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Relic And Rogue, Jodhpur (2026)

02/11/2024

Day 13-
We headed out for our second safari, this time through the Bishnoi village. We were welcomed into a local home where we participated in an O***m ceremony with three little old Indian men, talk about a life changing once it a lifetime experience! They do these ceremonies for weddings, funerals, and any holiday so we got lucky that we were here for the biggest holiday of them all! We got to see how the poppies are harvested and what they look like before they’re made into O***m. They even use it in liquid form to give a tiny bit to babies when they have upset tummies (no psychedelic effects when it’s consumed in liquid form in tiny amounts). We visited a local potter at his home and watched him throw pottery on a hand spun wheel, which was so impressive! Turning clay on an electric wheel is difficult, I can’t imagine having the strength to also spin the huge stone you have to get moving before even starting the process! We watched him make a couple pieces and even got to try it ourselves! Then we started the actual animal portion of our safari and saw SO many cool animals up close and personal, I literally had a cow lick me… it’s insane how they are not at all phased by humans here! We got to witness a pretty amazing showdown between a couple blackbuck antelope right outside the jeep. After the safari, we took the jeep to a local family’s house and got to see how they live out in the country as farmers of that tribe, everyone was SO welcoming and sweet! We drove further out to the countryside and enjoyed lunch at an absolutely breathtaking villa and got to meet all of their horses which sister LOVED! We ended the safari with some shopping in the city. Diwali is the holiday for shopping and bringing all new things and good fortune into the next year so…. who are we to argue 🤷🏼‍♀️ We spent the rest of the night celebrating the holiday back at the palace with music, dancing, and fireworks that lasted until the sun rose! We will DEFINITELY be back again, what an amazing experience 🧡

31/10/2024

Day 12-
We started our morning early, before the sun got too hot, visiting the Mehrangarh Fort and Jaswant Thada Mausoleum, both of them absolutely amazing examples of architecture, as has everything been here! We came back and had lunch at the hotel while we relaxed at the pool for prime sun time! We spent the evening out in the gorgeous market streets celebrating the first night of Diwali!! It was AMAAAAAAZING! It was extremely hard to capture the beauty and chaos of it all on a phone but….. WOW!!!! The streets were absolutely packed with people buying things for the celebration and the lights covered every single inch of the city. There were lamps lit all over and it was so so so beautiful! So many beautiful colors and lights, and so many sweet, happy people! It made my heart so happy! An absolutely amazing experience 11/10!! We walked through the spice markets, veggie markets (probably my favorite to capture if you can’t tell by the number of photos I took of food 😋), and the sweets market, the street food, and the textiles too! We were mobbed a several hundred times by people asking to take pictures with us 😂 It was quite the experience! We met the cutest little boy, maybe 2 years old praying in a temple- probably the cutest part of the whole night! So glad we could be here to celebrate this beautiful holiday!

31/10/2024

Day 11-
*Travel Day* We started our day with a 2.5 hour drive to the Ranakpur Jain Temple, one of the largest and most famous Jain temples in the world, and a major pilgrimage place. The temple was built in the 15th century and is made completely out of marble, with 1444 marble pillars holding it up. After our visit we had a delish lunch outside at a local restaurant and got to see an Indian irrigation system in action (the photo of the buckets and water wheel) before driving another 3.5 hours to Jodhpur, where we checked into our hotel at Umaid Bhawan Palace, apparently it’s one of the worlds largest private residences and it’s definitely the largest palace we’ve stayed at this trip! They were hard at work decorating for Diwali and made the most beautiful colored rice peacocks all by hand in less than a day simply by dumping the rice on the ground and shaping it with their fingers to look like a peacock. Travels took it out of us today so we had a quick dinner before crashing.

29/10/2024

Day 10-
Another amazing day in paradise! We had breakfast outside on the balcony with a beautiful view of the lake and enjoyed a relaxing sun filled morning at the pool. The Indian sun is unlike anything I’ve ever experienced and I am OBSESSED!! It makes my heart so happy knowing I’ll be able to bring some sunshine home with me! I also had what is 100% my new favorite drink at the pool and I will be making them anytime I need a little extra sunshine at home! Spice & Ice: Fresh mango juice, serano pepper, fresh lime juice and club soda. Sounds simple but, YUMMMO!! We had lunch at the hotel and then spent the afternoon in the city. Hands down our favorite city in India and top three experiences of our trip outside of the hot air balloon and hanging with the elephants. Wandering down all of the alleys and streets with all of the locals was absolutely amazing! The cows roaming the streets came right up to us and sniffed us without a care in the world. We visited a famous painter in Udaipur who free hand paints the most BEAUTIFUL fine line sketches using paint brushes made out of chipmunks hair, he hand painted pieces for us right there and it was amazing to watch such talent. Udaipur is such a quiet little town and there are very few tourists in the streets which we LOVED! The decorations for Diwali are really ramping up since it’s in just a few days so the streets were extra bright and beautiful! We had dinner at an Authentic Indian restaurant and Grace had her favorite meal of the trip, Laal Maas (mutton curry in a red chile sauce). She has been asking everywhere we go for them to make her meal with the same level of spice as the locals would eat it here (they automatically minimize the spices for Americans) and this was the first time they listened so she was THRILLED! We spent the rest of the night getting packed up to head out bright and early for Jodhpur.

28/10/2024

Day 9-
We caught a quick hour flight to Udaipur, the city of lakes, this morning and checked in at where we had a delicious lunch at Suryamahal. I got the Banjara Murgh (wild chicken prepared in a traditional Rajasthani style) and it was my second favorite meal of the trip (closely following the lentils and lamb we had on day 4!). The chicken was so moist that it basically melted in my mouth. The palace is decorated beautifully for Diwali and we got to watch them making the beautiful decorations (hand pouring and placing the colored rice on the ground around the candles and fountains). They go all out at night and have multiple rooms throughout the palace that they cover in candles and it is SO cozy feeling!! We spent the afternoon exploring the city. It is absolutely beautiful here, our favorite city that we have visited so far. It gives very Venice vibes being on the water, and the architecture here has been my favorite in India. We visited the City Palace in the afternoon and tried some tasty mango ice cream (mangos are very popular here but unfortunately they aren’t in season right now, so we settled for the next best thing)! We also got to see a carnival held specifically for Diwali and all of the rides sparkled so pretty at night! We ended our day with a sunset boat ride around Lake Pichola. We had a candle lit dinner at Chandni, the outdoor restaurant at our hotel that sits on the lake and enjoyed live traditional music while we ate, it was so nice to be outside for dinner!

27/10/2024

Day 8-
We spent the entire day at the pool today from sun up to sun down, it’s was 95* and exactly what we needed, we’re learning a pool day every few days is a must! We enjoyed Lamb & Chicken Kathi Rolls by the pool and they were DELISH! We did take a break to explore the palace and visit the peacocks (there are over 100 of them living on the property). We had our palms read before dinner, which was definitely an experience! We decided to get fancy for dinner and it was a good thing we did because we ate at the Rajasthani restaurant, which was actually the original dining room of the Maharaja who originally built the palace in 1835- it was absolutely GORGEOUS, every detail from the carpet, to the ceiling, to the Versace dinnerware was so ornate and beautiful. We tried the Royal Palace tasting menu which included dishes from 4 different states in India. For dessert we tried the Malpua Rabdi (milk pancakes filled with a reduced milk saffron syrup reduction), Badam Ka Halwa (crushed almonds and ghee), and Double Ka Meetha (a dense cake with saffron and condensed milk) and they were ALL delicious!

27/10/2024

Day 7-
Another early morning wake up, but 100% worth it because we took a hot air balloon ride over the beautiful countryside and had a gorgeous breakfast at the Samode Palace before heading out on a Jeep Safari. We visited a local farmer, he welcomed us into his house and we had tea with his wife and daughter before touring their wedding venue. The weddings here are absolutely BEAUTIFULLY decorated with flowers and bright colors! We had lunch back at the hotel and then spent the afternoon exploring and shopping our way through the gorgeous local markets of the pink city! We were lame and got room service for dinner because our early morning wake up left us reallllll sleepy by 7pm 😂

25/10/2024

Day 6-
We had breakfast at our hotel before our 4.5 hour drive to Jaipur. Thankfully the back seat is comfy and we slept basically the entire drive. We checked into our hotel at Rambagh Palace after the most beautiful traditional Indian welcome with music and dancing, rose petals thrown over our heads, and beautiful flower necklaces. We had a quick lunch at one of the restaurants there, Rajput Room, before visiting Amber Fort (a UNESCO World Heritage Site) a gorgeous fort on Maota Lake, it was absolutely beautiful (and the monkeys love it there too!) SO much detail goes into these buildings it is unbelievable, and what’s even crazier is that so many of them were built for just one family to occupy, it’s mind blowing! We spent our evening loving on THE ELEPHANTS!! This was the part of our trip I had most been looking forward to and it did not disappoint. We visited an animal sanctuary and had dinner with the beautiful female elephants who were rescued from the circus. We were able to feed and hug them and shared a beautiful dinner outside under a tent where we watched Naan made fresh in the tandoori oven!

24/10/2024

Day 5-

Purposefully woke up at 5:30am today so we could watch the sunrise over the Taj Mahal. It was absolutely gorgeous (it legitimately sparkles in the sunlight as the sun rises, although photos will never do it justice) and we got some fun shots in. We had a typical American breakfast at Bellevue, a restaurant in our hotel, (I know, lame- but I was really craving a breakfast sandwich), and spent the rest of the day back at the pool because, we couldn’t resist, plus we head out to Jaipur (aka The Pink City) tomorrow, so we HAD to soak it up ☀️. We were basically the only people at the pool the entire day and the chef must’ve been bored because he spent the morning bringing us out all kinds of delicious treats (our favorites being the homemade mango sorbet and the chaat). Our bodies hit a wall today so it was nice to have a day relaxing and eating all the delicious things. PLUS- the pool is unlike anything we’ve ever seen so it needed its moment! We got massages after our day at the pool before enjoying dinner at Esphahan, a Tandoori restaurant in our hotel, then passed TF out cold.

23/10/2024

Day 4-

Our bodies finally let us sleep in! We got up around 6:45 and had our last breakfast at Qube before making the 3.5 hour drive to Agra. We stopped along the way to try a DELISH popular roadside street food, Jalebi, (deep fried flour dipped in honey) it tasted similar to a funnel cake only 10x more delicious. We checked into our hotel at The Oberoi Amarvilas Palace (the government stopped allowing buildings to be built anywhere near the Taj Mahal to avoid pollution damaging it and our hotel was the last building built before the ruling was made so we have a direct view of the Taj from our room). I’ve never seen such a beautiful property! As soon as we were checked in we immediately SPRINTED to the absolutely breathtaking pool and spent the rest of the daylight soaking up the sun ☀️. We headed to the Taj (only 600 meters from our palace) to view it at sunset. No photos or words can describe how bright and beautiful this place is! It was absolutely soul stirring 🤍 We headed to Peshawri (famous for their Indian North-Western Frontier cuisine) for dinner and it did NOT disappoint! We tried the Murgh Malai Kebabs (chicken blended with cream cheese, malt vinegar, green chilli and coriander, grilled in the Tandoor), the Murgh Makhani (chicken tikka with tomato cashew gravy), the Sikandari Raan (an entire leg of lamb braised in malt vinegar, cinnamon, black cumin, and red chilli), and Paneer Tikka (cottage cheese marinated with fresh cream, yellow chillies, and gramflour, then grilled to mouthwatering perfection), the best lentils in India (according to our guide)- they are cooked for over 24 hours and immediately melt in your mouth- they were AMAZING and ruined any lentils we will ever eat back home! It was the best meal we have had so far, hands down! We came back home in a food coma and passed out before 9pm 😴

22/10/2024

Day 3-
Another 5am wake up 🤷🏼‍♀️ We had breakfast at the hotel (finally getting this down- we ate WAY too much the first day but we’ve got breakfast down to a science now, and their chocolate milk here is BOMB!) We headed out at 9am for a day exploring Old Delhi (not really that old according to our guide, Hem, only 350 years old). We visited a beautiful Mosque (Jama Masjid), took a tuk-tuk ride through the city center, and visited Gandhi’s cremation site (where we were bombarded by Bengali paparazzi who thought we were celebrities- which of course we loved😊). We spent the afternoon at Gurudwara Bangla Sahib Temple, a Sikh temple, and were able to help serve lunch which was amazing! (25-30 thousand people travel there to eat each day and 50% of the workers are volunteers) the kitchen has never closed even one single day for the over 500 years that the temple has existed and all food is free for anyone who wants to come. The temple was absolutely breathtaking, photos do not even come close to doing it justice. We enjoyed lunch at Tamra, a restaurant in the Shangri-La hotel down the street from where we are staying and then explored the Kahn market. Everyone in the city is preparing for Diwali, the Hindu Festival of Lights celebrating the victory of good over evil, so everything is beautifully decorated with flowers and lights. We headed back to the hotel around 4 to relax for the rest of the day since we’re heading to another state tomorrow (We learned India has 28 states). We ended our day with a private Henna artist at our hotel and had the most BEAUTIFUL work done! We ordered room service for dinner because we were lazy and didn’t want to get out of our sweatpants 😋 helllooo pizza and french fries 😍

21/10/2024

Day 2-
We woke up at 5am (clearly still getting used to the time change) and had an early breakfast at Qube. I was able to take all of my basic photos without anyone being annoyed because I think we were the only two guests awake in the whole palace. We spent a relaxing morning by the pool before jumping into the fast paced part of our vacation. We met our tour guide (who we now lovingly refer to as Indian Jones) for an amazing Sunday lunch spread at the palace and spent the rest of our afternoon exploring New Delhi. There were TukTuks and stray doggies everywhere - it was the most insane, no rules, driving experience we have ever had anywhere in the world (but fun to experience once we knew we made it out alive!) We visited the Birla House, Gandhi’s memorial and “home” here in India (for the brief times he stayed in New Delhi) where he was eventually assassinated. We also visited the first Mughal tomb ever made in India (Humayun’s Tomb) which inspired the Taj Mahal and has over 100 graves. We finished our day with sushi at Megu, the Japanese restaurant in our hotel before calling it a night.

Relic And Rogue

02/11/2024

31/10/2024

31/10/2024

29/10/2024

28/10/2024

27/10/2024

27/10/2024

25/10/2024

24/10/2024

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21/10/2024

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