Udaipur and Jodhpur, which will u recommend?

green.0330

Due to my limited time, I might choose one of the place to visit.
My origimal itinerary is Jaipur- Udaipur -Jaisalmer
But I find it takes 14 hours from Udaipur to Jaisalmer, it's not wise...

Anyway, I would like to visit the palace hotel in Udaipur, But actually I don't have budget to live there.And I don't know if those luxurious rooms will open for tourists to visiting?
If I can't get in and have a look then I think udaipur is not that worthwhile visiting...

So I am now thinking about replacing Udaipur with Jodhpur.
Many people recommend this city highly,
Which one do you prefer...
Could you recommend me?

Thx very much!!

LunavadaLad

I found this city to be on of the better places I visited in Rajistan. Stayed with a local family as a guest and had a great time. As far as I know only guests are allowed at the lake Palace.

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tasuray

Hi,
Jaisalmir and Jodhpur are on the same line in train.Take overnight train from Jaisalmir and you will reach Jodhpur early in the morning.Mehrangarh Fort in Jodhpur is beautiful.So far saving of time is concerned, Jodhpur is better choice.
With best wishes.

ninasimone

Udaipur was a nice clean town, I really liked it there. I believe you can go to the Palace Hotel if you book for dinner, but don't think you can just go in and wander around.

steven_ber

I much prefered Jodhpur.

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Annett

Due to the fact of your limited time I would go for Jodhpur. Give the water palace in Udaipur a miss. Jodhpur has more to offer. The Mehrangar Fort is an amazing experience, the markets downtown and worlds best lassi near the clock tower are a must see (and taste of course)...

wp7713

But you could go to Udaipur and pay the admission to the City Palace Museum, and then look down on the Lake Palace. It's a great view from there.

At least you will have seen it.

I don't know about choosing between Udaipur/Jodhpur etc. They each have their separate charms. It all depends on what your interests are/ what you want to do.

ShirleyD

A tricky one! But I think I'd opt for Jodphur. Looking down on the town from the fort is a lovely sight and the fort is really intersting.

wp7713

Agreed. But how awful to have to choose...

pkibbee

Jodhpur is certainly the better choice if you are on a limited budget. The last time I was there I stayed near the market by the Clock Tower and the hotel had a roof top restaurant where you could have marvelous views of the fort (open to non guests and very inexpensive). The Lake Palace in Udaipur is open to nonguests but the dinner buffet is fairly expensive. When I was there in February I tried to get a reservation and it was booked up. However there are nice restaurants which are nowhere near as expensive on the edge of the lake where you get a wonderful view of the Palace.

anubisgrau

i've just returned from a tour in rajasthan and we liked udaipur soooo much that we actually stayed 7 days instead of planned 2 - fully dropping jodhpur, shapura, ranakpur and kumbalgarh from the list.

I haven't been in jodhpur so i can't compare but considering that udaipur has something no other indian (let alone rajasthan) city has to offer - a combination of a lake, a palace and a city palace, i wouldn't fully bet on jodhpur. if you've seen 1-2 or 3 big rajasthan forts, you've seen them all and after ranthambore fort, bundi fort and chittorgarh fort i had no urge to see another of it so i even skipped kumbalgarh fort for another fenomenal sunset in udaipur.

despite lots of tourist and many locals connected to them, udaipur is amazingly relaxed and clean town for indian standards. it has a right mix of indian and cosmopolitan, plus a slow, relaxed pace that takes over you in a day or two. all you need is just not to rush and to slowly enjoy it.

i stayed in 2 hotels. for a cheaper accomodation i would suggest wonder view on hannuman gath, 750rp for a clean non-lakeview room but the moment you open the door of your room you have both lake palace and city palace in front of you. take rooms on higher floors (2nd or 3rd, room 202 for example). it is completely stupid to pay 2500rps for suites or extra rooms with a view when you will only sleep in room and spend whole of a day and an early night out or sitting on rooftops.

but, as a special experience if budget allows i would particularly recommend the new hotel "the tiger", a part of "cafe edelweiss" and "savage garden" triumvirate advertised as "enjoy the difference". it is not for those on the tightest budget but with 1500rp it provides the best deal i have seen in my 10 weeks total indian experience between 1999 and 2007, it's a kind of a boutique hotel with great new indian design, with a touch bollywood camp stylishly put into an old haveli building. if such a hotel would exist in bombay it would cost you 150$ at least for sure. the most wonderful rooftop with a wooden chairs and sundecks, amazing looks and food to kill for, plus a REAL coffee and great cakes from edelweiss cafe. also a big bonus is there are hardly any guests as it is only a few months old since opening so LP-junkies still haven't discovered it. it can be whole yours if you are brave enough, and when we stayed there there were only two other couples apart from us so it was really fantastic to feel as if the whole place is yours. plus you have a taj-like service for a fraction of price.

foodwise, i would fully recommend skipping any of the much hyped tourist places, except for a) AMBRAI, a nice location and a decent indian and raj food (try any kadai dish they serve) b) SAVAGE GARDEN, an amazing indo-fusion food place for these already overloaded with hard core indian diet (go for chicken filled with cashews and raisins in honey/cream sauce with carrot rice (this would set you 25E anywhere in europe, overthere is just over 3E).

for the best food, go to places for locals. i tried 3 of these and they were all much better than 10x more expensive tourist rooftop biz places. much hyped udai niwas has plastic chairs and i don't pay 1000rp for a dinner for 2 if i have to sit in a plastic chear, let alone food.

for best thalis in town, check out both NATARAJ outlets, one in the same hotel (45rp), another on a station road (75rp). the first is great but the second one has the best gujarat thali i ever tried, it consisted of nearly 20 different things on plate and their fruit custard was a killer compared to the one from udai kothi that costed 3x more than the whole thali from NATARAJ DINING HALL. another great place for locals (still spotlessly clean was near cheetak circle, the name escaped me, i think it's SHIVALI or something like that. we were late for thali but the veg feast was fabulous, don't miss their butter paneer. the whole lunch was 240rp for 2.

the best places for breakfast for us were cafe yasmine just right of pedestrian bridge towards hannuman gath, and cafe edelweiss.


hope this helps, have a good time whatever you choose (but it should be udaipur.

villavic

Both have interesting places but I LOVED Udaipur. the days I spent there were like a dream. UDaipur and Jaisalmer are my favorites (and the Taj Mahal of course)

daverm18

Personally we liked Udaipur better. We hired a car and driver there and he took us into the country, over to Ranakpur and Kumbalgarh fort(at least I think that was the name of it). I am a bit biased though. I was getting over food poisoning while in Jodhpur with the help of those lassi's aforementioned. I don't think you can go wrong whichever you decide.

Chandramukhi

Udaipur

stellap

Jodhpur, Jodphur, Jodphur!

And this may be contraversial, but why not do Jodhpur & Udaipur instead of Jaisalmer?
I'll wait for all the Jaisalmer lovers out there to jump on that! Jaisalmer was really nice, but very tourist oriented, and maybe a little too sleepy for me.

You don't need to go to the Lake Palace to enjoy Udaipur - in fact if you're in it, you can't see it - and it's the major sight after all.

Jodhpur is a beautiful, magical, friendly place - don't miss it