Up early and off to the fort. We are on the road by 9am. The city is white today and we are enveloped
in thick mist as we leave the building.
It is the coolest morning we have had so far. The roads are very quiet and our guide
explains, Sundays are quiet on the roads.
The driver does not seem to know where or how to use the window demister
and we both bite our tongues to refrain from showing him how to use them. We drive slowly forward looking out of a
small clear space in the windscreen which intermittently smogs over as the
driver raised and lowers the front windows. Hmmm.
We arrive safely and only then does the guide
inform us that the Fort is only 20 % open to the public as the rest is closed
off as a working military college, hmm,
something the tour booking person neglected to mention when taking our monies. (A bit like the forgetting to mention that Connaught place was crap and full of shysters when he booked our driver to that as well.)
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| Be sure you clear security OK Wendy!!! |
We ask our guide general
questions about Delhi , about the things we are seeing on the way and find that
he is not as knowledgeable as we would like.
He is even a bit remiss on knowledge about the fort.
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| And if you get through Security you have this Bunker in front. Some serious Hardware and not easily seen oncoming. |
We head from the Fort to a near by
Mosque. (Jama Masjid) Apparently the
largest outside of Mecca if you believe the guide. Going by the numbers of buses stuck in the
lane way and the 1000 of people we pass in the ally to find it, he might be
right this time. It’s free to get in,
but its 100 rupee for the special dress you have to wear, 100 rupee for the hat
and 200 for the special paper jiffies you need to put on your feed. You need to
leave your shoes at the door (with no security or guarantee of ever seeing them
again). Neither of us got good vibes from this place . . .
Tough Travel . . . .
We walk up to the entrance and are
glared at by all and sundry and decide we really don’t need to see any
more. The architecture is quite amazing
but very similar to the fort we have just been through so we give it a miss.
As usual, the guide recommends we stop
at another Craft Cottage Industry on the way home. We see some things we might like to come back
for, so we keep their card just in case, but hopefully we might find other stuff
on the rest of our travels. Jase is keen to let them know we are on a time
limit and no matter how many times we mention it the Salesman insists on
showing us how they make the ‘hand knotted’ rugs. He tells us the history of
the ‘hand knotted’ rugs and offers us tea and bickies etc. while bringing out a
selection of the ‘hand knotted’ rugs to view.
We cannot explain how ‘slow’ this man
managed to talk, how sleazy he was. or
how many times he managed to use the term ‘hand knotted’ in any one given
sentence. To summarize, it was painful,
and if it takes anywhere near as long to
make a ‘hand knotted’ rug as it does to hear about them, then they are probably
worth the thousands of dollars they are asking for them.
We finish up about 2pm and head back to
our local café strip near home. It’s
amazing what you get used to in such a short space of time.
