More Udaipur, Horse Safari, Kumbalgarh and Ranakpur

We stayed a cute little guesthouse run by a European lady and her Indian husband. This is one of their workers holding a recently-born Great Dane puppy.

Taking a walk through the gulab bagh, or rose garden, a beautiful city park in Udaipur.

Udaipur is famous for its many lakes. But light monsoon seasons in recent years have caused lake water levels to drop, or in some cases to dry up altogether. Local boys use this dry lakebed as a cricket field.

Adie on a horse! We went on a horse safari for a few hours at a ranch outside of Udaipur owned by the same people who owned our guest house. This is the beginning of the ride. You can tell because Adie is still sitting up straight and looking energized.

These are some of the sights we passed while winding our way through the arid country roads.



Stephen's new camel friend. He was parked in one of the villages we passed through, just hanging out.

The beautiful horses we rode.

One day we hired a car and took a day trip to Kumbalgarh (a fort) and Ranakpur (a Jain temple), several hours away from Udaipur. On the way we passed this really neat old-fashioned well. A man rode a cart and drove oxen around in a circle, which turned a crank and raised up a series of water buckets from a deep well.

Some of the people we saw along the road.

View of Kumbhalgarh fort, surrounded by 36 km of walls - the second-longest fortified wall in the world after the Great Wall of China.

We walked up to the top of the fort and this was the view from part way up.

View from the top. Easy to understand why they picked this spot for the fort - the view goes on forever. This was one of our favorite places we saw on the whole trip.

Monkeys hanging out along the road between Kumbhalgarh and Ranakpur.

Inside of Ranakpur temple, one of the holiest and most famous Jain temples in the world.

Ranakpur is famous for its carved marble pillars. Over 1400 support the temple and no two are the same.

Devotees at Ranakpur, their clothes covered with brightly-colored dust like the kind used on Holi.

Stephen making friends with a gigantic cow outside of Ranakpur. The bigger they are the more he feels the need to pet them and feed them. Luckily they are gentle creatures.

We were sitting when all of a sudden a dog friend came to Stephen. He attracts all sorts of wild animals.