Too Hot To Go Into The Pool

In Agra, after the Fort, we thought that we would cool off by jumping into the hotel pool. It was over 100F out of the water, which was presumably about 85F; when you got out, the breeze which was blowing made you cold - as some of the water evaporated immediately. But after about 5 minutes, you were in a blast furnace breeze. A very strange feeling leading Yvette to say that it was too hot to go into the pool.

Taj Mahal at Sunrise was fan-bleeding-tastic. Just about saw all of what we wanted to see by the time that it got too hot and we had run out of water to drink.After breakfast we set off in the general direction of Bharatpur (or something like that) and visited Ye Olde Fort On A Hill on the way. In one of the courtyards there was a giant game of Parcheesi - the guide said that that means 25 in Hindi (or was it Arabic?) and that the "legs" of the board are 8 long rather than the current 6. 3 * 8 + one for the Middle -> 25. Apparently the old Moghuls loved to play this with real people and had a high stand from which to command the game.

3 hours of Indian Railway later - Yvette's 3rd real rail journey, only foreigners in a "CC" class car, some A/C and an Indian Style Loo - we got to Ranthambore. Here there is a Tiger reserve, and the hotel has a bunch of pictures taken in there - or so they say. This morning (locally the 16th) we went on a 6AM Jeep Safari - seeing Spotted Deer, Blue Bull Antelopes, Crocodiles, numerous Birds, Mongeese, Fish etc. - NO TIGERS! Very bouncy Jeep, very hot! There is an afternoon/evening Safari later - my last chance to see Tigers in the wild!

What would a day in India be without the Shakedown. On the way to the Reserve, the Jeep stopped 200 yards short of the entrance for no apparent reason...well, there was an apparent reason, it was to let the Hat Hawkers try to sell the Jeep occupants floppy hats!