Amber Fort and Palace

Lost connectivity somewhere in Jaipur but have restored it now on the way back to Delhi. Hard to imagine that we are nearing the end of two weeks in India and will be on a plane to Nepal tomorrow morning.
To finish up then:
Arriving in Jaipur, we settled into a Ramada hotel with the least personality of any hotel thus far. Some of the group ran off to do some shopping but some of us stayed back to hang by the pool or to work out. Yesterday we had a 'full day city tour' of Jaipur. At the outset, we had planned to end our tour at the Taj Mahal. The way it ultimately worked out, though, the Amber Fort acquired the distinction of having to follow that icon of India in the order and I was concerned that it would suffer for the comparison.
That was not the case. I'm not going to say that they are equal because we'd be comparing apples and oranges: one was a monument and one was a residence. But as a home, the palace is lovely.
The fort and massive walls were built around and across the valley in order to defend what was the capital of the Mughal Empire at the time. Our tour started with a slightly rocking ride up to the Palace on our elephant, Madonna. The original Palace was expanded with additions in the 16th, 17th, and 18th centuries. There were entertaining areas, swimming pools, receiving pavilions, gardens ands lakes. The Mughals incorporated troughs along the walls of their winter residence where they (well, their servants) poured boiling water for heating and situated waterfalls under wind passages for cooling in the summer place.
The Emperor's wives were so weighed down by heavily embroidered garments and jewelry that they could hardly walk let alone climb stairs so wheelchair ramps were built everywhere so the servants could haul them around (which was certainly a welcome addition as far as we tourists were concerned).
Frescos still retain color (inside and out) and one room is covered (walls and ceilings, inside and outside) with stained glass, mosaics made of mirrors, and gold painted edges.
We rounded out the day's sites with the museum (part of the residence of the 14 year old current figurehead emperor). And checked out the royal observatory which made for a very full day of sightseeing considering the 40+ Celsius temperature. Kathmandu will seem downright chilly tomorrow.