Beauty and Octopussy in Udaipur, India

Our second stop in India was Udaipur: also known as “The Venice of the East.” In addition to being a gorgeous lake town and a haven for tourist bazaars (we bought all sorts of souvenirs here), it was also the principal filming location for the 1983 James Bond movie, Octopussy. Needless to say, much of our few days there was spent looking for the locations the movie was filmed, which brought us all around the city and helped us discover beautiful buildings and areas that we would not have seen otherwise.

We also found plenty of time to explore the non Bondian parts of the city, including a walk through many side streets, the Sahelion-ki-Bari park, the City Palace and, our favorite, a sunset boat cruise with spectacular views of the entire city. We did find it interesting though, that despite being a tourist town and seeing loads of other travelers, very few folks stopped to talk to us. In fact, it wasn’t until the New Years Eve celebration that we even made a couple of friends.