Where's Grayleen?

With a long morning of Jodhpur sightseeing under our belts and stomachs grumbling for attention, I nonchalantly mentioned to Aileen that I had read something in the guide book about being able to dine at the Umaid Bhawan Palace, home of the Rajastani Maharaja, which was right then a magnificent, curvacious silhouette on the hazy desert horizon. In 1972, when he ceded all of his remaining official royal authority to the Indian government, the Maharaja became just another guy needing to make a buck and shrewdly decided to turn the lion’s share of his palace into a hotel with associated restaurant.

Umaid Bhawan Palace seen from back garden

We arrived by rickshaw at the massive palace set on the highest point in town and headed over to the main gate manned by several serious looking security guards who were eyeing us more than just a bit suspiciously. Feeling quite intimidated and very out of place, I squeaked out something about wanting to eat lunch. The head guard quickly informed us that non-resident guests must spend a minimum of 2,000 rupees (US $45). Per person. Gulp. Would we like to reserve a table? Aileen and I risked a glance at each other, both falsely hoping the guards couldn’t read the looks on our faces. $90 is an obscene amount of money to spend on lunch anywhere, but in India it’s plain crazy. I mean, our none-too-shabby hotel room in town was $5/night. But we were there to experience this other, and very real, über-opulent side of India and so we responded, “No problem!”

The security guards were taking things pretty seriously – passport checks, metal detectors, and pat downs – but hey, there’s a king in there after all! I felt like an underage kid with a fake ID as he asked me to confirm various pieces of personal information from my passport. My confidence hit rock bottom when he asked where we were staying. I blurted out “Ku-Ku’s Palace” and they looked at me like I was nuts. But then the gates swung back and Aileen and I held our heads high as we walked across the grounds and up the massive marble staircase like we owned the place. We were in!

I think I was a bit stunned by the grandness of it all because I have only vague memories of walking into the palace. I know there was a massive front desk area and I know the foyer was stunning with dual winding marble staircases; I know I was taken aback when we walked through the main dome which has to be larger than the rotunda at the Capitol in Washington, D.C. And, very strikingly, while there were staff everywhere tending to this or that, we were the only guests within sight. We were ushered into a gorgeous dining room and seated at a princely table set with real silver.

Inside the rotunda of the palace

The food was… not special. It was no better than the average $2 meal that we had elsewhere in India I’m afraid. Bummer. Luckily, we were having such a grand time giggling over the absurdity of the fanciness that we weren’t fazed at all! The service was unparalleled by any other experience I’ve had with four or five staff waiting on us alone. They even brought over a little side table for us on which to place our camera bag so that it wouldn’t have to rest on the floor or the back of a chair.

After lunch, we decided to take a tour of the grounds, an oasis of green grass and pink flowering bushes in the midst of the Thar Desert. We passed by two tennis courts, the gym and fitness centers (don’t ask me the difference between these two), and the pool which is where we spied another guest for the first time. He had a spread of appetizers and cool fruit juice in front of him at his pool-side table and was being chatted up by a few members of the staff – tough life! Back inside, we decided to cool off by relaxing under the rotunda for a bit. We sat on fancy chairs and tried to look like we belonged as we chatted about how cool this place was. We watched as several people replaced huge beautiful orange streamers draped down from the floors above with, well, orange streamers draped down from the floors above of a slightly different pattern – go figure. After our respite, we wandered the halls of the hotel taking it all in and, most importantly, ensuring that we gave off the air that we belonged and hadn’t simply overstayed our lunch appointment. Highlights were the circular pool in the basement directly below the rotunda and sneaking a peak into the open door of one of the hotel rooms (which is where we saw two more guests for a grand total of three). A staff member caught onto our schoolchildren excitement and offered to show us one of the suites. I won’t suffer you the description, but suffice it to say it had a hardwood dining room table set for six.

Rwwaaarrr!

On our way out, we walked back down the marble staircase towards the entryway and took a moment to sneak some photos of the stuffed cheetahs. At the door, the doorman double checked: you have phoned your driver, correct? Yes, of course! But first we said we were heading to the museum. He walked us over to the museum so as to ensure that we received the free entry that comes with staying at the hotel. When he was out of sight, we quickly dove into the stream of tourists looking at a little model of where we’d just been. Back among our kind, we laughed as we walked out the circuitous museum exit geared to keep the riffraff far away from the hotel. We hopped into a rickshaw for the ride back to town. I did a pretty good job negotiating on the price – I saved us about 40 cents.

More photos of Jodhpur here.