Sawai Jai Singh II moved his capital off the hill in 1727 and laid out a city by treatise — wide avenues, walled blocks, and an observatory in the middle of it.
1592
Amber
The Kachwaha capital in the hills.
1727
Jaipur founded
A grid city on the plain below.
1734
Jantar Mantar
Masonry instruments for the sky.
1876
Pink city
Painted terracotta for a royal visit.
Begun in 1592 by Raja Man Singh, a general of Akbar's — Mughal and Rajput design worked into the same courtyards, with the mirrored Sheesh Mahal at its heart.
Opens at 8am. There is a separate evening visit and a sound and light show.
2.5 hrs
The ridge fort above Amber, built in 1726 to guard it, holding the Jaivana, one of the largest cannons on wheels ever built.
Ticketed separately from the composite ticket. Drive up rather than walk in summer.
90 min
The 1799 'Palace of Winds', a five-story screen of 953 windows built so the royal women could watch street life unseen.
The facade is best seen from the rooftop cafés opposite; go inside early for the views over the bazaar.
45 min
Nineteen masonry instruments finished in 1734, including a sundial 27 meters high that still reads time to about two seconds. A UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Hire one of the official guides at the gate; the instruments make little sense without explanation.
75 min
Built in 1734 by Sawai Jai Singh II to defend Jaipur and extended in 1868 with nine identical suites for the queens, its ramparts look straight down on the grid.
Closes around 5:30pm; the Padao café on the walls stays open for sunset.
90 min
The marble cenotaphs of Jaipur's maharajas, beginning with Jai Singh II's, carved with scenes of court life below Nahargarh's walls.
Quiet and rarely crowded; a ten-minute stop on the way to Nahargarh.
30 min
A seventeenth-century stepwell with criss-crossing staircases, a short walk from Amber Fort.
Climbing the steps is no longer allowed; view from the edge.
20 min
A complex of eighteenth-century temples and spring-fed bathing tanks in a ravine east of the city, known as the Monkey Temple.
Keep food and sunglasses hidden from the monkeys.
90 min
A five-story palace standing in Man Sagar lake, rebuilt by Madho Singh I in the eighteenth century as a pleasure palace for royal duck-shooting parties. When the lake is full, four of its floors sit below the waterline.
You can't go inside; view it from the promenade on the Amer road, best at sunset or when it is lit at night.
30 min