Udaipur-Still Worth Going?
 

I saw in a recent aricle in the Financial Times (before the start of he monsoon) that the lake at Udaipur is essentially gone. Since we are planning a trip for December which is the dry season it seems that a dry lake is a certainty.

Has anyone been there lately? What's the story? We read in the Financial Times that the lake has completely dried up.I was wondering if I should either eliminate
Udaipur from the itinerary or spend less time there.

The lake is pretty but definitely NOT the reason to go to Udaipur. I loved Udaipur and the lake is unimportant.

Kenstee,

I think I disagree with Gloria but I can see her point. Udaipur is a great place to visit...the Palace is lovely, the shopping is fun and it far less overwhelming than Jaipur.

Udaipur is worth visiting in my opinion if you are going to see something of the surrounding area, which I highly recommend, but if you're just going for the romance of the lake it is rather disappointing.

When we were there last November the lake was VERY low. We enjoyed Udaipur but felt we had missed it at its best. It just isn't as romantic with only a tiny puddle of the lake left. While we were there there was a little residual water between the Lake Palace hotel and the city palace, enough to take a boat between the two.

The lake was entirely dry on three sides of the Lake Palace hotel which meant we could walk from our hotel to the Lake Palace. In fact there were camels grazing right next to the hotel!

We enjoyed Udaipur because it was a great base for seeing some of the surrounding areas Devigarh, Ranakpur, Ravla Khempur, Bassi etc. We flew into Udaipur made a side trip to Chittorgarh and Bundi and then back to Udaipu and then north towards Jodhpur.

We stayed in lots of small heritage hotels which I highly recommend. You can see pictures of lots of them, and pictures of Udaipur and the lake, at our website eyebright.com/travels click on India and then click on the destinations on the mapt o see pictures of the surrounding areas.

Hope this helps!

I read on IndiaMike that the lake has been filling back up with this monsoon.

welltraveledbrit, great photos. I'm considering a trip to India next year, possibly October and I was wondering what your itinerary was. Did you do it independently? Did you have a drive throughout or fly between cities? What company did you book the trip through. Any suggestions. Thanks

Lisa,
Glad you liked the photos. You should be able to find our itinerary and trip reporton Fodors. We posyed it here though I can't remember the title...try searchingfor Rajasthan.

We spent 3 weeks in Rajasthan and a week with friends in Delhi. I organized the entire thing myself. It was easy to book the hotels via email.

We had a driver through Parul Travels and I highly recommend the owner Ramesh Dashora who has a website at rajasthan-travel-bycab.com

In general Iike to work with local travel agents and if we went again I would book the entire thing through Ramesh. He gave us some great recommendations while we were there and his drivers, we used two, were both very quiet, friendly and respectful.

We loved the smaller heritage places outside of the large towns. i-escape.com a British website has some great reviews and phoyos on their website and we stayed in a number of places they recommended.

Hope this helps!

I also enjoyed your photos. I like the i-escape website too. Could you tell us which places you stayed in and which ones you liked or didn't like? That would be really helpful. Thanks.

Hello,
You should defintely see Udaipur.When I was there last January for a relatives wedding the lake was fine and even better since the wedding was on the island. Also, if you can spend one night in the Palace Hotel on the mainland it is amazing. And so are the views.
Have fun.

I am currently planning a trip to India for this winter and my local Indian travel agent told me that the recent rains have filled the lake again.

Malea,
I'm glad you liked the photos - There are alot of details in the trip report.

We loved the small scale intimacy of Fort Bassi and Ravla Khempur, at both places we really had an opportunity to meet and spend time with the families. The opportunities to walk around the villages was wonderful. These were some of our favorite memories of India.

Rohetgarh was also charming in terms of the owners and decor which was less obviously impressive but an interesting and very comfortable colonial style. The garden was a haven of quiet and we loved our room overlooking the lake. Highly recommended.

Deogarh is a bit of a scene...very popular in the European press and suitably full. The food was great and we enjoyed the excursions. The rooms are wonderful and all very different we saw some of their most expensive rooms and they really were extraordinary...truly an Orientalist fantasy...mirrors and plush cusions...even a swing!

The family at Jasvilas could not have been more helpful and charming though we weren't keen on Jaipur overall.

Kankarwa in Udaipur was lovely, the food (on the roof) was great and very cheap. The room was nicely decorated in asimple blue and white. The owner and his family have a wonderful philosophy about travel and cultural exchange. The view from our room would have been wonderful if the lake were full.

Devigarh which was the most expensive place we stayed - think many hundreds instead of $40-100 which was true for most of the rest -was extraordinary in terms of the architecture and interiors...the food was also great and they prepared a special dinner for us in a private turret! Do not consider the tents here they are an age away from the rest of the hotel and overlook the vegetable garden...I think it's appalling that they even try to rent these.

Despite the wonderful architecture and decor in the hotel (including a green marble pool) we found the service though helpful enough, just didn't match the prices.

Killa Bhawan in Jaiselmer has a wonderful location within the city walls and a fabulous roof top terrace. It had become muchmore expensive in the last year or so but we enjoyed it.

Hope this helps!

To answer the original question:

According to the latest reports, the lakes in Udaipur are full (Udaipur was on the verge of floods!)

Thanks for the info. However, need to be aware that Winter is the DRY season. So, the rains deposited now may well have dried up by the December dry season. As I read it the substrata is really damaged so it is only a matter of time till it drains again.