How do you celebrate New Year? Well if you ask me, I would say that I just be at home with my family and we have good food and watch TV together and wish each other and sleep. But I wanted to end 2017 differently, I wanted to be at a different place, where I’ve never been, and I wanted to transition into the new year while sitting in a peaceful place seeing the fireworks. So I decided to go to Udaipur, the Venice of India.
I set my foots at the Udaipur Railway Station on December 16th. I had booked Moustache Hostel which is close to Lake Pichola in Udaipur. This was my first time in any hostel and after spending significant time in it, I feel the experience was great. I have seen things I’ve never seen before, both good and bad, sang in the bonfires, met new people from all around the world, shared stories and lived a hostel life for the time.
Places I’ve travelled
Unlike others, I travel a bit differently. Since I work remotely, I work on the weekdays and travel mostly on weekends. Before heading to the place, I had made a list of places to go and things to do in Udaipur and I’ve checked almost everything. Here’s what I think of the places I’ve visited:
- Jagdish Temple: Jagdish Temple has some nice carvings and artwork on the walls.
- City Palace: It’s like a big museum of old stuff, that’s the only thing I want to say about this place.
- Vintage Car Museum: This place is overrated. Nothing worth seeing here. There are like 15 to 20 old cars and that’s it. And the entry fee they charge for seeing those cars is 300 INR, good for car enthusiasts, meh for others.
- Fateh Sagar Lake: This is probably one of the best places in Udaipur. Sunset from this place is mesmerizing. The day I went to Fateh Sagar, my plan was to see Saheliyon-Ki-Bari after watching the sunset at Fateh Sagar, but it was so beautiful here that I ditched all the plans and just enjoyed solitude watching the shades of sky change from yellow to orange to red. Right in front of your eyes will be a beautiful lake, a layer of hills and sun setting behind those hills. It’s magical.
- Dance show at Bagore-Ki-Haveli: This was not on my list and one of the hostel mates took me here. This was unexpectedly good. Various groups dance in different Rajasthani forms and they also do a puppet show, it was one good refreshing hour here. They call it Dharohar.
- Shilpgram: Shilpgram is fair sort of place where you’ll find lots of shops for crafts of all kinds. There’s a place in Shilpgram where they have really good paintings from local artists.
- Dudh Talai: Dudh Talai is a small pond adjacent to Lake Pichola. It’s actually Karni Mata temple where I went and it’s like 20 minutes uphill. The sunset from this place is top-notch. You get to see half of the city, Dudh Talai pond, the Lake Pichola and hills on the opposite side.
- Badi Lake: I had expectations from this place and guess what? I should’ve researched before visiting this place. We took an auto to this place and the auto guy dropped us at Badi lake, but in the photos that we had seen, that wasn’t the place we wanted to be at at Badi Lake. We were expecting to be at a hilly place somewhere close to the lake and to watch the sunset from there. We even went ahead and walked like 3kms ahead to see if we can find the place. We couldn’t find the place but made memories, which is even better.
- Gangaur Ghat: Gangaur Ghat is a small ghat at Lake Pichola. A good place to sit and enjoy peace.
- Ambrai Ghat: Ambrai Ghat is my favorite place in Udaipur. It’s a good place to come and just sit and chill. There’s nothing more than a serene view at this Ghat, but there’s still something special about this place. And this is the place I was at in the New Year night, watching fireworks happening in the sky. I wished New Year to someone 2 minutes earlier, Happy New Year someone.
Experiences
Udaipur is a city of art, scenes and sunsets. It’s a good place to talk to yourself, enjoy the solitude and think about life.
Apart from traveling, it was good to be in the hostel and to meet different people and learn from them. I remember meeting a guy from Pakistan on my first day, talking to a girl from Germany, another one from Iceland, two girls from Ahmedabad who came there for a documentary, Tim from the Netherlands who takes amazing photos, a guy from Delhi, another one from Mumbai. It was my first time enjoying bonfires and I’m pretty sure I’ll miss the rooftop of the hostel. The view of Lake Pichola from Ambrai ghat, the food at Gangaur restaurant, the coffee I used to have at Mewar Foodies at Ambrai Ghat, the sunset at Fateh Sagar, that someone. Yeah, I’m going to miss all these and the moments I made.
Here are some stats from the trip:
And the best thing, made tons of awesome memories.
Udaipur in Photos
No trip is complete without taking photos. People do it for their reasons, I do it to remind myself that I was at this place once and this awesome view was right in front of my eyes. So here they’re, some selected shots from the trip. Enjoy and do share the post if you like them.
