Day ten - Bikaner

The drive to Bikaner took 5.5 hours although it was only 240 km from Alsisar. The countryside was mainly rolling hills of semi desert, a few wheat fields and several small towns. 

The highway was in rough shape and at times we were down to one lane, again shared with all types of transportation methods.

This poor farmer had broken a wheel. He is transporting feed for animals. He is relatively fortunate in that he has a tractor.

Bikaner is a city of 2.4 million. It is the administrative location of the district of Bikaner in the state of Rajastan which borders Pakistan.The weather today was partly cloudy with a high of 28 c.

The present ruler of Bikaner is HH Maharajadhiraj Raj Rajeshwar Narendra Maharajadhiraj Raj Rajeshwar Narendra Shiromani Maharaja Sri Ravi Singh Bahadur, who is the 25th of the line as of October 2003. (I think they call him Ravi)

The palace is both home to the Royal family and serves as a hotel where we are staying for the nite. The gentleman shown here might have not have been impressed that his home is now open to foreigners.

Donna has a new friend, the god Ganesha, which is the god of good luck and usually appears in all Hindu homes.

Eight km from the palace/hotel we visited the Camel Research Centre complete with a camel corral.

The camel has a wide range of uses including a very tastie ice cream.

We are about to have dinner. The entertainment is inspiring.