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A so-called-conference brought me to Rome.

It was a chilly mid-February and we had completely underestimated the weather. Further, I had never been close to this land on the globe so was clueless in any sense of direction. I was advised to carry heavy woollens along with caps, muffler, gloves and the works. And I kept thinking - what the heck, so what if I feel a little more cold, I’ll just live through it. Boy! I was wrong!

Amidst the chill and coastal winds that hover above the city, we managed to cover the most of it. Rome, or (rrrr)Roma - as they call it in Italy, is a city with many facets. The city of love, the city of ROMAnce, the city of water, the city of architecture, the city of history, the city of food, the city of art, the Eternal City, the Open City, the city of you-name-it!

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My travel tales are becoming more of hotel reviews which I don’t necessarily enjoy writing, unless they’re too good and I can brag enough, so this one - Hotel Inn Season in Jodhpur met the prerequisites. Besides being able to benefit from a review, it is also a good candidate to be in the books of fellow ghumakkars.

On our second lap on Delhi-Jaisalmer-Jodhpur-Delhi triangle, we were to spend two nights in Jodhpur. We got some rave reviews about a place called ‘Devi Bhawan’, yet we first checked this Welcome Heritage Property called “Bal Samand Lake Palace” but it was a little too expensive. ‘Devi Bhawan’ looked quite charming and sophisticated on “find-a-hotel” kinda websites but despite a lot of googling one could not find the official site. There is devibhawan.com which seems to be landing on someone else’s backyard. And finally after getting to get across to them, we could not get us rooms.

So the first tip : If you are not getting availability in a hotel of your choice, then always ask the guy on the other side to suggest options. Most of the times you won’t get cheated, more so because he is more worried about his own image. We were referred ‘Inn Season’ and it sounded like with a lot of conviction. With a phone call at ‘Inn Season’ we had a booking @ Rs 1500 for a Deluxe room for two nights. With that kind of price-tag we were not expecting wonders but from pics it looked like a small cosy place to hang-out. It was only two days and two nights, we thought.

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I have not been to many forts and am essentially not a fort fan but I had been to my share of them like Agra Fort, Delhi’s Red Fort, Jaipur’s Amber, Udaipur’s City Palace and few more. Probably there are a lot of them which are yet to be visited like ‘Chittor’ but most of them have some basic attributes. This start with the complexion, size, the usual rooms for prayer-ladies-guest-etc, jharokhas, courtyards, sheesh-mahals, paintings, raj-era photos, weaponry and so on. While the ones like City Palace in Udaipur are much better preserved and run (being private), places like Red Fort in Delhi are more closer to being called ruins. So when we started to go to Mehrangarh, the mood was peppy (more for being out then anything else) but not too excited. Jodhpur is 2nd largest city of Rajasthan but one needs to maneuver all kinds of vehicles to move through. And after a while, we got close to the fort and wow, what a sight. Amber in Jaipur has a great view from the road but this one really looked like a large-high-cell, standing atop mightly. The contrast of small blue houses amid the backdrop of this large dinosaur was difficult to grasp and as we got closer, you sort of start to get the feel of being in a gigantic company with a large door-way welcoming you.

Welcome to Mehrangarh Fort.

As you get in, you realize that its been built on a high-land and adding its own height, it really gets very tall.
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Jaisalmer has many many hotels for its small area and population, but heck, the city survives on heritage tourism. There are hotels right in the fort, inside the market, on the outskirts, towards deserts, on highway and one right inside a temple complex!

Mandir Palace / Mandir Mahal / Badal Mahal / Taajiya Mahal : ITC-Welcome Heritage property and one of the better addresses of Jaisalmer since it also happens to be the residence of the Royal Heir-apparent (Maharawal Brij Raj Singh).

We got this info after spending a day and a night there. Mandirpalace is also open to Day Visitors (Rs 20, I guess) to look around and see the temples and very elaborate, expansive and magnificent jaali work. The place is marketed and branded by ITC but is essentially run by King’s staff - polite, not necessarily sophisticated - pretty pleasant.

It is located at Hanuman Chauraha and you can’t miss the Taajiya Towers (also known by this name) or Mandir Palace. The story is that before migrating to Pakistan, some of the Muslim artisans built the tower like the structure for Taajiya processions, some sort of last offering, towards the royal lineage. There is a temple complex inside, and hence the name. It’s a heritage property so all rooms are different.
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