Recap: After conquering a grueling 17-hour marathon on the road, punctuated by a stubborn car breakdown, my mom and I finally arrived at Jodhpur for my cousin’s wedding; albeit 6 hours late.
Read about Part 1 of the journey and the reason for our late arrival in the below links
Women’s Roadtrip (Part 1): Delhi to Jodhpur
Women’s Roadtrip Chronicles: Car Failure on the Highway
Contents
The Planning
My cousin’s wedding was a destination wedding spread over 3 days with the final wedding and bidaai scheduled for a Friday.
Our initial departure was planned for Saturday which meant that we would reach Delhi on Saturday itself.
Arriving home from a vacation on a Saturday night was not something I could relate to. I am usually the kind of person who would maximise her holidays and if possible arrive home on Monday morning – just in time to log in.
Hence I decided to include another destination where we could stop on Saturday night and then drive to Delhi the next day to arrive on Sunday night.
I looked at a few destinations and finally zeroed down to two options:
- Kumbhalgarh (adding ~4 hours to our return journey)
- Pushkar (pretty much on the route to Delhi)
I gave these two options to mom and she immediately chose Kumbhalgarh. It was on her list for a long time and in fact she had told me about this particular fort a few years ago.
So Kumbhalgarh fort it was.
KumbalGarh Fort
Kumbhalgarh Fort is a majestic fortress located in the Rajsamand District of Rajasthan, India.
The fort was built in the 15th century by Rana Kumbha and is renowned for its robust architecture. The massive walls of Kumbhalgarh extend over 36 kilometers, making them the second-longest continuous wall in the world, after the Great Wall of China (21,196 km!).
Yep, its not a close competition between the top 2 contenders.
Jodhpur to Kumbalgarh
The drive was ~4 hours and the total distance between these two cities was about 175Km.
For route, we had 2 options which split from a town named Pali
- Via Nadol-Desuri
- Via Rani – Ranakpur
The time and distance for both these routes was similar. However, the map was recommending Nadol route.
While in the marriage, we met some relatives who were Jodhpur residents. I checked with them about the preferable route and they suggested that we should drive via Ranakpur and also stop there if possible.
Now, from what I have read I could only associate Ranakpur with Jain temple; however, the relatives increased my knowledge by mentioning that Ranakpur is actually quite popular for its Jungle Safaris.
Since we only had one day in Kumbhalgarh, we would definitely not have time for a safari.
“The drive via Ranakpur is quite scenic” said they.
They had mentioned the magic word- I can rarely resist a ‘scenic’ drive.
So Route option 2 it was – contrary to what Google Maps was suggesting.
Jodhpur to Kumbhalgarh
By the time we packed, had breakfast and bid adieu to all the relatives, it was about 11AM.
Since the entire day was only for the drive and fort visit, we seemed to be on track.
The drive was supposed to be ~4hours and our aim was to reach the fort by ~16:30 as afternoon sun + fort is not a good combination.
Even though it was a mid-December, the afternoons were quite hot especially under direct sun.
As it was a fort (and that too the longest one in India!), I expected a lot of walk.
After Pali, we took NH62. The drive was quite pretty with mustard fields on both side of the roads.
At Kenpura, we took the MDR105 and immediately got onto a narrow road. The road condition was decent and it seemed as if we had made a good decision.
The good decision bit was soon busted though.
We soon came across a small town named ‘Rani’. It was a village with shops/houses on both sides of the narrow road and at quite a few places we had oncoming traffic too. So it was quite difficult to navigate this stretch.
And as if the two way car traffic was not enough for these narrow roads, there were also many cows on this road.
It was a harrowing experience to get out of this town.
Although the roads became quite broad after crossing the town, the condition of the roads deteriorated further. As a result I had to stick to second-third gear for nearly 10 km.
Not fun.
Maybe the road was ‘scenic’ but due to the pathetic road condition, I barely got a chance to look at the surroundings. My focus was only on maneuvering the potholes.
We soon reached a hilly region – this was around Ranakpur.
The air felt cooler and I slowed my car to roll down the windows. Within minutes a bus passed me releasing a cloud of smoke.
So much for feeling the mountain air.
To add to it, once the bus crossed me, the road became really narrow and now it was difficult for me to overtake the bus. I actually stopped for 5 mins to increase the distance between me and the bus.
After driving on this road for some time, the map asked us to take a left from the main road on to what seemed like a very ‘kacha sadak’. The road had loose gravels and was extremely steep with quite a few hairpin bends.
It did not seem like a road that would lead to any place. And to add to it, there was absolutely no one around who could confirm the direction.
We had climbed a bit of the steep hill and now had only two options. To either blindly trust the map or go back on to the normal road that we had left behind.
Mom wanted to go back to the main road while I wanted to keep climbing that steep road and hope for some civilization soon.
My issue was that by now it was already about 15:30-16:00 and as per the information online, the entry to Kumbhalgarh fort would close at 17:00.
Going back to the main road would mean that we would not be able to reach the fort by 17:00.
Since I was the driver, my wish was adhered to and we continued climbing. After about 1 km further up, I too became skeptical.
Just then, I saw two guys on a bike heading towards us. I flagged them down. They confirmed that the road would lead to Kumbhalgarh and also assured us that we had already crossed the worst bit and soon we would reach a village after which we would hit regular roads.
We profusely thanked them and continued on the same road and soon hit regular roads as we had been promised.
I drove quite fast after that as we wanted to reach before 5PM in order to be able to enter the fort – our main reason for the drive!
The fast driving bit paid off and we reached the fort at about 15 mins to 5.
Kumbhalgarh Fort Tickets
The entry to the fort was 40 INR/person and they also had a light and sound show at ~7PM which was priced at 179 INR/person.
My mom was not too keen on the light and sound show but I was. I believe theses shows are a very nice way to know the history and get a feel of the place. And I am all for contributing to the Indian economy for such initiatives!
I bought the tickets so my mom had no choice.
Kumbhalgarh Fort Experience
The fort was in a very good condition. It was a bit crowded but because the area was huge, it seemed fine.
From the parking, you need to walk up ~1km to the highest point which is named the terrace view point. The walk up is paved but quite steep.
My mom had recently recovered from a fracture in her right foot but she was too excited to reach the top and while I was busy trying to click some nice pics, she continued climbing and was soon waving towards me from quite some height.
The walk, although steep, took about 20-30 minutes for us and since this was about 5PM, the weather was perfect. Slightly chilly though – which is much better than heat for a fort climb.
The view from the terrace was decent but it did not really give me the feel of being the ‘longest’ walled fort. Maybe you can see the impact from a particular angle but from the view point, you could see bits of the wall.
The view though was very beautiful with the sunset as a backdrop.
From walk point of view, although this is the longest fort, there isn’t as much walk required here. Only about 1 Km albeit quite a climb.
Kumbhalgarh light and sound show
This is for about half an hour-1 hour. The show was okay, the story was not very clear as I believe one of their speakers was not working at that time.
However, we still got a gist of the history. The lighting was pretty though and the music was a little jarring but quite catchy. I was singing the tune on my way back!
We had picked up some chaai and biscuits/chips from the fort canteen area and had it while waiting for the show to begin, It had become quite cold by then and we did wish we had got more of the chai from the canteen but now it was too far to go back.
If you have time, do check the show. Till date the best light and sound show in India as per me is the one at Cellular jail in Port Blair. I wish some day that becomes the standard for shows nation wide.
Tolls
On this route (From Jodhpur to Kumbhalghar via Rani), we only came across two tolls with total cost of INR 110.
Continued in Part 3: Delhi – Jodhpur-Kumbhalgarh
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