Kumbalgarh, Rajasthan - Day 6

Rajasthan Road Trip - Day 1.
Udaipur, Rajasthan : City of Lakes, Venice of the East - Day 2.
Jodhpur, Rajasthan : Blue City - Day 3.
Jaisalmer, Rajasthan : Sand Castles - Day 4.
Jaisalmer, Rajasthan : Sufferi - Day 5.

Jaisalmer had taken it's toll and we were happy to be heading home. What lay ahead was a major amount of driving. Jaisalmer's location is such that you have to re-trace your steps all the way back to Udaipur, same route. We couldn't have made it back to Mumbai in one day without it being immensely tiring, so we had planned to stop over at Kumbalgarh, which is between Udaipur and Jodhpur in that triangle.


Kumbalgarh is in the hills and has a bizarre story surrounding its naming - more on that in a bit. Heading back out of Jaisalmer early morning - Nov 1st 7.15 AM - KM : 17860 - point that baby home and hit the gas! We make our way back through the now familiar roads - our plan is to keep driving till we hit Kumbalgarh, since we know we can nail the times due to the good road conditions.

We bypass Jodhpur by 10.40 AM and head towards Udaipur - the turnoff to Kumbalgarh is via a small place called "Sayra" - which we hit around 2 PM - the approach to Kumbalgarh from this direction has some bad roads - it seems like most people visit it from the Udaipur side. We reach Kumbalgarh around 4 PM - hungry and tired as hell - this place has two decent places to stay, we're staying at the cheaper of the two - Kumbal Castle - the other is a heritage hotel - pricey and we didnt feel like shelling out that lil extra - called the Audhi.

Kumbalgarh is a solo fort out in the wilderness, nothing much to write about really - not much for the regular tourist, no guides in sight - just plain fort. We managed to find one bored government employee who was manning the gate to talk about the fort - mildly interesting trivia - named after a "rishi (saint)" Kumbal - who was approached by the then king to find a location such that would never be conquered - the rishi told the King that he should sacrifice a human to find such a place - obviously no volunteers were forthcoming and it turns out that the rishi in an amazing "walking the talk" agreed to sacrifice himself - according to legend the rishi says - slice my head off - my body will keep walking and will map out the fort - but he had to name the fort after the rishi. A lil nutty - but hey made for interesting listening in an otherwise mundane fort.

The fort is lighted at night to give a spectacle - but we skipped that - weren't very piqued by the thought of it. Day 6 ended with us holed up in our room - tired and watching the Haryana chief minister blabber about something on Doordarshan - the only channel available!

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Jaisalmer, Rajasthan : Sufferi - Day 5

Rajasthan Road Trip - Day 1.
Udaipur, Rajasthan : City of Lakes, Venice of the East - Day 2.
Jodhpur, Rajasthan : Blue City - Day 3.
Jaisalmer, Rajasthan : Sand Castles - Day 4.

Day 4 in Jaisalmer was like drinking from a hose, too much beauty pepperred with touristey cliches (bedsheet shopping?!, camel safari pushers, the pushy guide). Day 5 we decided, the pace had to be controlled and we'd try to look at Jaisalmer one more time at our own pace. Good intentions all around!

Morning dawns, we stroll out of Mandir Palace and head back to the fort, this time there is a sense of recognition or atleast we think so - we're steering clear of the tourist traps we've seen yesterday. We are armed with a map of the fort and begin our self-guided tour of the fort - its lovely to look at the lattice work one more time and really absorb the designs we see everywhere - but turns out that bus-loads of more tourists have arrived and we're also not having that much luck navigating the old fort bylanes by ourselves - we remember from our trek the previous day and manage to re-visit some areas that we wanted to check out again.

We had decided to take the camel safari, neither of us likes camels,nor were we thrilled at the prospect of a bumpy ride from our previous experiences with the camel - but after much deliberation we felt that since we had come out so far - it would be a shame to miss out on the camel safari's that are such a staple in Jaisalmer - so - we ended up with a compromise where we opted to take a camel cart - which we felt was not on the animal and might be slightly more comfortable. Safari booked.



Outside the fort there is a Govt. approved "Bhang" shop - found that very puzzling - a government approved shop that sold hallucinogens - very nice! :) We bought some for use later when we were back home - hey it was government approved after all! The rest of the afternoon was a little aimless, we went back to the old market and I guess we were looking to recapture the feel of Jodhpur, but Jaisalmer is waaay too touristey.

We made a beeline to "Sam National Sand Dunes Park", we had a liaison who drove with us in the car - which he then took onwards to the "camp" while we hopped onto our camel cart - much to the amusement of the ton of foreigners who were all hopped onto the camels. Now, the idea is - the camel drivers take you some distance into the park - to the sand dunes to see the sunset and then drive you to the "camps" for the evening entertainment under the stars - sounded good on paper!

Camel ride was super bumpy - add to that hordes of small kids / adults etc all trying to push you to buy cold drinks / snacks / water and what have you. You got to note that this area has no commerce other than tourism - so the locals are very pushy - our camel driver made it a point to let us know that he would *really* appreciate a tip - OK. Anyhow, we make our way to the supposed "serene" sand dunes and it starts with a low hum - then it grows louder and suddenly over the next sand dune are a zillion tourists and really, there were a zillion tourists - I felt like I was back at Juhu beach - we took pictures if you dont buy it! :)

We navigated to a dune which was mostly slightly away from the human beach - and decided to settle down for the sunset - to bide our time we tried to take atleast one picture without any human entering the frame - yes, it was very hard! It might sound kind of snobbish, but the intent is to sound amused that soooo many (we included) tourists had shown up. Oh well.

Sunset check. Hurried exit to entertainment camp - check. Tip to camel driver - check. So, the camel drive ordeal complete (yes, it was a bad idea and its overrated) - we make it to our camp - traditional greeting with drums and "tikka" - we head to our place around the campfire - and its a big one - for whatever reason we had managed to purchase the "VIP" tickets - it was about Rs. 200 / head, so we got to sit right up front.

In our session, we had a huge group of students from Goa I think so there was a buzz all around. It got dark and the campfire and the entertainment kicked off. There were the staple Rajasthani folk songs, followed by dances, in which the speciality dancer performed some gimmicky dance moves - picking blades with her eyelids etc. OK - was cool to see.

This thing went on for about 3 hours - about 1.5 hour too many - ultimately the session devoloved into Bhangra / popular Hindi movie songs - dinner was served and we were more than ready to get out of that place. On our way back we felt glad that we had taken in a more intimate folk experience in Udaipur which was timed just right and had the right blend of crowd and atmosphere.

Another long day - we were done with Jaisalmer and were ready to start our trek back home to Mumbai. Jaisalmer - check.

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Raghu Dixit - The Review

So, the album finally launched, here are my thoughts. I felt the album might have been tailored to be a bit more populist and I dont blame him for doing so - hey you've got to earn dough don't you! Good effort - hopefully his brand of music catches on and his next album is more booming vocals and more indo-folk-fusion - which is what Raghu's brand/genre to me is.

First, you can buy the music online at Music Yogi or its now widely available in most music stores, I've seen it my local Planet-M and at Crossword too.

Album starts off large with "Hey Bhagwan", reggae/guitar comes to mind, its also the first video Raghu has released - good start. If that song woke you up, the next "Mysore Se Ayi", ofcourse is a Raghu classic, the album version is good but its a kind of song that amazing live and its Raghu at his best blending folk / rock. You're just getting over the solo music piece at the end of when "Gudugudiya Sedi Nodo" kicks off, by far the best song for me on this album - its in Kannada, I had to read the lyrics to understand what it meant - its by a Kannada poet, first the song blows your mind and the lyrics are just phenomenal. Amazing song and amazing soundscapes.

After the high of "Gudugudiya..", comes "Ambar", which I felt was a needless love ballad that goes on and on, not for me and not what I would associate Raghu with, after this point the album seems to go into a "populist" mode (for me) - lets add a ballad, a "foot tappy" Hindi rock song "Khidki".

"No Man Will Ever Love You Like I Do" is soulful, perhaps he wrote it for his amour! "I'm in Mumbai Waiting For A Miracle" follows - which for people following Raghu is ironic because he's really beeen waiting quite long for a miracle! :) Lyrics are predictable and I've heard better songs about Mumbai - a throwback to Remo Fernandes (Bombay City) - ah the good ol days.

The album ends with "Soruthihudu Maniya Maligi ", another Kannada song - nice, but not even close to Gudgudiya, which for me was the gem of this album, I've heard "Mysore" too many times perhaps!

Good beginnings - Raghu's forte I think is his live performances and his crazy booming voice - I read someplace (facebook) - where someone referred to him as having "big pipes" referring to his vocal strengths - thats fits totally. Its a good start for Raghu, hopefully his next is more indo-folk. Just for support I'd say go buy the album - but objectively it was an average attempt for me. Good sound - but the only song that pulls me back is Gudgudiya.

BTW the album design is PHENOMENAL - I dont buy too many physical CD's nowadays - but probably the best designed CD I've seen ever. Kudos to his brother I think who designed it.

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