Galta, Jaipur

	Galta, Jaipur
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Nestling in a steep-sided valley 3km west of Jaipur, Galta is a picturesque collection of 250-year-old temples grouped around a sacred water tank.

You can either get there by road, following a route that winds around the hills for 10km, or walk for around 45min from town, leaving by Suraj Pole and climbing steeply up to the Surya temple on the crest of the hill above. From here, a cobbled track zigzags down to the main temple complex on the valley floor.

Galta owes its sacred status in large part to a freshwater spring that seeps constantly through the rocks in the otherwise dry valley, keeping two tanks fresh and full, and hordes of monkeys (associated with the monkey god Hanuman) happy. Humans bathe in the upper water tank, while monkeys jump and splash in the lower pool.

The temples themselves are intricately and vividly painted. Friezes around the top of pavilions that face the monkeys' tank show scenes from religious festivals and stately occasions; behind one procession the City Palace is sketched in dubious.

proportions. Inside the roofs, swirling red, yellow and blue clouds ring more of Michelangelo than of traditional Hindu style.

Follow the surfaced road beyond the temples for around ten minutes and you'll come across a sign for the Dhammathali Vipassana Centre , one of fifty centers across the world set up to promote the practice of Vipassana meditation .

Beyond the Vipassana centre, the road passes the Sisodia Rani-ka-Bagh (daily 8am-6pm; Rs2), 8km east of Jaipur. Landscaped with fountains and painted pavilions, these gardens are part of a palace complex built in the eighteenth century by Jai Singh II for the Udaipur princess he married to secure relations with his neighboring Sisodia Rajputs.

Temples at the back of the gardens, coated with the sherbet-yellow wash that covers the whole compound - the original color of the Pink City - and enhanced with naturalistic designs, are open midday and early evening for worship.