Udaipur

Udaipur is really pleasant town next to a big lake and surrounded by mountains. We've been here a few days and really like it. We're staying down by the lake in a great hotel called the Gangaur Palace. Due to some confusion and some expert bartering/walking away/game playing on our behalf, we managed to get a great room for half the price paid by it's previous occupant (I sneaked a look at the payments book). The hotel is a Haveli, which is a large building (usually 3 or 4 stories) with rooms built around a central, open courtyard. It's a beautiful old building with narrow stone staircases, big tall double doors and a nice restaurant on the roof. Part of the James Bond movie Octopussy was filmed in and around Udaipur, so many of the restaurants show it in the evenings (it's a classic). There's loads of great shops in Udaipur selling art, clothing, wall hangings and all sorts. We are having some clothes tailor made, which we are picking up this afternoon. You can get fairly good suits made for about 60 quid a pop (and have them sent home) which is very tempting. It's very touristy here so prices start ridiculously high and you have to barter ferociously and at length to get a good price.

Yesterday we had a cooking lesson with a local woman called Swati. It was a superb morning spent in her family home learning to make veg curry (the base sauce used for almost all curries), biryani, samosas and chapatis. Whilst we were cooking away, her mother (a Gujurati) kept cooking dish after dish and offering them to us to try. We sampled so many delicious foods, most of which we have not seen on any restaurant menus before or since. We really enjoyed ourselves and are so glad we chose Swati over the bigger (and more expensive), classroom style cooking "schools".