Chittaurgarh (or ‘Chittor’), in the far southeast of Rajasthan, is famous for its majestic fort – the scene of a succession of medieval sieges and battles between the Rajputs and Mughals. You could easily spend a whole day wandering around…

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A typical rural market town surrounded by miles of boulder-strewn plains and bare granite hills, Deogarh is a great place to pause on the journey between Jodhpur and Udaipur in order to experience everyday life in the Rajasthani countryside…

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Jaisalmer is the undisputed jewel of the Thar Desert. The town lies a long journey west of Rajasthan’s main transport arteries, but once its honey-coloured bastions have appeared on the horizon, you’ll know the effort has been worthwhile. F…

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Capital of the former Kingdom of Marwar, Jodhpur owes its prominence to the trade route that once passed its gates, connecting the ports of Gujarat with the cities of the northern plains. The resulting wealth enabled the Marwari rulers to c…

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The ridges of the Aravalli range ripple west and north of Udaipur into country that has always been something of a world apart from the rest of the region. Its cultivable valleys and surviving tracts of forest are the homeland of semi-nomad…

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The Shekhawati region to the northwest of Jaipur is renowned for its ornately painted havelis (walled town houses) – vestiges of a more prosperous era, when it lay on a vital trans-Thar trade route. A handful have been converted to offer st…

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Nagaur’s a delightfully unspoilt market town in Western Rajasthan, built of pale-red sandstone. Every in November it hosts a camel fair to rival the better known one in Pushkar, but the chief attraction the rest of the year is its beautiful…

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Pushkar, in the heart of Rajasthan, is one of India’s holiest Hindu sites, and among its most scenic. Overlooked by beautiful desert hills, its focal point is a pearl-shaped lake surrounded by bathing ghats (steps), and more than four-hundr…

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Just down the mountain from Kumbhalgarh lies the famous Jain temple complex of Ranakpur. Built in the 15th century, the shrines here are renowned above all for their richly carved interiors, sculpted from creamy white marble. The painstakin…

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The crop of former merchants’ havelis (mansions) dotted around the dusty desert towns of Shekhawati in northern Rajasthan are unique in India for their superb murals, dating from the time before the arrival of the railways when the region l…

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Rajasthan’s fourth city, Bikaner, rises from the eastern fringes of the Thar Desert, its medieval core encircled by rich pink sandstone ramparts. A crop of ancient Jain shrines and eccentric 19th-century havelis cluster in the sand-blown ba…

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Udaipur, India’s most romantic city, is spread around the shores of shimmering Lake Pichola. Tiers of ghats (sacred steps), whitewashed havelis and temple towers line the shore, overlooked by the pale-ochre walls and domes of the exquisite…

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