Udaipur: The City of Lakes and Other Unexpected Adventures.
If you have ever dreamed of stepping into a postcard, Udaipur might just be your best idea. This pretty city in Rajasthan, known as the “Venice of the East,” is where royal palaces casually float on lakes and every sunset is Photoshopped by the gods. Naturally, it’s also where you’ll find your sense of direction, your tolerance of spicy food and your understanding of “peace and quiet” might all require some serious-minded re-evaluation. My first impression in Udaipur was that of mere wonder. The air felt like it was humming with the sounds of history, maybe along with the honking of auto-rickshaws, not sure this was all exactly true. The city’s flagship, Lake Pichola, functions as a mirror, reflecting both the sky and your own romantic visions. The Taj Lake Palace floats in the middle of the city, a white marble sight that once contained royalty and it contains tourists who have seemingly inherited a fortune. The rest of us get to enjoy the view on a boat ride and assume that we’re James Bond in Octopussy (which, conveniently, was filmed here). And then there’s the City Palace. It’s massive, dazzling and confusing — in ways that all great things. Every hall opens to a courtyard, every courtyard to a terrace and every terrace onto another stunning view of the lake. Between admiring ancient artefacts and dodging steely selfie sticks, I realised I’d been wandering out for three hours without an exit. If you’ve ever craved to feel like a royal prisoner with a camera, then this is your opportunity.
Food in Udaipur is adventure in a new sense. Traditional Rajasthani thali appears innocent enough, until you realize what’s spicy and what’s lethally spicy. Each dish appears to confront you: “Go on, have another bite. What’s the worst that could happen?” So make sure to have a glass of lassi handy and that you surrender gracefully. On the plus side, rooftop restaurants gazing out at the lake make everything taste better, particularly if there is live sitar music and an evening breeze that’s soft and gentle, a reminder that, despite its oddities, life is still capable of being pretty perfect. Of course Udaipur isn’t just a bunch of palaces and lakes. Take a walk around the old city, with narrow streets full of shops selling colourful textiles, miniature paintings, silver jewellery (which you don’t have to have, but will purchase if demand is such a huge number). You’ll also come across cows that have tenure, motorbikes that seem to run like machinery entirely devoid of the slightest consideration of physics. It’s chaotic, yes, but there’s a rhythm to it, a kind of ordered confusion that feels strangely freeing when you stop pushing back against it. At the end of my visit, I had fallen for Udaipur’s contradictions. It’s serene but loud, majestic but earthy, traditional but unpredictable. I walked away with sunburn, too many photos of doorways and a strong sense that I hadn’t dug in at all. I realized that Udaipur isn’t a place that you just go to but one that stays in your mind, leaving you wondering whether you had left a piece of yourself floating somewhere on Lake Pichola. |
