Rajasthan personalised tour
 

My husband and I wish to arrange a personalized (2 week) tour of Rajasthan and Varanasi in 2017 and would like some recommendations for a tour company. We are coming from Australia and there are a few companies which do this, but wondered whether anyone could recommend an Indian based company (maybe slightly cheaper?).
We understand the below itinerary is doable but would also welcome any comments/suggestions:
Driving - Delhi (2 nights), Agra (1), Jaipur (2), Mandawa (2), Jodphur (3), Udaipur (2) then fly to Varanasi for 3 nights
Thank you

A couple that are regularly recommended here: Castle and King, Legends and Palaces.

Many thanks - Does anyone have recent experience of both/ either company? Also - I could not find a current email address for Legends and Palaces

Search here - there have been plenty of trip reports here on both. Both get rave reviews.

Daphne, I just searched this forum (use the search box above) and found lots of reviews of both.

Googling Legends and Palaces brings up their website.

We've used TGS twice and having nothing but good things to say about them. India-based, happy to put together a tour that works for you rather than just being the same old-same-old, has great drivers, reasonable prices, very prompt follow-through and solution if a problem arises. Definitely recommended.

I am planning a trip to Rajasthan in December for a week. How much will it cost? ANy idea?

It will cost as much or as little as you want it to.

Start here: https://www.lonelyplanet.com/india/a...d-costs/356195

We have used Mr. VP Singh from Legends and Palaces before and plan to sue his services early next year. I high recommend him.

We are currently working with Tim @ Panorama. He has been very prompt & very responsive to our needs. He has talked with my wife several times to get a feel for what we want (he lives in NZ so the time zones made this interesting). He had some great suggestions for hotels, local tours etc etc. We cherry-picked exactly what we wanted. We will be finalizing everything with him after we book our flight to India later in the year. We are not going until November 2020, so we have lots of time.

Kolkata > Varanasi > Jodhpur > Aravalli hills > Udaipur

Arrival/departure through New Delhi.

And costs? It's personalized so my tour is not your tour. Hotels are the big variable. If you want riverfront in Varanasi, you will pay. Etc . . .

If you have deep pockets and wish to see a sanitised India then go with Castle and King or any expensive tour company. If you want to see India at a different level, then hire a good driver and car to take you where you want.
We were introduced to Kan Singh of Rajasthan Visit Tours ([email protected]) 0091--9950106532 , 9929281961 by an English friend of ours who lives in Rajasthan. She used him exclusively for her overseas visitors. We have never looked back, hiring Kan Singh for four different Rajasthan tours and recommending him to others who have found him as we did, to be honest and friendly. On our first tour, we managed to get caught out by the railway workers strike in Jaipur and were not able to get back to Delhi. Our tour with Kan Singh had finished a couple of days earlier, but when we phoned him for help, he drove at his own expense, from his home outside Jaipur, took us to the bus station and organised out tickets for us on the last bus for the day out of Jaipur - no extra charge!
On another trip, the hotel we booked in Chattaugur was dreadful - Kan Singh organised a great room and rate for us at a lovely hotel. After that we allowed him to book our hotels for us and he has never let us down. He is so well liked by his German and Austrian clients, that they fly him to Salzberg, Vienna etc at their own expense and he stays with them and their families every year! Our last trip to India was to the South, we got Kan Singh to book all our flights, train and buses - no extra charge.
He is scrupulously honest and has a great sense of humour when you get to know him. We thoroughly recommend his services. Remember you are not funding a multi million dollar company, you are actually helping a sole operator work and feed his family. Your call.