Jodhpur

Mumbai –Jaisalmer – Jodhpur – Mumbai: December 2019

Where is it located?

• Country – India
• State – Rajasthan

Jodhpur is the second largest city in Rajasthan, also known as Blue City. “Jodhpur marks its origin back to the year of 1459 AD. The history of this prosperous city revolves around the Rathore clan. Rao Jodha, the chief of Rathore Clan is credited with the origin of Jodhpur in India. The city is known to be built in place of the ancient capital, Mandore of the state of Manwar. Hence, the people of Jodhpur and surrounding areas are commonly known as Marwaris. “

Information given As per Rajasthan Tourism

How to reach here?

One can reach here by road, rail, or air. Jodhpur is well connected to all major cities and towns.

Best time to visit

October to March would be the ideal time to visit Jodhpur. The weather is pleasant during the day and chilly at night. Temperature varies between 10 deg Celcius to 24 deg Celcius.

March to June is very hot during the day (sometimes as high as 42 deg C), but pleasant during the nights. During July to September, it is monsoon elsewhere in India, but Rajasthan receives very little rain, so it is still summer-like here, with pleasant bearable heat and pleasant evenings.

What we did –

Jodhpur is the second leg of our Rajasthan trip. We travel by overnight train from Jaisalmer to Jodhpur reaching our destination at 6 am. Our stay, which is more like a homestay than a hotel is just 5 mins away from the station. The owner, Mr. Anshuman, was considerate enough to give us a room for freshening up till our suite was getting set up.

Day 2 – Umaid Bhavan Palace (could not visit as it was closed due to Maharaja’s birthday) and Desert safari.

Day 3 – Simply hang around the city and enjoy the last few moments of this beautiful city. We have an afternoon flight to return back to Mumbai. And of course whatever remaining time we have we go shopping and dining.

What we could not do but maybe you could!

Our Plans of visiting the Umaid Bhavan Palace, which is the residence of the present-day Maharaja, couldn’t materialize. It is the Maharaja’s birthday today and he has invited a lot of guests over and hence closed his Palace for tourists.

What to do here?

Mehrangarh Fort Museum

The fort has a beautiful history associated with, the grandoise of the kings of those times is obvious from this fort. The entry charges to this fort is Rs 120 per person for Indians and Rs 600 per person for Non-Indians. We paid Rs 500 additional for a guide. You can take an audio tour as well if you wish too. Our guide shared the history of the fort and the royal family which lived within. The artefacts, fabrics, the carving and paintings on the walls, ceiling are mind blowing. A walk around the fort with a guide will take around 1.5 hours. There is big garden with a green lawn and lots of big trees for resting our exhausted bodies.

There are several cafe’s within the Fort premises, serving a variety of food and beverages. You are sure to find the one that is suitable for your palate. We have lunch within the fort premises “Mehrangarh cafe”.

There is a scenic panaromic view of the blue city from the fort. Jodhpur is called a blue city primarily as several of its homes have blue colour on the outer walls of their homes. In earlier days Blue houses indicated they belonged to the Brahmin community only. But now several families prefer coloring their outer walls blue to reduce the heating of the homes due to scorching summer sun.

Jaswant Thada

The next site is just 10 minute walk from the fort called “Jaswant Thada”. A beautiful construction, actually a cremation ground for the royal family, very serene, a beautiful lake with a variety of birds around it.

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Toorji Ka Jhalra

Now we head towards Toorji Ka Jhalra. A deep stairwell. almost 250 years. The area around it called Stepwell square has many high-end shops, a theatre, and several rooftop restaurants. Do try dining in one of these restaurants, it’s an amazing experience to eat with a view of history around you. We dined at “Zostel”.

Day Safari – Black Buck sighting – Bishnoi Tribe

Things To Do

Beautiful Jodhpur, look around for shopping for handcrafted items, fabrics, silver jewellery, dupattas, dresses, shirts etc. I for sure did a lot of shopping. I have bought a lot of silver jewellery from here.

Clock tower market is an awesome place to buy handicrafts, show pieces, mojdi (traditional shoes), dupattas, stoles, home furnishings and linens, and an awesome range of block printed fabrics and dresses and sarees. I can go on and on and on. I could spend a whole day here.

Ditto for Sadar market – this is the market where the locals do their shopping from. Beautiful heavy handwork chaniya cholis / lehenga cholis for such a nominal rate (simple elegant lehenga choli with just resham embroidery at Rs 2500 – unbelievable, right??). These are unstitched sets of lehenga, blouse piece and a dupatta. I would have bought a couple of them for sure if I had a wedding coming up. I even tried a few of them and fell in love with the intricate handwork ranging from zardosi, resham, dori, beads, gota, swarovski – you name it and they have it – and for half the rates available in Mumbai.

All you want to know about local food

We intend to always Eat local wherever we go. In Jodhpur food to try are “Dal Pakwan“, Puri Bhaji, Kachori, etc. As per our host Anshuman’s recommendation, we go to roadside stalls near Sojati Gate and savor yummy dal-pakwan and puri bhaji. The serving style is different than the style in Jaisalmer, nevertheless, both were delicious. The typical North Indian Dal Pakwan consists of thin “Farsi puri” (a crispy thin flatbread) and toppings made up of chana dal, in Jaisalmer, it is made up of mung dal, in Jodhpur the topping is a mix of chana and mung dal.

Mishrilal’s Eatery near the clock tower is not to be missed. Here we savor the “world-famous” Mishrilal’s lassi, mung dal kachori, goond pak, carrot halwa. Lip smacking food !!!

There are several roof-top restaurants here wherein one can enjoy the view of the city and enjoy meals. “Zostel” is one such cafe predominantly visited by the 20/30 something generation. The ambiance, as well as the food, is too good and the icing on the cake is the direct view of Mehrangarh Fort from here.

Hotel review – Baijoo Niwas – Jodhpur

• Highly Recommended.
• Beautiful property, small though – but very neat clean rooms and bathrooms – with all necessities
• This is actually a part of a haveli (a mansion) which the owner Mr Anshuman has converted into a hotel. He stays at the other half of the haveli which is adjacent to the hotel. Hence he is available at any given time of the day or night.
• He has retained the old structure , architecture of the old haveli, the typical doors, walls, windows – all reminded me of my grandmothers home in Baroda, Gujarat.
• 5 mins drive from the railway station.
• 2 mins walk from Sojati gate.
• 15 – 20 minutes walk from the famous Clock Tower.
• We had booked a suite room – biggest room in his property- beautiful.
• Excellent food – continental breakfast – fruits – juice – bread/ muffins/ indian breakfast of your choice. He had got kachori for us for breakfast once from outside. One day chef made poha and paratha for us, the other day he made upma. I had expressed desire for ginger tea and he made an effort to make it exactly the way I have it.