, personally I did not feel a tunic and turban really suited me but the girls looked good in saris!

Dinner was in the hills outside of Jaipur, a rural “camp” on the edge of woodland. Well “camp” is not quite accurate, as the site has a restaurant and bar plus second dining area with bar.

This a great venue for all manner of activities across a day with lunch and dinner on site. You can take woodland elephant rides, try your skills at turban tying, play a local side at cricket, and more. Or as I did, even try your hand (well, arm really) at camel polo.

Different dinner dishes just kept coming and I came equal first in the turban tying. Not bad considering there was only one other male in our group!!!

As for the camel polo – I did not fall off, I did score once and definitely need a lot more practise.

And after dinner back to Rajvillas for a nightcap.