Tour De Royals : Kumbhalgarh

- December 27, 2014

Plans for year end road trip were in progress, after exploring almost whole of India on map we finally settled for Gujrat or Rajasthan. Impressed by Mr.Modi’s Gujarat marketing we almost finalized gujrat , the plan circled around Kacch Rann utsav , but after checking the rates we thought it’s not worth its price , besides eating pure vegetarian and sugar coated food for 10 days didn’t seal the deal for Gujrat , Rajasthan was better choice.

After playing a lot on Google maps trying to figure out the route which will allow us to cover as much Rajasthan as we can in the stipulated 10 days period, we finalized the route starting from Udaipur and covering kumbhalgarh , jaisalmer and jodhpur.

It would take us 2 days to reach kumbhalgarh, covering 650kms on day one and reach Ahmedabad and then 360kms the next day.

It took us close to 14 hrs from Pune to Ahmedabad, vikram had travelled this route by car last year and convinced us that we should be able to cover the distance easily as the road condition is excellent.

Road condition was great we managed to reach Mumbai and reach Maharashtra- Gujarat boarder in good time, all was well till now, as soon as we entered Gujarat it seemed truck drivers had left their driving sense behind, there was no lane discipline amongst the heavy vehicles and they were everywhere.

Finally after more than 12 hours we managed to reach Ahmedabad, traffic here was no different, as a habit we stopped at the signals but were heavily abused for doing so, following traffic rule was a sin here in Ahmedabad. Traffic Rules were kept at bay in Gujarat’s so called planned city.

Next day we preferred starting early , first few kilometers of Ahmedabad to Udaipur highway were single lane and we feared another 12 hour long drive , fortunately road broadened after some time and traffic here was much less and disciplined.

There is a distinct difference in landscape of Gujarat and Rajasthan, where Gujarat’s landscape shows the industrial growth, is very much polluted ,Rajasthan may not be manufacturing powerhouse as Gujarat but is definitely more scenic and peaceful .

Finally we crossed the gujrat border and the first thing we noticed is a long queue of Beer and Wine shops J

By down we managed to reach the small village town of Kerwada , just 4 kms away from Kumbhalgarh and decided to call it off for the day.

Kumbhalgarh

Kumbhalgarh is second most important fort after chittorgarh in Rajasthan and may be second largest after mehrangad fort in Jodhpur.

The fort was named after Rana Kumbh, who started construction of this fort after winning these aravali hill ranges from Mer rulers. The protective wall surrounding the fortress is 36kms long and runs through the Kumbhalgarh wild life sanctuary.

Kumbhal Meran or Kumbhal mer as the fort it locally known also is the birthplace of Maharana Pratap , the construction is not as massive as the surrounding wall and unlike other forts in Rajasthan doesn’t have much artwork , but the fort offers great view of surrounding aravali hills.

Fort also has many temples with beautiful carvings but these are surprisingly neglected by the government, there are no sign boards or information boards. Authorized guides as well were not available.

The main palace building is three storied with separate chambers for queens and the king.

Entrance

Kumbhalgarh palace complex

Temples in Kumbhalgarh

unending walls of kumbhalgarh

Fort complex from palace top

Kumbhalgarh National Park

The area surrounding the fort is part of kumbhalgarh national park which covers the area of 610 sqkms and is famous for its leopard sighting along with Bera national park.

For 2500 rs per jeep we were able to book the safari for the afternoon , the safari here is managed by local people and forest department has very little or nil control over it hence you can always make the last minute booking.

Unlike other safari routes, here the route is through the hills and it’s almost like the mountain driving. The drivers here seemed more interested in getting it done as quickly as possible and there was no forest guard accompanying us.

We were later told that for 1000rs a forest guard would take you for a forest trail. As per the last animal census there are 89 leopards and 105 sloth beers in this area.

Unfortunately we couldn’t find leopard nothing apart from Owlets and sambhar but the ride was great fun and I loved the jungle, would love to explore it on foot though.