A set of opulent new palace hotel villas make the perfect base to explore mesmerising Udaipur – and to fall back in love with travel, says Indian author Jeet Thayil
Imagine it like this. You have reached a certain point in your life when the things that happen to people have happened to you. The loss of loved ones, homes, cities, your previous selves. You have a new aversion to travel. How could you not? The cramped seating, endless delays, heightened security, plastic airline food … all these things have taken the pleasure out of it.
So it has taken you some real effort to get to where you are at this moment: on the edge of Lake Pichola in Udaipur, in the northwestern Indian state of Rajasthan, stepping into an electric boat with your suitcase in hand, your sunglasses cutting the bright glare off the water. You’re handed an orange life vest. But the lake is so placid it resembles a sheet of greenish glass, marred only by the wake of passing pleasure boats and the piped-in sitar music. You accept a bottle of water, settle in and recall what you’ve learnt about the lake.
This man-made freshwater creation was thought up more than 600 years ago by a Rajput maharaja who wanted a pleasing vantage point from which to view the sunset. Pichola started as a single large lake. Over the centuries succeeding maharajas have extended it, adding a number of contiguous lakes, as well as other structures: palaces great and small, grand temples and modest ones (including a tiny homemade tower dedicated to Shiva), bathing platforms, jetties, a couple of small islands.
One island is the Jag Mandir, from which bhajans (ecstatic temple songs) float out over the water in the evening. This is where the German director Werner Herzog shot his 1991 documentary Jag Mandir: The Eccentric Private Theatre of the Maharaja of Udaipur, a film usually referred to by its subtitle. Another of the islands is home to a hotel that featured in the James Bond movie Octopussy. As I pass its low white bulk, I realise I remember nothing about the film other than its striking setting.
But the lake’s most remarkable feature is none of these things. It’s definitively un-Indian; there is no rubbish on its surface, no bags or containers thrown into the water by visitors. Most places of interest in India are littered with all kinds of waste by tourists from other parts of the country who prefer not to leave a landscape as they found it. I say this as an Indian man who has lived in various parts of the country. Litter is a fact of modern life and this makes the lake an exception as far as Indian bodies of water go.
As we make our way to the hotel jetty of the Leela Palace Udaipur, I’m starting to remember some of the pleasures of travel. The hotel was opened in 2009 with 80 rooms and suites, and is one of three palace hotels on the lakefront. The ride is only about ten minutes, but it is a passage to another country; a soft passage that takes me from the chaos of an Indian city to the serenity of a place, and a palace, designed to be experienced against the backdrop of water. Here is tranquillity and order. I sense it on the boat as I watch a pair of sunbirds perch on the wooden prow and the buildings across the water come into focus. I see it on the face of the boatman, Brij Mohan Barbar, one among half a dozen Rajasthani men who ply the water between the jetties.
When the boat docks, senior hotel executives escort me to my villa, one of a collection of three new luxury options sleeping two or four people that were recently added to the original palace hotel. They let me know they are there to make my stay as memorable and comfortable as possible.
In the big room overlooking the pool and the lake beyond are three cakes in the shape of my books, accurate down to the colours, the sizes and typefaces. To one side is a tall walnut cabinet with a full bar, a selection of wines, liqueurs, spirits and chocolates. A minibar it most certainly is not. (All of this is included in the price, which is substantial enough that the cost of incidentals will not matter.) There is a giant brown marble bath tub, two sinks, a shower and, in its own room, a toilet with a heated seat. Butlers and chefs hover unseen at all hours. Cocktail hour begins when you wake. The Leela has pulled out all the stops for these new Arq villas by the lake, each a marvel of privacy and service. It is a level of luxury that’s hard to beat.
Located in the southernmost part of Rajasthan, near the border with Gujarat, Udaipur was once the capital of the Mewar kingdom. Founded in the mid-16th century by the Rajput Maharaja Udai Singh, it takes its character and other name, City of Lakes, from the lakes that surround it. Jaipur is Rajasthan’s capital but, as in any second-tier Indian city, visitors there must contend with congestion, noise, sprawl and pollution. Udaipur, by some miracle, has escaped this fate and manages to retain the romance of its princely past.
In India, the Rajputs are seen as warriors and mercenaries, a historical reputation that extends as far back as the 7th century at least. It rests on an idea of itinerant military nobility, like the samurai, and the Rajputs take some pride in it to this day. They consider themselves members of the Kshatriya or warrior caste, but Rajputs come from a diverse range of backgrounds. Some are part of the princely or ruling class, while others are agriculturists and cultivators. War is embedded in the history and culture, and the former royal family of Udaipur is a living reminder of that legacy.
An internecine feud between Mahendra Singh Mewar and his younger brother, Arvind Singh Mewar, both claiming to be the 76th maharana of the former kingdom of Mewar, has become one of the longest-running court cases in Indian history. When the 75th maharana, Bhagwat Singh Mewar, died in 1984, he left his older son out of his will. Depending on who you talk to, the maharana and custodian of Udaipur is one or the other brother.
When Herzog made his documentary, the eccentric maharaja of the title referred to the younger brother, Arvind Singh. Mahindra Singh doesn’t figure in the film. As with many Herzog productions, the storyline is invented if not entirely fictional. It records an elaborate theatrical performance by some two thousand artists, including dancers, contortionists, magicians, soothsayers, puppeteers, musicians and percussionists. According to Herzog’s imaginative narration, the event was requested of the maharaja by a baba, or holy man, who prophesied the sinking of the city’s palaces into Lake Pichola, a portent that Udaipur’s cultural life itself was sinking and that the maharaja needed to stage a performance to revive it. Today, Arvind Singh has been in seclusion for some years in the Shambhu Niwas Palace, located at the southern end of the City Palace complex.Which, to my mind, only adds to the atmosphere of royal intrigue and mystery that surrounds Udaipur as much as its lakes.
A fortnight after my visit the long feud changed in one significant detail: Mahendra Singh died on November 10. But it brought no end to the dispute between the two sides. Immediately after his death Mahendra Singh’s son was denied entry into the City Palace, which is run by Arvind Singh’s branch of the family.
Keeping all this in mind, I visit the City Palace, a massive showpiece of 11 palaces, inlaid courtyards and gardens overlooking the lake. The museum at the City Palace is an extraordinary repository of Udaipur’s martial past. Almost every item in the museum — an extensive warren of rooms and corridors that takes several hours to navigate –– is an artefact, document or relic of war.
An abundance of metal in the land around Mewar made it fertile ground for the making of weapons. The first display that greets a visitor to the museum is an array of swords: gauntlet swords, double-edged straight swords, traditional curved talwars, wicked punch daggers, gilded scabbards, armour, helmets, body plates, maces with eight flanged heads, axes with hidden knives. Then there’s a more eclectic selection of knives and swords from other parts of the country, in particular kukris from the northeast, bows of bamboo and steel, many types of arrows, slingshot catapults and shields depicting religious or hunting scenes. The firearms are a curated selection of gleaming weaponry, including elegant pen-and-pocket pistols of all kinds.
The weapons are immaculately maintained, as is the entire museum, which is by no means the case at other Indian state museums. There’s a café on the ground floor that specialises in the usual fare of laal maas and heavy dahls and curries. But I have my mind set on the laal maas at the Leela’s lakefront restaurant, the Sheesh Mahal. This slow-cooked mutton dish is made in stages and each part of the process takes its time. It calls for patience and attention to detail to get it right, from the low flame used throughout to the defining moment when the chef adds a deep red paste made from local Mathania chillies, named after the village they come from; it is the red, laal, that gives the dish its name.
The taste is rich, dark and smoky, immediately distinctive, unforgettable, with all the flavour and fall-off-the-bone texture you’d expect from this signature piece of Rajasthani cuisine. At the entrance to the Sheesh Mahal sits a woman from a nearby village who, on a small wood-fired clay brazier, or sigri, makes a range of local rotis, the correct accompaniment to the laal maas.
Later that night I take a boat out on the lake. The heat of the day has subsided and there is a low breeze off the water. Brij Mohan is seated pacifically at the helm and I am the only passenger on the wide, noiseless vessel. We pass a strange boat, contorted and bleached pale in the moonlight, moving towards us very slowly. Brij Mohan identifies it as a cleaner boat, sent out twice a day by the hotels. Which explains the lack of plastic detritus on the water.
After nightfall the lake is markedly different from its daytime prospect. It seems enormous, the hills in the distance framed by yellow lights from the buildings fronting the water. The heat dissolves and the air fills with bhajans from more than one source, the tiny Shiva temple among them. The voices from the Jag Mandir are loudest, broadcast from speakers built to carry sound.
When the bhajans end, I become aware of other music, small waves lapping against the hull, the hoots of a night owl, old Hindi film songs from a radio somewhere, faraway hand-drums in the night. The water puts these sounds in my head and I hope to keep them there a while. In the morning I’ll fly out of the city, south, to another world.
Rajmahal Palace, Jaipur
Next to more flamboyant palaces, this 1729 royal home looks positively minimalist. Though you’ll spot a fair number of crystal chandeliers, the decor leans towards “English country house”, executed in hand-printed wallpapers and mammoth silk rugs. Lounges and restaurants serve regional favourites yet resemble tea rooms. And you’ll feel as if you’ve been personally invited for the weekend: family photos and heirlooms from the present owners are spread throughout; a princess descended from Jaipur’s last maharajah still lives on the property.
Umaid Bhawan Palace, Jodhpur
Facing out to a city painted in variations of royal Brahmin blue, this sunset-shaded sandstone palace — the last built in India, between 1928 and 1943 — has more in common with the desert landscape. Inside, it’s kept that art deco feel with clean-lined, curvaceous furnishings and Burmese-teak accents, letting the spectacular Taj Mahal-style dome speak for itself. Corridors to the 347 rooms and underground swimming pool go on for miles.
Taj Lake Palace, Udaipur
In the City of Lakes, of course the maharana would build his summer residence smack dab in the middle of one. Now a 65-room, 18-suite luxury hotel, the 18th-century confection is an island to itself. At its centre is a courtyard that feels like a lush botanical garden with a pool resembling a mini lake. Inside, Mughal archways lead into shiny marble salons draped in silk and guest rooms painted with intricate botanical murals. Built out to the waterline, it’s completely cut off from the world but, with four acres to explore, doesn’t feel like it.
Details Room-only doubles from £508 (tajhotels.com).
The LaLiT Laxmi Vilas Palace, Udaipur
This hotel is slightly glossier and less palatial than its neighbours
If His Highness Maharana Fateh Singh were to return to his renovated lake house in Udaipur, he might still recognise the silk linens and tapestries of the early 1900s, recreated for a different sort of resident. Slightly glossier and less palatial than its neighbour the Taj, it nonetheless has a fantastic outlook, from a cool hillside perch in the Aravalli range overlooking the maharana’s eponymous lake. It’s also a relative bargain, considering the views and the lustrous lawns that step down the property.
Details B&B doubles from £140 (thelalit.com).
