Private, on your own dates · India
A 12-day private journey across Rajasthan linking Jaipur, Jodhpur, Jaisalmer and Udaipur, with Pushkar, the Thar dunes and Ranakpur on the road between them.
Rajasthan is where the royal India of the imagination turns out to be real, and this twelve-day route takes it one walled city at a time rather than in a blur of monuments. It opens in Jaipur, where the Amber Fort climbs a ridge above a lake and the old city keeps its pink-washed façades and grid of craft bazaars, and gives the capital two full days so that the fort, the observatory and the working workshops of Sanganer each get the time they deserve.
The road west then becomes part of the journey. A morning at the lakeside temple town of Pushkar breaks the drive to Jodhpur, where the Mehrangarh fort rises off a rock face above a sea of blue houses and the old city still runs on the rhythm of its clock tower market. From there the highway crosses into the Thar, and Jaisalmer appears as a fortress the colour of the sand around it, one of the few living forts anywhere in the world, with families and havelis still inside its walls. An afternoon on the Sam dunes and a night at a desert camp put the emptiness of the western desert in proper scale.
Turning south, the route slows again. Ranakpur's Jain temple, carved from pale marble into a forest of columns, sits in a wooded valley on the way to Udaipur, and it is the natural halfway point of the longest driving day. Udaipur itself closes the journey with lakes instead of dunes: the City Palace stacked along the water, boats crossing Pichola in the late afternoon, and a sunset from the Monsoon Palace over the Aravalli hills.
Throughout, travel is by private air-conditioned vehicle with a driver who stays with the group for the full route, and licensed local guides join in each city rather than travelling along. The pace is deliberately uneven — two nights where a city rewards it, one where it does not — and the longer drives are placed on days with something worth stopping for. It suits travellers who want the depth of a slow overland route through one region rather than a national highlights reel, and who would rather arrive somewhere in the afternoon and walk it than tick it off from a bus window.
Hotels are named on your confirmation — all are of the stated category.
You leave from a different place than you arrive — book an open-jaw flight, not a return.
The representative waits outside the arrivals hall with a name board for the arrival transfer.
India
Oct–Mar is the golden season across most of India. Monsoon (Jun–Sep) transforms Kerala and the Northeast.
Four of the twelve days are travelling days. The longest is Jaipur to Jodhpur via Pushkar at roughly 330 kilometres, and the drive from Sam back to Jodhpur is about six hours. Every other day is based in one city with short local journeys only.
It is a fixed tented camp near the Sam dunes with a proper bed and an attached bathroom, not a hotel building. Dinner and breakfast are served at the camp, and folk musicians usually perform after dark around a fire.
No. Entrance at monuments, forts, museums and temples throughout the route is excluded and settled locally on the day, and the guide will advise what applies at each site as you go.
No. The tour starts with an arrival transfer at Jaipur International Airport and finishes with a departure transfer at Maharana Pratap Airport in Udaipur, so book an open-jaw itinerary or an internal connection accordingly.
October to March is the comfortable window, with clear days and cold desert nights around Jaisalmer. April to June is very hot in the Thar, and July to September brings intermittent rain that can affect the lake and dune sections.
It runs as a private tour. The vehicle, the driver and the guiding are for your party alone, and only the Lake Pichola boat and the camel ride at Sam are shared with other visitors.
Moderate. Amber, Mehrangarh, Jaisalmer Fort and the Udaipur City Palace all involve long stretches of stairs and uneven stone, and the old city walks in Jodhpur and Jaisalmer are on narrow, sloping lanes shared with traffic.
Minor changes are usually workable — swapping an afternoon, adding a site, or moving a boat ride because of weather. Anything that changes a hotel night or a driving day needs to be agreed before departure so that bookings can be moved.
Tell Tulli what you'd change — hotels, dates, an extra city — and she'll price it with our team and come back to you.