One day Jaipur trip from Gurgaon - Trip Report

[rkbharat]

Hi All,

Thanks alot for your replies and suggestions. and following is our trip report.

As I mentioned earlier, this was supposed to be lazy trip no hurry, so we started on Saturday 15th Sep 2007 @ 9:30 AM after checking out some money from sector 4. I did no prep for this trip. car was in good shape, air pressure was corrected few days back and about 20lts of diesel was in the car, did not corrected the air pressure of stepney. Infact hotel was also not booked. We were five adults and my 4 month old daughter packed in my Indica. This time I realized that its too small for five people packed with even small luggage. also I was carrying to much stuff for my daughter (including wheel trolley).

At around Rajiv chowk there was some jam for no reason...anyway no problems we passed the jam in no hurry.

from now on roads are really good. Its fun driving in NH8, not a single pot hole. Earlier I decided not to exceed 80km/h, but once you put wheels on this highway, 80 is shame with everybody passing, leaving you dusty. So I was driving at 100km/h without any stress.

Ride was event less for most of the part. there were two diversion near kotputli, with one side closed and traffic merged on single side. but not a problem as such.

after kotputli we took our first halt near shahpura for the breakfast. I was looking for a restaurant with open space and found a very good one by the name Highway Choice. It has a very big grass lawn, we asked to setup the table in the grass lawn and had aloo(Potato) and payaz(Onion) prantha(?) with curd and achar (Pickle).


From here, drive was pleasant, weather was also good and we were using AC intermittently. On the way I had rabbit race with an Indigo. Though I was not racing, this guy was pretty irritating. Whenever I dipped/honked him for pass, he drove too fast and after some time I was again behind him. I was driving at constant speed of 100. and this guy was playing a jumping kangraroo game. I really got in mood of racing but kept my mind cool, and backed off. You know we were on the lazy trip

We reached Jaipur @ 1:30 PM and started lookout for hotel. I first dialed hotel Pearl Palace to check if there is any cancellation to adjust us there. but no luck. Then I called hotel Ganguar, and they were dumb and non-courteous on phone that I dropped the call. Lastly I called the owner of Hotel Aroma. And we shaked hands for Rs 2200 all taxes for two AC rooms. It has a nice restaurant and most importantly ok-good bar serving most of the booze. It has enough parking space.

Its located near paanch baati, just 3 km from Johari/bappu bazar. I will discuss about this and other hotel at the end.

After checking into the hotel, we quickly got refreshed, had something light to eat and decided to move for City Palace. as they close the entry @ 4:30PM.

Now came the surprises. And to my amusement, it surprised foreigners more than us
Parking 50 Rs., Still Cam/mobile cam-50 Rs, Movie cam-100 Rs, handy cam 200 Rs. That's a clear highway robbery. Anyways we took only one digicam and payed 50 bucks for it (+ tickets for 5 @ 35 rs).

Also we decided to have a guide for rs 200 to explain us what are we looking at. We took around 1.5 hrs to look around and taking snaps.

We planned for Jantar Mantar but it closes at 5:00Pm so we moved towards Johari Bazar. Ladies were very eager and restless to bargain and buy. So we decided to have some food and then spend rest of the time shopping and moving around. I was looking for some Pyaaz Kachori stall or shop but could not find one. So we settled for LMB. Ambiance good, food quality good, price too high..

After having food, it was shopping time for ladies. As most of the shop remains closed on Sunday, ladies were in hurry to buy everything. and I was in no mood to stop them (that's brave to say "in no mood", can you stop them).

Johari Bazar is pretty congested area and its get difficult to park your car there. Though I got a place to park safely.

Hawa Mahal was a very frustrating experience. All covered with bamboos to do the recovery work. Most of the monuments are going for facelift and are covered with that ugly looking bamboos


After doing all the shopping we drove back to hotel @9:30 PM. Adjacent to hotel is a recently opened reliance fresh store. just went to buy some stuff.

Sunday morning we started lazy (@ 10:00 AM), checked out from hotel. first went to Jantar Mantar, Temple around, some quick shopping. then we moved to Jal Mahal, Naragarh, Amer etc.


@ 4:00 PM we started our journey back to Delhi... after cruising on 100KM/hr for 30 mins, we faced bad truck rush. I am surprised where did they came from at 4:00PM, or may be on Sunday... anyways we passed through them listening to nice music on board. we took our solo break 110 km before delhi, had some decent food. while starting from there I realized that everybody was feeling tired and dull, so some trick was needed. So I played the "Laughter Challenge 1" cd and Raju Shrivastva brought back the liveliness in the car. (remember that dogs episode by Raju, news correspondent, nagma ae nagma, and that sholey one, kahi gaye thae kya, ghodae nahi thae tumhare yaha )

We reached home (Gurgaon) @ sharp 8:30 PM. back to sweet home...

Car gave me 18KM/Ltr with 100% AC, we drove around 490 KM, no problems from the 88K KM driven car. Managed the steep climb drive of Amer with 5 adults and luggage without any strain.

Hotel Aroma, is average hotel and I think rs 1100 was bit high for it. Though after reaching Jaipur we realized the must have requirement of AC in rooms.

I liked the Holiday Inn, I saw on the way to Jal Mahal, You can try that as well.

Overall a very good trip, my daugther enjoyed it the most at the age of 4 month. she was happy and laughing all the time, and so were we.

Will post more snaps after some time....

[javed406]

Nice travelogue. It reminded me of my trip in 2003. though we did it on bike till Ajmer. The roads are really pleasure to drive. We were driving mostly at night without any problem.

[rkbharat]

more pics : Photo Albums/Jaipur - Sep 2007