Jaisalmer

Today we are in Jaisalmer which is basically in the desert in the far western part of India. Jaisalmer is yet another beautiful city in India. Since it is in the desert, all of the buildings are constructed out of sand stone. At the center of the city is a hill with a fort built on the top. The fort was first built about 900 years ago and still contains a whole active community of restaurants/cafes, hotels, temples and a museum. From the roof you can see all of Jaisalmer and the sandstone colored flat-roofed buildings.

The other amazing architectural fact here is that since the buildings are of a more carveable sandstone, they are all intrically detailed in beautiful patterns, animals, and other figures. The pictures are amazing (but the internet connections are a little slow to load them here).

Tomorrow we are off on a camel safari through the desert. We are going in a group of no more than 8 people where we walk through the desert for 5 hours a day, each with our own camel, and sleep under the stars for two nights. There will be no tents; we will sleep on mattresses, covered by blankets, right under the stars on top of a sand dune. My biggest fear is the cold. We have sleeping bags, but it gets down to about 50 degrees at night. Hopefully there really are a lot of blankets.

Needless to say, updates will be delayed for a few days while we are bouncing around on camels.

Again, hope everyone is well.

Ted and Erin