And so on to the next city by overnight train! As I mentioned on the intro page, the overnight trains were great. A chap would come by selling chai (tea) in a big urn, and another guy would take orders for and deliver dinners (which we didn't partake of, but which looked nice). Travelling in 2A/3A meant we were sharing carriages with middle class Indian families most of the time - all felt very safe etc and was able to get plenty of sleep.

We arrived in Jodhpur very early in the morning (6 am or so?) and left our luggage at the station. From there we again struck out on foot and headed up winding back streets to the dominating feature of the city - the fort named Meharangarh. On the way, we met a chap in front of his restaurant who was able to tell us (after asking where we were from - a question we must have had about 20 times a day for the whole trip!) the capital and prime minister of Australia, as well as how long little Johnnie had been in power. A quick quiz revealed that he had this information for all countries that one might imagine he would meet people from - good effort! We decided we had to come back here for lunch...

The fort was excellent! They even had self audio tours, which were very useful (or you could have hired a real person for not much more). We spent most of the morning wandering around this fort, and walking to a nearby marble tomb (a sort of mini-Taj Mahal). The Indians *really* know how to do architecture - these buildings are incredibly intricately carved and fabulously ornate. There was definitely a class of people living the life of Riley here...

We went back to the memory-man for a very pleasant late lunch on his rooftop restaurant (a common arrangement over there), and Fionna took the opportunity to have her hands henna-ed by the chap's wife and daughter - her concession to girliness, which was not easy to come by when you are touring with Ann and I...

After a visit to the Omelette Man (a chap selling omelettes from a street stall - Lonely Planet...), we were back on the train and hitting another overnighter - this time to the desert town of Jaisalmer.