So it might look like I am in a Middle Eastern desert but I’m actually in the Thar desert that separates India and Pakistan and in this blog we're going to explore India's golden city Jaisalmer.
It's almost 3 p.m right now and I am in Jaisalmer in western Rajasthan. It's called the golden city actually because it's so close to the golden sand dunes and also it seems like every bit of architecture in the city is the golden color because it's all almost made from yellow limestone. Even my hotel is completely golden speaking of residences, I’m gonna walk now to probably the most famous place of residence in this city.
So one thing I’d always seen in the movies but I’ve never seen in person is cows sort of like standing in the street and blocking the streets and no one moving them but I guess that's a thing especially in this part of India as you can see I was not kidding when I said literally every building is golden in the city.
So if you follow google maps of the city you're definitely going to go through some very interesting alleys like this one. Just watch out for pigeon poop on top of you
Okay so right now I’m at Patwa ki haveli and haveli means basically a very fancy mansion in this part of India and there's quite a few of very fancy havelI’s in Jaisalmer but this is the oldest one and arguably the fanciest one out of all of them. This one was built by this guy named Patwa who was very very wealthy and a very well-known merchant of the time and he actually had five havelis built at the same spot for his five sons.
He was that rich and the architecture is still just insane. Almost every bit of this building is covered by like ridiculous yellow sandstone architecture. okay just noticed something very interesting happening behind me here.
There's a cage with one tiny little bird in it. There's like dozens of the same birds chilling on top of the cage seemingly in solidarity with the bird that's caged up.there's also a lot of handicraft shops right outside the haveli which look very similar to the ones I saw in Jodhpur a bit further back in history than the havelis let's go to the fort
Sidewalks are definitely not a thing here. We can't really talk about the city's history without talking about the city's fort. The good thing about this city is that all of the attractions are like within two to three kilometers of each other .so you won't be walking very long if you're walking between places
holy this place is definitely a lot cooler than I expected. This fort was built in 1156 by this guy named Rawal Jaisal who was a Bhaati Rajput ruler at the time and he moved his capital right here and he built this fort and he named the city after himself, called it Jaisalmer. So this location was picked because this fort is placed on top of a 250 feet high hill and there's 30 foot high fortifications around the fort and there were three layers of walls protecting.
The city this fort was declared a UNESCO world heritage site back in 2013 and honestly this is less of a fort and more of like a small town inside the Thar desert because like I said people were living here at the beginning, but people have continued living here for a generation starting from olden times.so this is the only living fort of India which means it's not just like a fort for show and all guarded up.
There's actually more than 3 000 people still living inside the fort and they have their shops where they sell handicrafts all over the streets and they have their hotels and everything else in here. So it's a pretty unique fort I must say on top of being a very gorgeous one from what I’ve seen so far. And honestly it's not just India. I don't think I’ve ever seen or been to a fort anywhere in the world where there's like thousands of people still living inside it
Just like everywhere else in the city there are cows inside the fort too. I’m next to this building called the Raje ki mahel which was basically the main palace for the king of Jaisalmer for a long time. So it seems like riding motorbikes is a huge part of culture in Rajasthan in general but especially in this part in Jaisalmer and also in Jodhpur. So I’m in front of this very pretty temple right now it seems to be closed but there are actually quite a few prominent Jain temples in Jaisalmer.
So I’m right by the outer walls of the fort of Jaisalmer and through the walls you can see the whole city or the rest of the city outside the fort behind me And even inside the walls you can see the houses of the people that live inside the fort here.
So to finish the day I came to this cafe called Chai-salmir which has to be the most clever name I’ve heard in a while to get some chai and enjoy the sunset and this place has insane panoramic views of the whole city and especially of the fort behind me,It's definitely getting a little bit chilly but I got myself a pot of tea. It should be a couple of cups to keep myself warm until I really have to go. Not very good at pouring this. Cheers to Rajasthan
ah oh okay burned my mouth. Alright that's it for today. My guide for the next day or two is Vikram from classic desert safari (Camp) and he's just telling me his story. You didn't go to school after fifth grade yeah? yeah you speak every day English so we learned English from foreigners. He said he couldn't read his name when he left school in fifth grade and he's been working with camels and stuff
So I finally arrived at the campsite itself So I am in the Thar desert. I was actually in the desert for a while but this feels more like the desert because I’m on sand finally.
Thar desert is also called the great Indian desert so it's one of the 20 largest deserts in the whole world and has an area of over 200 000 square kilometers and it acts as the natural barrier between India and Pakistan at least to the south and the middle of it. So I’m actually staying in this camp overnight in these super deluxe tents that are like surprisingly really really nice, Yeah this is a really nice room, place to put your stuff. I think this is for two people.
Okay this is happening. So cute. They're a lot bigger than I remember and they look like dinosaurs almost sometimes. So I sit on here? this one is the biggest camel apparently so I’m pretty freaking high. Oh what do you want boy?
this ride is a little more bumpier than I expected. (It’s) making noises. Definitely in the sand dunes completely right now, you can see there's sand on pretty much every side of me. So you don't really see a lot of camels when you're in the big cities like Jaipur and even Jodhpur but camels are the state animal of Rajasthan and there's more than 200 thousands of them.. oh boy.. in Rajasthan alone. Obviously they're known as the ship of the desert because for centuries and thousands of years people have just relied on camels to traverse these deserts.
Today there's not as many as there used to be because there's tractors and other technology that can kind of do the same job and these are becoming more and more expensive to maintain.
You can still come to Jaisalmer and get a ride for two hours or even upto like 20 days from what Vikram was saying,That was quite the adventure I think. My legs hurt from keeping them spread for so long. So we've come to a spot after a little bit of a safari and we're preparing tea for the evening or chai
Going on an early morning sunrise jeep safari. So yesterday night was super chill. I’m in the middle of a 7 am safari. Just woke up and got out of bed and uh got on that jeep behind me. So a cool thing I saw on the way were some wild camels like just eating some bushes and stuff. I didn't know they were just running wild in this part of
Rajasthan at least. Now we have someone preparing some tea for us. We're gonna see the sunrise and then we're gonna get on the car again.. what do you want?
hey doggy. This doggy wants to play. Chai. Okay dogs not right now.The sun is finally coming up ,My time at Jaisalmer and my time at this camp is running out so I just want to give a quick shout out to classic desert camp. They're the ones that provided the tent for me. They actually provide options for camping out for longer stays and it included everything like the camel ride and breakfast and dinner and everything else. Some other things like the jeep rides cost extra but
it's still an amazing deal and the guy who sort of owns and runs the place, Vikram, is a super chill dude. I’ve been hanging out with him for like the last 24 hours and we've become good friends and he lives his life to show a good time to tourists which is always a good attitude to have. I’ll leave more information contact details for him and the camp in the blog description if you're interested.
Feel free to follow me if you want to see more blog from India and everywhere in the world.
I’ll catch you guys in the next blog from I don't know where
0 Comments