NOV 2 TOUR OF GOLCONDA FORT AND THE QUTB SHAHI TOMBS

We finally are beginning to feel rested and in the time zone.  Maybe it was the 9:30 PM pile of Bryani that helped?  We had breakfast at the Palace.  I was expecting a buffet.  Nope.  We were served a huge breakfast: juice, tea, croissants, eggs, bread, a tiered plate of miscellaneous items like walnuts, Danish rolls, and fruit.  While Charlie and I got through half of the breakfast, we decided we needed to eat like our dog, Wally, only twice a day.  Maybe even taking our pills and jamming them in our food like we do for the dog.  I can't take the regal good life.

While we waited for our guide, I took a few photos of the palace.  Later this afternoon we are planning to go on the champaign palace tour.   I'll take more photos of this place then.

The palm trees are coconut palms.  The city is below.  The palace sits on a hill about 2000 feet high

The nizam's palace apparently has been repaired but well worth the fun.

The grand staircase.

Our guide John showed up around 9 AM as planned.  We took a golf cart down the hill to the clock tower.  The driver and van were parked there.  No one can drive up to the palace - golf carts or horse and carts are the only vehicles allowed.

Our first stop was the Golconda Fort.  We drove a bit, passed the military installation near town.  Apparently, the Nizam of Hyderabad didn't really want to join India.  In 1948, the year of independent India,  the Indian government (military) forced his hand, and Hyderabad became part of India.

The fort is surrounded by an outer wall.  The inner wall is the section we toured.  We basically climbed 180 steps to see the sections of the fort to the top of the hill, and then climbed 180 steeper steps to see the rest.  Apparently, the steeper steps were the royal path up and down.  It was easier our way, since we weren't going to be dragged up the hill in palanquins.

A view of the fort from just inside the outer wall.

A bit closer

This is a photo of the ceiling.  If you stand beneath this section and clap your hands, or make any noise, the sound produces a number of echoes.  Best example of this I have heard.

View of the tombs from the fort.

Carvings done by a man who was prisoner at the fort for 12 years.  He literally did them with a rock on the rock

Another view of the fort from the inside

At the top we spotted two men wearing traditional Kerala sarongs

A view down the hill from the top of the fort

Workers were digging dirt out of a section of the garden and carrying loads of it to another area.  The work was done by woman carrying dish loads of dirt from head to head.

After our schlep up and down the fort, we drove over to the Qutb Shahi tombs.  These Tashma Hall type structures were, in fact, tombs for the Nizams and their families.  They are slowly being cleaned and repaired so some of the tombs look white, and others don't.

The commander's tomb

Nifty lizard on the wall

Another view of the painted trucks

Tomb of Fatima Sultana.  The roof has been restored.

After our tomb tour we drove to a pearl shop.  Hyderabad is famous for pearls, and I am a jewelry sucker.  We got back to the palace and rested until our champaign tour.