Jaisalmer & Sam – Of the Thar Desert and heritage

Part 2 of my travelogue to Western Rajasthan takes us to the arid landscape of Jaisalmer and beyond. Shakti Singh the manager of our hotel at Jodhpur was from Jaisalmer, and we got good information from him; Jaisalmer is a small town, around 5kms in radius, the Pakistan border being around 150kms from here. I had always wondered how there was no border issues around this region. Shakthi Singh explained how the entire region have similar culture and continued relationships. There were still some Sodha Rajputs happily living in Pakistan, where they had good control of the state affairs. Apparently, there even was train service from Pakistan up to Jodhpur during Jaswant Sinha times until recently, but then it was stopped due to weapon smuggling and other concerns. Until the 1980’s there was not even a border fence. Interesting!

On Day.2 of our Journey we hit the road at 10am, travelling from Jodhpur to Jaisalmer. Enroute we passed through Pokhran village, nothing special to look around, although legendary. My daughter kept asking when do we get to see the desert. Surender ji, our driver told there was this place called Dechu where we would stop to experience some sand. As promised, he stopped at this place, it was truly beautiful, a great welcome to the desert landscape. We walked up a small hill full of sand to get a nice view from the top and of-course play with the desert sand, quite refreshing!

Then we went to Ramdevra temple. Legend goes that when the King was childless & queen was cursed to be a Bhaanj (Woman who cannot conceive), the king got frustrated and went to some water body, threw stone that hit god’s forehead and he tried to drown himself. Lord appeared and said I will be born as your son. Twins were born, Elder was named Lakshman, younger one Ram, the god himself. Temple was chaotic, but quite vibrant. Plenty of colorful shops, but way too many hawkers, tad bit annoying.

We were almost forced to buy some shawl and Prasad for Rs.150, the arrogant person sitting near the deity just threw the shawl into the area, what a pathetic attitude. A group of people sat around singing good Bhajans, interesting piece of artwork on the walls, generally the temple did look powerful. We then went for lunch at highway side restaurant; the place didn’t look hygienic, with flies flying around, but still we ordered Bhaajra Roti and Ker Sangri, our new favorite. Bill came to Rs.540. It was now a 1.5 to 2 hours trip to Sam (pronounced “Sum”), the magical desert place.

We asked Surender Ji about desert Jeep safari, he recommended us a vendor in Sam, where we met Abdul Chaacha, the owner of the Jeep Safari agency, he quoted Rs.3500 for our family of three. He convinced us by saying “Dubai mein Safari karke idhar aathe hai.. majaa nahi aaya karke” (People try the Jeep safari in Dubai and come here complaining they didn’t enjoy there much). Here it was an open jeep, while in Dubai its an enclosed Fortuner. Although bit scared for my daughter, we hopped in and hoped it would be good. What transpired in the next few minutes was absolutely an experience beyond imagination. The jeep took us around 3 deserts, tossing and turning much to our delight, finally getting us to the mighty Thar desert. Although the desert was filled with people, there was a sense of calm here. There was a complimentary Camel ride that came along, that was also brilliant experience, a 10-15mins ride. And then the most anticipated event happened – Sunset – wow, glorious, no words to explain the pleasure of watching the majestic sun set under the desert.

Having mostly seen sunsets in beaches and cities, this view looked completely different and stunning. Full-on gratitude for being here. We sat there for a while, waiting for our Jeep to bring us back to the main road. What an unforgettable experience, and must-do while in this part of the world and definitely worth every penny.

We reached the Prince Desert Camp at around 6:45pm, there was a traditional welcome (not very enthusiastically done I must say), here we met the manager, Mr.Gajender singh. He explained us well about the facilities at the resort, told the cultural activities starts at 7pm and then asked a young man Shoaib to bring our luggage to our tent. Tent was beautiful, way beyond our expectations. We hadn’t expected such good facilities in this remote part.

After quick freshening up, we came to the main area where cultural event was taking place. Got a seat and amazing service continued with hot Besan Pakoda and masala chai. The team performed very well, with the singer singing beautifu ghazals, lady dancing to the tunes in a unique style, including the Rajasthani style of dancing on the knife, plate and pots on the head.

Great experience overall. We then went to dining hall, again had the dal bhaati, what I found was that each Dal Bhaati had unique taste. I was impressed by the service, and how they delivered such food and service in this desert.

While walking around we bumped into Gajendra Singh, who checked on us if we were doing ok, nice of him. Interestingly, he mentioned there is a star gazing site at the edge of the resort. We walked there and yes it was brilliant. There was this small gate to get out of the resort and towards the real star gazing place in the desert, but we were bit afraid to go past here, came back and joined the bonfire dancing gang for a while. We again met Gajendra Singh, and had interesting conversations with him. He talked a lot about Rajasthani traditions – how people still got married young. He himself got married at the age of 16-17 years. The groom and bride are already chosen while kids. Things have been improving recently due to education. He told me how lucky I was to have a housemaker as wife, as most women are working these days. He is a Rajput, have to marry a different Rajput clan. Proudly said even science confirmed the gene pool gets better with such cross pollination. It was such a delight talking to him. We went back near the camp fire, and met some young folks, some working, some still studying.

We mentioned about the star gazing deck, they all became interested, the team brought their tour guide, one Mr.Shakti Singh, an interesting chap. We all went past the gate this time, walking on the sand in the pitch dark of the night, with the mobile flashlights the only source of light, quite an interesting walk. We climbed a very small mount of sand and made ourselves comfortable over there. The sky above was a pure delight to watch; Pitch dark with a blanket of stars over us – an incredible experience.

Shakthi Singh made camp fire there and we had lots of interesting conversations.

He talked about two haunted villages in Baan-gadh near Japiur and another one Kuldhaara near Jaisalmer. The FIFA world cup finals between Argentina and France was getting played while we were completely enjoying this once-in-a-life experience at the desert. We walked back at 11:30pm, we had to wake up early for sunrise camel ride. What a fantastic evening. One of the best ever of our lives. We got introduced to Star Walk app, which shows the planets and stars as we hover the mobile around in sky, great app. We saw Jupiter, never thought we could see this mighty planet with our naked eyes, what a feeling. Slept by 12.

We woke up on Day.3 for the sunrise camel ride at 7am. We went to dining hall, and were served fantastic tea. We went to the camel stable and boarded, it was another fantastic experience riding the Camel in the morning.

The camel ride took us past the camp fire place that we had done star gazing the previous night, the desert seemed much more calmer, thanks to no crowd in the morning. After around 15-20 mins ride, we alighted from the camels and waited for the sunrise.

We walked around and enjoyed the beautiful sunrise, fantastic start to our day.

Breakfast was quite simple, with Pova Chana (bitten rice with chickpeas), Paratha, again loved the great service. Checked out at 10am, thanked Shoaib for his service, tipped him Rs.100/- and off we set to Jaisalmer, 40kms away. Driver told us the previous night they did find one Scorpion trying to enter a camp, luckily they found and killed it. He called up someone and arranged a guide at Jaisalmer.

We met Mr.Anil, our local guide at around 12 noon who asked us to board an auto, taking crazy turns in chaotic streets, we arrived near Patwon Ki Haveli, string of 5 Haveli’s. Built by merchant class, the Marwari Jains, who funded Kinds for war and welfare through their trade. Ambanis and Adanis of yester years i thought. Out of the 5 havelis, 1 & 2 was crowded and privately managed, 3 were someone living, 4 and 5 managed by government, he took us to the 5th one, it had entry charges of Rs.100/- per adult.

We loved the design of the Haveli, Anil explained how Jaisalmer was connected to the Silk route, how women were treated lower than men, and lots of stories. Haveli had a verandah, left side room had Thoran and Ganapathi, a Shwethambar jain design. A pulley through which workers would need to pull rope to fan the landlords inside. The woodwork was done with mix of desert wood and sandstone. There was an arrival area, just inside the main entrance, people were welcomed by giving a sweet (hard version), which was essentially prepared mixing 500gms of opium & 5kgs jaggery, truly high on life. Kitchen area looked neat with fire place, storage room, and elegant looking shelves. We went over Munim (main accountant) room, god’s room, we also explored rooms upstairs, similar design as downstairs. We took some great pics and a general good feeling. After the Haveli visit, it was time for some street shopping, aplenty.

We bought some T-shirts, Rajasthani specific wood showpiece, and walked to another Haveli, called Munim Haveli. Anil explained it was built by two different architects, two halves that looked similar, but had minor differences, not easy to be spotted. Family still lived in this Haveli, they now sell stuff for a living. Anil explained how tourist season is only 6 months, remaining 6 months he works as a Line producer for movies and OTT shows, helping to book sights and take government permission, although he could muster only one or two per year. He then took us to a handloom shop, apparently owned by some popular lady who contested at KBC (she undertakes lot of social service). Quite pricey and touristy, we thought. We took auto and went to the main fort, Anil took us to Jain Mandir, walked around the homes, markets, nice restaurants with view. Finally, as it normally is the case with guides, he brought us to emporium, we bought one painting for Rs.1800/-, some memory of this place, we concurred.

We requested Surender Ji to bring us to a local popular restaurant D-Desi, where we went (again) for Dal Bhaati and Rajashtani Thaali, incredible taste, but it was just too much food. We got dropped at the golden Haveli hotel, which looked great from the outside, but inside was crap. We went to Gadisar lake at 5:30pm, the lake was simply beautiful, nice sunset and great sky views, we saw vibrant colors of red, orange and dark blue hue, it was great experience.

The light & sound show was very amateurish, we got up midway and took car back to hotel. We were so tired, and we slept off by 8pm, had a great night’s sleep. We had a complimentary dinner at this hotel, so we did get call at around 10:30pm to check if we would come for the dinner, we apologized for not dropping by, told we wouldn’t be coming and went back to sleep.

It was an interesting day with chaotic fort area, fantastic sky views at Gadisar lake, although not maintained well. This lake has great potential, but as elsewhere in India, lot of scope for improvement. The Sam desert experience was truly fantastic, Jaisalmer had some great points, this was very much the Rajasthan experience we sought out for, and boy did this place deliver! Highly recommend people to visit this part of the world.