2011 Biking Rajasthan

Via Kolayat (53km), where we spent the night in a very basic pilgrim’s rest house and where a sign outside this sacred village proclaims: “Kolayat: A Holly City”, and Bap (95km), where the pretty hotel we stayed in was occupied by engineers working on a massive new solar panel plant in the vicinity, to Phalodi (37km) to admire the thousands of demoiselle cranes who winter in nearby Khichan. On then to Pokaran (75km), filled with soldiers in military convoys and the site of India’s first nuclear bomb test. The two cheap hotels in town were fully booked and we were forced, therefore, much to our delight, to stay in the wonderful old fort, now doubling as a hotel. Pokaran Fort is still privately owned by the Maharaja of Jodhpur (see later). Traditionally, this fort would be ceded to a younger son. We dined extremely well (particularly enjoying the mutton curry, our first meat dish in this vegetarian state), kept company by the manager whose family has worked for the Maharaja’s family for generations. In the morning, the security guard who let us out of the massive fort gates, built to withstand elephant charges, had to lean way back as he tugged at the unwieldy weight and ushered us into the pre-dawn streets of the old town – impossibly romantic!