We had an amazing couple of days and nights, trekking through desert, stopping off at the odd village for water, or chatting to any random farmers that crossed our path, and sleeping under the stars with Kamal snuggled up beside us. After a few days of this we had to say an emotional goodbye to our new friends, and got picked up by jeep to take us back to Jasialmer.

We hung around for another day as we waited for our bus to Jaipur, and among other things had tea with an Indian family who offered to paint Sarah's toes for her, and saw a large crowd forming around what turned out to be a man trying to free a pigeon from an overhead wire. He failed.

Our next stop (and our last in Rajasthan) was Jaipur, known as 'the pink city', since it was painted that colour in honour of Prince Albert's visit. We visited the Hawa Mahal (wind palace, built for the king's ladies), the Raj Mandir cinema where we watched 'Gunday', and the Jantar Mantar, an outdoor observatory with instruments used for determining horoscopes before the days of telescopes. This last would have made an excellent level on Tony Hawk Pro Skater.  

Hawa Mahal

Raj Mandir

Jantar Mantar

We also spent an afternoon at the nearby Amber Fort, a short bus ride from Jaipur followed by a steep climb. We were rewarded by getting the chance to see THE WORLD'S LARGEST CANNON!

We saw these two guys enjoying each other's company on the way back down.

Our original plan when leaving Goa was to head north to Rishikesh and do a bit more yoga before we (sob) went back to England. We were within reach of Rishikesh in Jaipur but we had one more stop to make before that, so our next destination was Agra to see the Taj Mahal. 

It was, well, a massive marble gravestone which we paid 750 rupees each for the pleasure of seeing. We got there early but there was a big queue already. We got in and got out, checked out of the hotel then hung around in the noisy street directly outside the Taj for most of the day watching Slumdog Millionaire before taking a 'nature walk'. There was other stuff to do in Agra but we took the easy option and waited for our bus to Haridwar in comfort. We arrived in Haridwar the next morning then took the 1 hour bus ride to Rishikesh. We couldn't believe our eyes. After the noisy cities we have travelled through we weren't expecting the serene sight of the Ganga weaving its way through the hills around. We decided to set up camp until it was time to go home and spent just under two weeks in this blissful surrounding.

We were delighted to be joined by an old friend for the Holi festival.

Kathryn!

We also tried out a few different yoga classes, had a few walks in the mountains and fought off the monkeys from our balcony. From Rishikesh we came to Delhi where I am writing this now.

The train ride from Ajmer to Jodhpur was about 6 hours, and we enjoyed hanging out of the train as the countryside zipped by.

We were only in town on a short stopover en route to Jaisalmer, but we had time to check out the Mehrwar fort, which offered some good views of the city.

From Jodhpur it was 6 hours by bus to Jaisalmer, on the edge of the Thar desert and not (that) far from the Pakistan border. We arrived in the evening and set off early the next morning for three day of camel safari.