A busy day was ahead for me after waking up to a hot shower (my second in as many days, bliss!) for there was a whole day of shopping to do...

The entire city/town or whatever of Jaislamer is pretty much geared up to tourists. View image
Most of the shops and cafes had "recommended by lonely planet" signs outside them. Nethertheless, the prices were the lowest any of us had seen so far, and I was eager to give haggling a go...
After breakfast in a local chai and samosa place (I am so addicted to chai now!) I headed off around the town to get an idea of what was being sold... for those of you reading from the Midlands, the shops were pretty much Pennyfarthings and Rowfers over and over again. It reminded me of my uni and college days and I was well up for a trip down memory lane :o)
Haggling turns out to be a right laugh - I managed to get 2 skirts tailor made to me for just over a fiver, and even ended up bargaining over taxi fairs down to the festival going on in the low town of Jaisalmer.
The town itself looks pretty much unreal, like a big sandcastle, but very picturesque: View image

The desert festival is on all week, but I was only there for the first day, and only saw an hour or so of that (was shopping while the tug of war and turban tying competitions were on) but managed to make it in time for the promised Mr Mustache competition.
Here are a couple of the contestants: View image
and here is the rather dashing winner... View image
The evening was rounded off with the funniest meal I have had so far... Remember I mentioned Indian time..? 5 of us went to the Little Mongolian restaurant (as recommended by Lonely Planet of course) and had to wait 20 minutes for a seat, then we had to write our own order down on a pad, waited another 1/2 hour for drinks, then another hour for food. We spent 4 hours there n total and thought we were going to miss the much vaunted fireworks that should have been going off from 9pm.
Luckily the organisers of the fireworks were also going from the Indian clock, as by 10pm we were all esconsed on the roof top balcony of the hotel, drinking cold beer with a perfect view of the fireworks when they finally began to explode over the stadium in the distance. View image