Duration : 07 Nights / 08 Days

Destinations : Delhi - Jaipur- Jaisalmer - Jodhpur - Sawai Madhopur- Chittaurgarh - Udaipur- Bharatpur - Agra

Palace on Wheels Tours:

The Palace on Wheels is one of the world's most exciting journeys, as much for the train and the facilities provided on board, as for the royal destinations it proceeds to every single day. With everything taken care of - dining, accommodation, sightseeing - as well as organized shopping, there is nothing for the traveler to do but seep in the history of the land, soak in the colors, and experience the royal life of a maharaja.

Day 01-Palace on Wheels Tours :

Wednesday The tour starts in the evening with the ceremonial welcome aboard the Palace on Wheels at Delhi Cantonment. Delhi too is an ancient capital, once the fabled city of the heroes of the Mahabharata, and ruled by the Rajputs before they were displaced by the Tughlaqs, the khiljis, and the Mughals. After a hectic day of sightseeing, the train will come as a respite. Feel free to explore your new home, and acquaint yourself with its various facilities. Relax with a drink at the bar. Dinner will be served on board the two restaurants. The train departs from Delhi at 18:30 hrs.

Day 02 : Thursday-Palace on Wheels Tours

Arrive 02:00 hrs in Jaipur to be greeted by caparisoned elephants. Lunch will be served at Rambagh Palace, and dinner is a celebration under the canopy of the star-lit skies at Jai Mahal Palace. Your sightseeing during the day includes Amber Fort, Hawa Mahal, the Jantar Mantar observatory, and the City Palace complex.

The train departs from the Pink City at 19:30 hrs. Jaipur became the capital of the Kachchwaha kings when they shifted here from their hilltop of Amber.

It was built according to the principles laid down in the ancient architectural treatises, but with all the opulence deserving of a royal city. At its center rose the seven-tiered palace of the royal family, and around it came up gardens and temples, its astronomical observatory and the myriads of mansions and shops that went into the making of the new capital.

The palace not only has most of the original furnishings and artifacts, but its famous Polo Bar also has pictures of the last maharaja with English aristocracy and other important guests.

Day 03-Indian speciality tours : Friday Arrive at 08:15 hrs at Jaisalmer. Spend the day in this isolated, but architecturally one of the greatest royal bastions of the world. After a safari dinner served under the stars, at a campsite, come back to the train to resume your journey. Departure is at 23:00 hrs. Jaisalmer was the stronghold of the Bhatti Rajputs, and a hardier race never lived.

Their early settlement was marked by brigandage, as they looted caravans at will, stealing horses, and inviting the wrath of the West Asian invaders. Over time they began to settle, and the 12th century fort with its ninety-nine bristling bastions was established on top of Trikuta hill, exactly as prophesied for these descendants of Krishna.

Day 04-Indian speciality tours :

Saturday Time for you to visit yet another desert kingdom, Jodhpur, where you arrive at 07:00 hrs. You can spend the morning at Mehrangarh Fort that towers over the city like an eagle's eye, and then come downhill to lunch at Umaid Bhawan Palace, the largest art-deco residence in the world, and now home to the head of the royal family, museum and luxury hotel. Departure, after unwinding in the palace, is at 15:30 hrs.

The history of Jodhpur is five-hundred-year-old, the bastion of the valiant Rathore Rajputs, bristles with conflicts and sieges, with battles and savage skirmishes, so it is difficult to believe that they found the time to not only build the impossibly invincible-looking Mehrangarh Fort, but also its lavish, and delicately embellished palaces.

Within the fort, the accoutrements of the royal past are well presented - swords and daggers and spears and matchlock guns; a battle tent seized from Emperor Jehangir; howdahs and chariots and carriages; cribs and beds; the royal, octagonal throne; musical instruments, large drums, even a collection of turbans. From the ramparts of the fort, where the cannons are still mounted, the sweeping view also takes in a huge palace located on top of another, though lower, hill.

This is Umaid Bhawan, the palace the maharajas set out to build as a famine relief project, but also ambitiously as the world's largest private residence. It was intended to, and did, rival the presidential palace coming up at Delhi. Built by a British architect, while the planning has incorporated the elements of the Rajput lifestyle (large courtyards, for example, or a zenana wing),

there is a formal, western sense of symmetry and restrained sense of ornamentation. Only in the royal suites does exuberance take over, since a Polish artist, then traveling in India, was given the permission to create huge paintings to suit the art-deco theme of the architecture and furniture in the palace.

A museum here, unlike that of the fort, has memorabilia that consists of clocks and silver and tableware, a nostalgic look at a more recent past. The grounds of the palace are huge, and toward the back, there is a bougainvillea garden, perhaps the only one of its kind in the world, and at the end, a baradari, a pillared pavilion where the maharajas held mehfils, entertainment courts. Within the palace, the courtrooms are more formal, while the ballrooms resounded, till recently, with the sounds of revelry, now captured in the whispered conversations of tourists.

Day 05-Indian speciality tours : Sunday Steam into Sawai Madhopur to spend the day in the wilds of Ranthambor National Park, which is home to the royal Bengal tiger, the stateliest of the big cats. As it moves through the underbrush, its tawny gold hide striped with bands of black, the jungle stands to attention. Ranthambor is also very picturesque.

A number of lakes form the shallow lands where tiger sightings are quite common, and where herds of deer can be seen foraging while crocodiles bask in the sun. The hills ring the park, and in the distance the ramparts of Ranthambor fort create a dramatic silhouette.

Once, this was the scene for fierce battles, and for fiery jauhars, but all that is of the past now, though former hunting lodges such as Jogi Mahal, close to the lakes, is still in a great state of preservation.

Ranthambor is particularly well known for its tiger sightings because the undisturbed environs and the spreading, shallow lakes provide them the surroundings best suited to their needs, and therefore sightings by day time are quite common.

Day 06-Golden tringle tours : Monday In time, the Sisodias also laid the foundation for a new kingdom - Udaipur - situated by Lake Pichola, where the impressive City Palace was lavished with aesthetic embellishments, and the art of miniature paintings was encouraged in its ateliers.

Day 07-Golden tringle tours : If it's Tuesday It must be Bharatpur. Arrive at 06:30 hrs at a royal kingdom where the Jats, rather than the Rajputs, ruled. Bharatpur's Jat history is not too old, with Suraj Mal establishing a firm stronghold in the region contested by both the Rajputs and the Mughals. Suraj Mal's exploits are legendary, and the fort, Lohagarh, or iron fort, has a history that recounts it with pride.

Day 08-Golden tringle tours : Wednesday You're back in Delhi as early as 06:00 hrs where, after breakfast on board the train, you descend to the humdrum existence of modern life, with only royal memories to retain for the rest of your lifetime.

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