3 Shades Of Rajasthan :- Part 1 : Udaipur

Sometimes travelling is just about breaking pre-conceived popular notions about places and it's people and making room for your own.

When Rajasthan comes to mind we mostly think about the desert, hot weather, royal palaces, and folk music. But what we have explored during our wanderlust was something else. This travelogue taught us how travel can shatter your creeds and mould you into a new persona.

Group of 6 people including me, decided to plan a week's trip to Rajasthan. I am one of those who tries to stay away from travel agencies and their expensive itineraries. After all, exploring is what I constantly look forward to and this approach brings me here to share my travelogue.

We sat together and drew a rough plan, where we ended up choosing the north-west side of Rajasthan for this road trip: "Cities of three different shades : Udaipur, Jodhpur and Jaisalmer ". We split the tasks among us and started cooking for the unknown escapade ahead.

We booked the flight from Mumbai to Udaipur and return flight from Jaisalmer to Mumbai, as tickets were cost-efficient from Mumbai than Pune. We also booked the zostel doms at each destination as they are the best way of accommodation for backpackers like us and hired a Mahindra Marazzo to travel between cities.

Day 1 : Pune - Mumbai - Udaipur

On 10th January 2020, we packed our bags with a tangled feeling of fear and excitement and left for Mumbai International Airport at 11 am from Pune. After reaching Mumbai airport by 4 pm, we were done with all the formalities.

As per my knowledge, travel without a drama is not possible, so here is an anecdote:

While we were eagerly waiting for a 5:30 pm flight, suddenly one of my friends receives a call from our car driver from Udaipur. My friend started arguing and yelling over the call. So I asked him what is the issue upon which he said: "Our driver has denied to drive us from Udaipur to Jodhpur during the night and also he talked very rudely over the call. He is cancelling our booking and ready to return the full advance payment".

Now we're about to land in Udaipur in the next two hours and we had just lost our only way of sailing in an unknown state. So I called the driver again to settle upon some middle ground. For the first time in my life, I had pleaded someone saying "sir sir sir ...... " for more than 50 times and finally, we successfully convinced him for night driving.

I believe that travelling, constantly teaches us lessons, and this incident taught me one: "always share the full itinerary with the driver beforehand to avoid issues like these". After this episode, my friends changed my name to Saar Suyash Gandhi.

Finally, at 6 pm our flight took off from Mumbai and we landed at 7:30 pm in the "White City of Rajasthan - the Former Capital of Mewar Kingdom : Udaipur".

City Of Lakes - Udaipur:

The first thing we experienced in Udaipur was its freezing cold weather of about 3-6 °C. After checking in and getting freshened up, we left our zostel in search of dinner at around 10 pm. Udaipur has many rooftop restaurants near lake Pichola and all of them offer a remarkable night view of Udaipur. We chose the 'Sun N Moon Rooftop cafe' to satisfy our craving. The food here was fabulous although, it was nothing compared to impeccable night beauty of lake Pichola we saw that day.

I suggest carrying warm clothes on a winter trip to Rajasthan.

Day 2 : Udaipur (11th January 2020)

The next day, we set out to explore the beauty of city and its delicious food. As we got out of zostel, a huge mesmerizing mural of traditional Rajasthani man painted on one of the walls of zostel caught our attention. It was representing diversified culture and inhabitancy of Rajasthan.

We started with Jagdish Temple, one of the best architectural wonders of the Mewar dynasty with Indo- Aryan architectural style. We spent some time here taking photos while making fun of each other.

After breakfast, we went for boating in Lake Pichola, which was built in the year 1362 AD. You can take a boat from Rameshwar Ghat, which will cost Rs 400 per person for the tour. This hour-long excursion gives you splendid views of the City Palace, the quaint ghats and Sajjangarh. After the pleasing view of the marvelous architecture made in marble and yellow sandstone, they dropped us at Jagmandir, where you can spend some time appreciating the scenic views. From here, you can take the boat back to the city palace. The trip of Udaipur is incomplete without a boat cruise in Lake Pichola.

Then we spent our time exploring the City Palace and its museum. I suggest taking a guide to explore the palace unless and until you want to get puzzled in the enormity of the Palace.

The City Palace was built for over 400 years in parts by several rulers of the Mewar dynasty. Palace has marvelous mirror-work, marble-work, murals, wall paintings, inlay-work on windows, and colored glass that decorates balconies, towers and domes of the complex which are worth admiring.

The main attractions of the City Palace are Mor-chowk, Sheesh Mahal, and Zenana Mahal. The palace will astound you with an extraordinary view of impeccable Udaipur city from the top.

Exit from the City Palace lead us to the local eateries, where we had Tea, Kachoris and Dal Pakwan. When the driver arrived, we went to zostel and loaded our luggage into the car and went to experience the best folk dance show in our life.

Dharohar Folk Dance:

This show takes place in the courtyard called the Neem Chowk at Bagore ki Haveli. We had already booked e-tickets for this show.

The show started with Gavri Dance performance, an act showing vigorous fight between Goddess Amba and Demon Bhiamwal. The dance concludes with the victory of good over evil. Then comes the Chari Dance where the performers dance with lit brass pots on their head skillfully balancing them.

Next was Terha Taal Dance where, each performer was playing 13 Manjiras (Traditional Indian Instrument) tied to their hands and legs as per the rhythm of the music. During the dance, they held a knife in their mouth along with brass pot on their head and played manjiras, all at the same time quite skillfully. This part gave us goosebumps and kept us spellbound.

Then comes the Puppet show known as Katputli. It gave us a detour from the dance performances to humorous skits. Next performances in the queue were Gorbandh Dance and Ghoomar Dance.

The final and breathtaking performance was Bhavani Dance performed by a single artist. She started dancing with two pots on her head. She kept on adding eleven more pots one by one as the dance progressed. Then with all those pots on her head, she was dancing on the edge of a metallic plate. As a last breathtaking stroke to the performance, she moved on to sharp cut pieces of glass. She danced without any fear and pain. It took our breath away for some time. I have never witnessed or explored anything like that before.

This show was the best thing we experienced in Udaipur. After this show, we were released from the exertion of wandering since morning. If you are in Udaipur, never miss this outstanding show.

After this, we spent sometime chilling at Gangori Ghat and absorbing what we had just experienced. Then we went to dinner at Khamma Ghani restaurant. While talking with the driver uncle on the dinner table, we got to know that his daughter had just got selected for the government job, and he needed a day to celebrate this. But as there was no one else available to drive the car, he was forced to come for this trip. This was when I realized the reason behind his frustration earlier. After this friendly talk, everything was sorted and we were good to go.

After dinner, we bid adieu to the white city of lakes and started our journey towards the blue one.

While on the journey to Jodhpur, I started rewinding my day when a thought suddenly struck my mind.

"How strange it is, when sometimes, we assume that everything we have in front of us is correct. But we are never aware of the blindspots that someone is going through, which causes turmoil. So wait, be patient before directly getting angry over someone, eventually everything will cool down, or maybe, at times, getting angry is the only option we have".

This was our first day on the trip of Rajasthan. Completely Unplanned Yet Beautiful !!

Continued to: 3 Shades Of Rajasthan :- Part 2 : Jodhpur