Drive to Jodhpur via Ranakpur Jain Temple

11th September 2018

With a long day ahead of us, we left the hotel at 9 am as planned, heading off to our final destination for the day in Jodhpur.  We expect to get to the hotel in Jodhpur late afternoon. Along the way we have one planned sightseeing activity, a stopover at the Ranarkpur Jain Temple.

Our drive takes us along a mix of highways and country roads and there is always something to see. On the way to the temple we go through lush forests and fertile farming valleys. Everything is green. The main crops grown here are corn, millet and rice. Tropical fruit trees are a common sight.

Millet crop (behind the vine)

Villagers home garden

Driving is challenging, as you have to be an expert at avoiding cows, which wander along the highway, sometimes stop for a rest or lie down on the road, or just decide to cross the road oblivious.

In addition to this, the little villages we pass through are crowded, have poor roads and there are a lot of road works going on, as there is an election next year. The traffic in some of the towns is also chaotic and in one town we stumbled upon a celebration of some sort.

The road becomes increasingly mountainous, narrow and winding as we climb in elevation in the direction of the temple.

Arriving at the Jain Temple a little ahead of time, we need to fill in around 45 mins before we can gain entry to the main temple, as only Jain people have access in the morning.

The temple grounds are huge and are dotted with a number of smaller temples, so we have a chance to stretch our legs and are entertained by the many families of monkeys that are here.

The Sun Temple in the Ranakpur Complex

Monkeys have a certain attraction to rubbish bins

and cars

Jainism is an ancient Indian religion that predates Christianity and is believed to have emerged in the Indus Valley. It differs from both Hinduism and Buddhism. It has a very strict set of laws that must be adhered to such as vegetarianism, but not eating any bulbs or root vegetables. They believe that no harm should come to any living things.

At last it is 12 noon and we can buy our tickets and enter the temple. Guides are not allowed inside the temple, but we do have an audio guide to provide information at certain points around the inside of the temple.

the main temple (our driver in front)

After obtaining our tickets and audio sets, and paying for the privilege of taking photos, we climbed the main stairs into the temple.

The step into the temple has a demon carved either side of the step to keep out the evil sprits

It was obvious from the outside, that this temple is very large. The building covers close to 1 acre, and is all made of carved marble. It is constructed using columns and beams (all marble) and has a number of intricately carved domes. The temple was completed in 1496, and contains 1444 carved columns supporting the structure. It is nothing short of amazing and is a huge surprise to us, as this was not even on our radar.  It is incredibly well preserved and is certainly worth a visit.

On entering the temple you are confronted with a mass of carved columns

There is a central courtyard that contains a tree that has been there since the temple was built

Here are some photos that give an impression of both the size and intricacy of this incredible building

one of the intricately carved domes

We left the Temple at around 1.30am, and took the opportunity to have lunch at a “hotel” about 3 km down the road. Our driver explained that there will not be another opportunity until we get to Jodhpur.

Something simple was all we required, so we ordered a few samosas and something to wash them down. The gentleman who greeted us on arrival, struck up a conversation with us, and decided he would give us a shoulder and head massage. He claimed to be a trained masseuse and was actually very good.  He did not ask for any payment, so I gave him 200 rupees (about AUD4) made him very happy.

Lunch was good and we were back in the car, still travelling through mountainous, winding roads and tropical vegetation. Within half an hour of leaving our lunch venue, the terrain is starting to flatten out and we end up driving on very flat plains pretty much all of the way to Jodhpur.

Another discovery today was that our car has wifi, so we were able to check our email etc along the way.

Whilst there is still some agriculture, the land is becoming increasingly more desert like and we start seeing a few camels as we get closer to Jodhpur. Along the was we saw some herds of sheep and goats, and of course the road loving cows.

It was after 5pm when we eventually arrived at our hotel. Our hotel, The WelcomHotel,  is located quite a way out of the Jodhpur City centre. It is a huge sprawling resort style hotel managed by ITC and looks like it is set up for conferences and functions. It appears to be quite new, and very empty. There are beautifully landscaped grounds, a lovely swimming pool and nothing much for miles around.

The rooms are large and very comfortable, we even have a bath tub. Sadly only about 4 rooms appear to be occupied.

To our great surprise, this hotel does not offer free wifi, but will sell you time at an exhorbitant rate, so we declined, hence a bit of a gap in blogging as there was no wifi yesterday.

We went to the restaurant (only one is open but another is soon to open), and we swamped by eager staff. Finally another guest turned up about 15 mins later and took the focus off us for a while. Clearly the staff are still being trained and were very eager to help. Customers surveys are everything in India at the moment and I did my duty and filled one in. After leaving the restaurant, I was halfway down the corridor when a gentleman from the restaurant caught up with me to query why I had marked the ambience in the restaurant as 3 out of 5. I told him that the 2 or 3 blackouts we had that preceded the meals did not do a lot for the ambience. Being the only customers in a very large space did also not help.

Tomorrow we will see Jodhpur.