Rajasthan Festival Tour: Pushkar Camel Fair

A representative from Payless Tours India meets you at Indira Gandhi International Airport, holding a sign with your name, and drives you to your hotel. If your flight lands in the morning, you can rest for a few hours before the afternoon programme begins. Your guide then takes you into Old Delhi, the walled city laid out by the Mughal emperor Shah Jahan in the 1640s. The first stop is Jama Masjid, the largest mosque in India, where the courtyard holds up to 25,000 worshippers. From its southern gate you can look straight down the lanes towards the Red Fort, which is closed on Mondays and is seen from outside.

A cycle rickshaw then carries you through Chandni Chowk, once an imperial avenue with a canal running down the middle. Today it is a dense web of wholesale markets, each lane given over to one trade: silver in Dariba Kalan, wedding cards in Chawri Bazaar, and dried fruit and spices in Khari Baoli, the largest spice market in Asia. Your guide will stop at a few shop fronts to explain how the trade works and where the goods come from. It is loud, crowded and full of smells, and it gives you a useful first lesson in how Indian markets operate before you reach the trading grounds of Pushkar.

Later in the afternoon you drive to New Delhi, planned by the British architects Edwin Lutyens and Herbert Baker after the capital moved from Calcutta in 1911. You pass the wide lawns of Kartavya Path, the sandstone arch of India Gate and the dome of Rashtrapati Bhavan, the presidential residence. If time permits, a stop at Gurudwara Bangla Sahib shows how the Sikh community kitchen feeds thousands of people for free each day. The guide will then return you to your hotel, where your driver will brief you on the plan for the coming days. The evening is free to recover from the flight. Overnight stay in Delhi.

After breakfast you leave Delhi on the Yamuna Expressway, a six-lane toll road that cuts the drive to Agra to under four hours. You should arrive around lunchtime and check in at your hotel. The afternoon begins at Agra Fort, a red sandstone citadel started by Emperor Akbar in 1565 and enlarged by his grandson Shah Jahan, who added white marble pavilions. Your guide will walk you through the Diwan-i-Am, the hall of public audience, and the private quarters overlooking the river. From the Musamman Burj tower you get your first distant view of the Taj Mahal, the same view Shah Jahan had during his years of house arrest.

Next you cross the river to the tomb of Itimad-ud-Daulah, often called the Baby Taj. Built between 1622 and 1628 for the father of Empress Nur Jahan, it was the first Mughal building faced entirely in white marble with stone inlay. The tomb is small enough to study in detail, and your guide will point out the wine cups, cypress trees and flower vases set into the walls in coloured stone. It is far quieter than the main monuments, which makes it a pleasant break. Many visitors find that the fine craftsmanship here prepares the eye for the larger work they will see the following morning.

In the late afternoon you drive a short way along the river to Mehtab Bagh, a restored Mughal garden directly opposite the Taj Mahal. From here you watch the sun go down behind the tomb, with the marble turning orange and then grey as the light fades. Local farmers often bring buffalo to the riverbank at this hour, giving you a view of rural Agra that most tour groups miss. Dinner can be taken at your hotel or at a restaurant nearby, and your guide will recommend a few places serving Mughlai dishes such as korma and biryani. Go to bed early, as the alarm is set before dawn. Overnight stay in Agra.

Your guide collects you before first light and walks you to the Taj Mahal entrance about half an hour before the gates open. Please note that the Taj Mahal is closed every Friday, so the dates of this tour are arranged around it. Once through security, you walk under the great red sandstone gateway and see the tomb framed at the far end of the garden. In the early light the dome looks almost blue, then cream, then gold. Your guide explains how the building was raised between 1632 and 1653, how the four minarets lean slightly outward, and how the Quran verses around the arch grow larger towards the top so that they appear even in size from below.

After breakfast back at the hotel you check out and head west towards Rajasthan. About two thirds of the way to Jaipur, a short detour brings you to Abhaneri village and the Chand Baori stepwell, built in the ninth century by the Nikumbha rulers. Around 3,500 narrow steps zigzag down thirteen levels to the water, forming a geometric pattern that photographs beautifully at midday. Next to it stands the ruined Harshat Mata temple, whose carved panels of dancers and musicians survived a later invasion. Your guide will explain how stepwells stored rainwater for the dry months and doubled as cool meeting places for village women.

From Abhaneri it is roughly ninety minutes to Jaipur, and you will notice the change in landscape as the flat farmland gives way to the rocky ridges of the Aravalli hills. On the way, roadside stalls sell kachori and sweet milky tea, and your driver can stop if you need a break. You reach the Pink City in the late afternoon and check in at your hotel. The evening is free, but if you would like to see the city lit up, the marble Birla Mandir temple and the busy stalls along MI Road are both easy to visit by car. Overnight stay in Jaipur.

The morning starts at Amber Fort, eleven kilometres north of the city, which served as the capital of the Kachhwaha Rajputs until 1727. The fort climbs a hillside above Maota Lake, and you reach the main courtyard on foot or by jeep. Your guide takes you through the Diwan-i-Am with its double row of columns, the carved Ganesh Pol gateway and the Sheesh Mahal, a hall lined with convex mirror pieces that sparkle when a single flame is lit. From the ramparts you can see the long wall of Jaigarh Fort snaking along the ridge above, built to protect Amber from attack.

Coming back towards the city, you stop beside Man Sagar Lake for a view of Jal Mahal, a palace that sits in the water with most of its floors submerged. Inside the walled city, the City Palace remains the home of the former royal family, and its museum displays royal robes, a collection of arms and two enormous silver jars that once carried Ganges water to London for Maharaja Madho Singh II. Next door is Jantar Mantar, an open-air observatory built by Jai Singh II in the 1720s, where your guide demonstrates how the giant sundial reads local time to within two seconds.

The afternoon is kept free for the bazaars, which is a good chance to buy a light shawl or scarf for the cooler fair nights ahead. Johari Bazaar is the place for silver and gemstones, Bapu Bazaar for printed cotton and camel-leather slippers, and Tripolia Bazaar for brass and lacquer bangles. You will also stop in front of Hawa Mahal, the five-storey screen of 953 windows built in 1799 so royal women could watch processions unseen. For an evening meal, your guide can suggest a restaurant serving dal baati churma, the traditional Rajasthani dish of baked wheat balls with lentils. Overnight stay in Jaipur.

After breakfast you drive south-west to Pushkar on the Ajmer road, a journey of about three hours. As you near the town, the traffic changes: tractors pulling trailers full of villagers, camels walking in long strings with their owners, and trucks painted with flowers and slogans. Pushkar lies in a narrow valley between the Aravalli hills and the sand dunes, and during the fair its population grows from around 20,000 to several hundred thousand. You check in at your tent camp near the fair ground, where the tents have proper beds, electric lights and attached bathrooms with running water. All meals at the camp are included.

After lunch at the camp, a local guide leads you on a first walk across the livestock ground, which stretches across the dunes on the western edge of town. The scene is unlike anything in a city: herders in white dhotis and bright turbans sitting beside their animals, camels decorated with silver anklets and carved patterns in their fur, and traders checking teeth and legs before naming a price. Your guide explains the basics of the trade, including how a good riding camel is judged and why Marwari horses with their curled ears fetch the highest sums.

As evening falls, the fair ground fills with cooking smoke, the sound of folk musicians and the glow of oil lamps in the herders' camps. You can wander the market stalls selling camel saddles, brass bells, embroidered blankets and silver jewellery, or watch the giant Ferris wheel lighting up the sky. Pushkar is a holy town, so meat, eggs and alcohol are not served anywhere, including at the camp, which provides vegetarian buffet meals. Nights in the desert are cool at this time of year, so keep a warm layer handy. Dinner is served at the camp. Overnight stay in the Pushkar fair tent camp.

Wake before sunrise and walk out to the dunes, where the trading ground is at its most photogenic. Mist hangs low over thousands of camels, and smoke rises from small fires as the herders brew tea and milk their animals. The traders come mostly from the Raika, Rebari and Gujjar communities, pastoral groups who have bred camels and cattle in the Thar for centuries. Your guide will introduce you to a few families, translate as they talk about the season's prices, and explain the herding routes that bring them hundreds of kilometres across the desert to this one market each year.

After breakfast at the camp, the action moves to the mela ground, a stadium-like arena where the Rajasthan tourism department runs the fair's official programme. The schedule changes every year, but it usually includes the moustache competition, where men with whiskers stretching to well over a metre compete for the longest and best groomed. There are turban-tying contests in which visitors race local men to wind a nine-metre length of cloth into a proper Rajasthani turban, as well as camel races, camel dances and a pot-breaking contest for village women. Your guide will check the daily programme and plan your day around the main events.

Lunch is at the camp, followed by a quieter hour before you return for the afternoon competitions and the camel decoration contest, where owners dress their animals in mirror-work blankets, beaded halters and painted patterns. Later, you might catch the friendly cricket match often played between local villagers and foreign visitors, or the folk dance performances on the main stage. As the light softens, the dunes behind the fair are the best place to watch the sun set over the camel herds. Dinner is served at the camp, and some evenings bring folk music around a fire. Overnight stay in the Pushkar fair tent camp.

As the fair moves towards its final days, its mood shifts from trading to worship. From Ekadashi, the eleventh day of the lunar month, up to Kartik Purnima, the full moon, pilgrims pour into Pushkar from across Rajasthan and beyond to bathe in the sacred lake. Hindu tradition holds that a dip here on Kartik Purnima washes away all past sins. Because the fair dates move with the lunar calendar, we arrange your three camp nights to overlap with these religious days wherever possible. Your guide will take you down to the lake's 52 ghats early, when families gather on the steps with flowers and offerings.

If you wish to join in, you can take part in the holy dip yourself, with the guide explaining the rituals and the right way to behave on the ghats. Shoes must be removed near the water, and photographs of bathers should only be taken with permission. You then walk to the Brahma Temple, one of very few temples in the world dedicated to the creator god, with its red spire and a silver turtle set into the floor. In the afternoon, those with energy can climb or take the ropeway up Ratnagiri hill to the Savitri Temple for a view over the lake, town and fair ground.

At sunset the ghats fill again for the evening aarti, when priests swing large brass lamps and the chanting carries across the water. On the nights around the full moon, pilgrims set small leaf boats with lit wicks floating on the lake, a sight that draws photographers from around the world. Your guide will find you a good spot on one of the quieter ghats and explain the meaning of the prayers. The main market street is lined with stalls selling rose petals, sweets such as malpua and religious souvenirs. Return to the camp for your last dinner at the fair. Overnight stay in the Pushkar fair tent camp.

After an early breakfast you check out of the camp and drive south through the Aravalli hills to Udaipur, a journey of about five hours on a good highway. The road passes marble quarries around Rajsamand, small villages with whitewashed temples and fields of maize and wheat. Lunch can be taken at a highway restaurant on the way. You reach Udaipur in the early afternoon and check in at your hotel, where you can rest after the early starts at the fair. Udaipur was founded in 1559 by Maharana Udai Singh II of Mewar after Chittorgarh came under repeated attack, and it has been called the City of Lakes ever since.

In the late afternoon your guide meets you at the hotel and takes you to the jetty for a boat ride on Lake Pichola, an artificial lake first dug in the fourteenth century. From the water you see the long white facade of the City Palace rising above the eastern shore, the Lake Palace hotel floating in the middle and the domes of Jag Mandir on its own island. The boat usually stops at Jag Mandir, where the young prince Khurram, later Shah Jahan, is said to have sheltered while in rebellion against his father.

As the sun drops behind the hills, the palace walls turn pink and the ghats along the shore come alive with people washing and bathing. After the boat ride you can walk across Daiji Bridge into the lanes of the Gangaur Ghat area, which are lined with cafés offering rooftop views of the lake. Udaipur is known for its slow pace, and after several busy days at the fair this evening is a chance to sit back. Your guide can suggest restaurants serving Mewari dishes such as laal maas or gatte ki sabzi. Overnight stay in Udaipur.

The morning starts at the City Palace, the largest palace complex in Rajasthan, built and expanded by successive Mewar rulers over almost four hundred years. You enter through the Tripolia Gate and move through a maze of courtyards, narrow staircases and balconies. Highlights include the Mor Chowk with its peacock mosaics in coloured glass, the Badi Mahal garden built on a natural hill at the top of the palace, and the Zenana Mahal with its painted chambers. Your guide will tell the story of Maharana Pratap, the Mewar ruler who refused to submit to Akbar, and his loyal horse Chetak.

A short walk downhill brings you to the Jagdish Temple, built in 1651 and dedicated to Lord Vishnu. Its steep steps lead up to a carved shrine where devotees sing hymns throughout the day. After that, you drive to Saheliyon ki Bari, the Garden of the Maidens, laid out in the eighteenth century for the royal ladies and their companions. Its fountains are fed by gravity from Fateh Sagar Lake and still work without pumps. You can then take a short drive along the shore of Fateh Sagar Lake, which is popular with local families in the evening.

The afternoon is free to stroll the markets near the Clock Tower and Hathi Pol, where shops sell miniature paintings, silver jewellery and colourful leheriya scarves. In the evening, the Dharohar folk dance show at Bagore ki Haveli, an eighteenth-century mansion on Gangaur Ghat, presents an hour of Rajasthani dance and puppetry. The finale is a performance by a woman balancing a tall stack of brass pots on her head while dancing. Tickets can be booked on the spot, and your guide can advise on the best time to arrive for a good seat. Overnight stay in Udaipur.

After breakfast you leave Udaipur and drive north-west through forested hills and small farming villages towards Ranakpur, about two and a half hours away. Ranakpur is home to the Chaumukha Jain temple, built in the fifteenth century under the patronage of a Jain merchant named Dharna Shah during the reign of Rana Kumbha. The temple is made of pale marble and stands on a raised platform among wooded hills. Its doors open to non-Jain visitors from midday, so the drive is timed to reach the temple at the right hour.

Inside, the temple has 1,444 carved marble pillars, and the tradition is that no two are exactly alike. Your guide or the temple's own audio guide will explain how the shrine faces in all four directions, symbolising the Tirthankara's spread of knowledge across the world. Look out for the carving of Parshvanatha, a Jain saint, surrounded by a canopy of a thousand snake hoods all carved from a single block of marble. Leather items such as belts and wallets are not allowed inside, and the temple asks visitors to dress modestly. A simple vegetarian lunch can be taken nearby.

From Ranakpur the road continues for around three hours through the dry landscape of Marwar, past fields of mustard and millet and herds of goats. You will see women in bright orange and red odhnis walking along the roadside with water pots, and occasional villages of mud houses with thatched roofs. You arrive in Jodhpur in the late afternoon, where the huge Mehrangarh Fort dominates the skyline from its rocky outcrop. After checking in at your hotel, the evening is free. Many hotels in the old city have rooftop restaurants with a direct view of the fort lit up at night. Overnight stay in Jodhpur.

Your guide meets you after breakfast and drives up to Mehrangarh Fort, founded by Rao Jodha in 1459 on a cliff 125 metres above the city. Its walls rise straight from the rock, and the entrance path still carries cannonball marks from eighteenth-century battles. Inside, the museum is one of the best run in India, with galleries of royal palanquins, elephant howdahs, turbans and weapons. The Phool Mahal, a hall of gilded ceilings and painted walls, and the Moti Mahal with its coloured glass windows are both worth slowing down for. From the ramparts you look down over the sea of blue houses below.

Just below the fort stands Jaswant Thada, a white marble memorial built in 1899 for Maharaja Jaswant Singh II. Its marble is so thin in places that it glows when the sun shines through it. The surrounding gardens and small lake are a pleasant place to rest. After that, your guide leads you on foot down into the blue city through the Brahmpuri neighbourhood, where many houses are painted indigo. The guide will explain the competing stories of why: some say it marked Brahmin homes, others that the colour kept the houses cool or repelled insects.

The walk ends at the Clock Tower and Sardar Market, a lively square where stalls sell spices, textiles and bandhani tie-dye fabric. Nearby, the famous omelette stall at the market gate is a local institution, and the makhaniya lassi shops serve a thick saffron yoghurt drink unique to Jodhpur. The rest of the afternoon is free to rest or do last-minute shopping for gifts. If you would like a final view of the city, your driver can take you to the Umaid Bhawan Palace, part of which is a museum, for sunset. This is the last night of the tour. Overnight stay in Jodhpur.

After breakfast your driver transfers you to Jodhpur airport for your flight to Delhi, which takes about an hour and a half. On arrival in Delhi, a Payless Tours India representative meets you and drops you at the international terminal or at a hotel near the airport if your onward flight leaves later. This marks the end of your Pushkar camel fair tour.