48 ~ Modern day sculpture park or ancient Observatory?Jaipur

Another 9am / 09:00 departure so there was after another double breakfast time for a walk around the resort taking the day time images in the previous entry.

Took just 2.5 hours to get to the Pink City of Jaipur.

Surrounded on three sides by the rugged Aravali hills, Jaipur is the picturesque capital of Rajasthan. It takes its name from the prince, soldier and astronomer Jai Singh II who moved his capital here in 1727. Jaipur is notable for its distinctive pink-orange colouring. The whole of the old city, including many fine palaces and buildings was constructed from solid blocks of sandstone or faced with the same stone. But it was only in 1853 that it gained its famous title, the ‘Pink City’ - it was painted pink for the first time in honour of a visit from Prince Albert.

Check into the Fortune Metropolitan, a 4 star hotel.

https://www.fortunehotels.in/jaipur-fortune-select-metropolitan.dh.41

A short break before the 1pm / 13:00 departure for the city tour. So, it was next door into the adjourning shopping centre to see what was there.

Pushpendra (Push) was my local guide for Jaipur. With his pink baseball cap and tall stature, he was really easy to spot.

Then off to Jantar Mantar Observatory.

The open air Jantar Mantar Observatory was a real surprise. As one brochure said it was more like a modern day sculpture park than an ancient Observatory.

Here is the link to Tripsavvy:

Jantar Mantar, built by King Jai Singh II between 1727 and 1734, literally means "calculation instrument". More than just a curious collection of sculptures, each structure at the intriguing Jantar Mantar observatory has a specialized astronomical function. There are 14 structures in total, which measure time, predict eclipses, and track stars. The most impressive one is the huge Samrat Yantra sundial. At a height of 90 feet (27 meters), it has a shadow that moves roughly the width of a person's hand every minute. It's a profound display of how quickly time does in fact go!

https://www.tripsavvy.com/top-jaipur-attractions-1539207

Push gave me the briefing, showed me the best places to take photos and then for the next 30 minutes let me loose to snap away.

Papadom is a term used mostly in South India where as in north they just call it as papad.

You see a lot of papad's being sold in Rajasthan because of the heat. Normally papad's are made at home and sundried on sarees or old bed sheets.

The papad variety starts from Dal (lentil), chawal (rice), chana (chick pea), sabu dana (tapioca), hari mirch (green chilli) ... and so on.