Gondal- A small treasure trove

While planning for our long road trip, it was a struggle to find places where I could find accommodation and at the same time maintain driving distances for a day. I just happened to chance upon Gondal and found it interesting enough. Accommodation too wasn't a problem. Just 3 hours from Diu and it happened to fit the bill. I was also keen on ensuring of elements of fun and frolic, heritage, culture in the trip.

A small princely state of the erstwhile years, Gondal is hardly on the tourist map. Gondal is located in the Rajkot district of Gujarat, just 35 kms off Rajkot and 255kms from Ahmedabad. No sightseeing places in the town except for a palace which is turned into a museum and a guest wing of the palace where you can stay. In spite of all this the experience that Gondal offers,  puts this destination apart from any other.

HH Bhagwat Sinhji

Set out from Diu around 11 in the morning and passed through Una, Tulsishyam, Dhari and Bagasara. On this route you enter the Gir forest, famous for its Asiatic Lions for a small distance. We were hopeful of sighting some wild animal, but all that paid an audience to us were some birds, random peacocks and peahens and some monkeys.

The state of Gondal was a small state comprising of 4 towns and more than 175 villages. The rulers of Gondal belonged to the Krishna vanshi Jadeja clan. Under the famous king  HH Maharaja Bhagwat Sinhji the princely state became a first-class princely state. He was a very progressive ruler who introduced many economic reforms, compulsory education for girls, made the state tax free and improved infrastructure. Bhagwat Sinhji was a highly learned personality with degrees of Law, Medicine, Engineering and architecture everything under his belt.

Now coming back to our experience. We reached Gondal (Orchard Palace) by around 1530. A part of the Huzoor palace, Orchard Palace was originally the guest wing of the  now converted into a heritage hotel. The original rulers also stay in the same campus, just behind the hotel.

Antique Fan in our room!!

We were then escorted to our room (apparently we got the best one). Seeing the decor of the room, with antique furniture right from writing table, carpets, beds, fan and the sheer size of the room , we were floored. In addition, there was a dressing room, again with elegant furniture and a more bigger bathroom with bathtub and old tiles. Lot of  fruit bearing trees gives Orchard Palace its name and serenity. You could see peacocks flying in and out of the gardens adorning the palace. Oh my god!! I felt like a queen myself.

The Orchard Palace Hotel

Orchard palace is the location where the famous vintage car collection of the Gondal maharajas is displayed. There are about 60 -70 of them, many of them are specially crafted on order and all of them are in operating condition. They are taken out for vintage car rallies. The present title holder and his son are sports and car racing enthusiasts. When we were taking a look around the cars, we could see the Yuvraj Himansusinhji zoom in, in one of his sports cars. There is also the Railway Saloon of the Maharaja, which is on also on display next to the palace. Interestingly, this saloon is offered as accommodation for a family or a couple. It features separate living and dining areas, attendant areas and its own kitchen. The staff at the Orchard Palace, especially Ravi takes good care of the guests at the hotel. His service is exemplary and  leaves no stone upturned to bring a smile on the faces of guests at the hotel.

The royal saloon

Rolls Royce 1973

The common area at Orchard Palace replete with antiques and accessories

Dinner at Orchard Palace hotel is something one should not like to miss. It is an fixed menu dinner served in the tastefully decorated dining hall..The dinner is cooked at the royal kitchen and you eat what the royalty eats. It was a complete 3 course dinner with an interesting combination of western and Indian cuisine. The food was one of the most tastiest meals we have ever had. You can choose not to have your dinner here, but do not make that mistake.

All guests staying at Orchard Palace or the Riverside Palace (originally meant for the Princes now a heritage hotel) are taken for a guided tour of the Naulakha Palace (the main palace of Gondal). This place is now given out for film shootings apparently. When we visited there was some movie being shot featuring Mithun Chakraborty and Ayusshman Khurana. The palace has also been converted into a private museum.

The Naulakha Palace

The palace itself is quite impressive with its jharoka styled windows, long pillared corridors, arches, spiral staircases and carvings. The museum at the palace houses many antiques, silver and gold caskets and other gifts received by the King, coins and stamps of Gondal state, beadwork and other personal items. Hunting spoils of the kings are also on display here. Among the other things on display are fine crockery, utensils used by the royals, toys etc. The toy car collection of the present Yuvraj (prince) is definitely not be missed, on display are hundreds of vehicles of all sorts. Horse carriages and other mode of transport used by the royal family is also on display. A wonderful trip down the history of Gondal!!

This toy actually runs on petrol

The legend has it that, HH Bhagwat Sinhji would use this carriage to check the newly made roads. He would travel on this with some water in a vessel and if even a single drop spilled out, the road would have to be redone

Another interesting thing about Gondal is respect and protection that cattle (esp cows) is given. There are in fact many trusts established to take care of cows and stray cows from all parts of the country come here and no cow is denied the care it is in need of.

Beginning of the Road Trip to Gujarat

A road trip is something that I have always enjoyed, new roads, new landscapes, the people along the road everything seems so exciting. Something, that I enjoy more than this is planning for the trip. Having done many weekend driving holidays in and around Bangalore, sought for something more this time. A long holiday was overdue and the holiday season in December meant non-availability of seats on flights. So what could be better than a road trip.

Amitabh Bachan's ad for Gujarat Tourism had definitely enticed me and wanted to make it to Kutch. Tried lots of, route permutations and combinations and depending on availability of accommodation, finally decided on Bangalore-Mumbai-Daman-Ahmedabad-Diu-Gondal-Hodka-Bhuj and return.

So it was December 22, left at the decided time of 5am and just a kilometer or two from home, our well behaved Safari started making some problems, steering vibration, clutch not returning. Not wanting to lose the initial momentum, we drove till Hiriyur and stopped for breakfast at Hotel Aroma. Note there are hardly any decent places to eat after you cross the usual Kamat Upchars and Coffee Days before Tumkur. After breakfast the problem with the vehicle seemed more pronounced and we decided to get some help at Chitradurga.

It was a Sunday, and a call to the Toll Free Tata Motos number gave us the number of a Tata authorised service center in Chitradurga. Call to the manager and he asked us to wait at the workshop while he would send in a mechanic. That wait lasted for 2 hours and the mechanic finally arrived. He did something and the vehicle seemed fine. We were planning for lunch at Belgaum with my brother, which looked far fetched now.

At 1130 am we started from Chitradurga and manged to reach Hubli by around 3. Lunch at Rajasthani Ghar Dhaba just after Dharwad high court. It was a cuisine not explored, by doing so, it marked a start of our road trip in the true sense. Excellent panner tikka masala, Dal tempered with red chilly and oil and hot rotis were really needed. Finally ordered Sev Tomato which was the icing on the cake. Some buttermilk to go with it and the meal was complete.

It was my turn at the wheels and with some temporary arrangement at the clutch, I was not very comfortable and loads of tractors and trucks carrying sugarcanes to the factories on the road added to it and finally gave up little after Belgaum as we didn't want to lose time. It was getting dark and we hoped to reach Satara/Karad by 2000h and halt for the day.

As we bid farewell to the roads of Karnataka, the condition of roads did not remain all the good. Lot of bikers on the road after Kolhapur and the roads were only 2 laned on each side. Finally we decided on Hotel Alankaar at Karad for our night halt. A decent hotel right in front of the Bus Station with good food.
We decided to start early the next day as we had a booking at Daman for the night. We could start only by 9 after  a tasty breakfast of Misal Pav.

The New Katraj tunnel

Fully loaded for the trip

By 1130 we were in Pune and looked around for authorised workshops to find a proper solution to the problem in Tata Safari. We spotted Concorde Motors and went in. Amazing facility and excellent staff. Safari got a quick fix there where we realised that there was a problem with the clutch plate and it would have to be used very carefully. We get our vehicle back at around 5. So the entire day was gone. We had two options either halt at Mumbai or drive till Daman. Went with the second option and drove till night 11 and reached Daman. It was the first time we had ever driven after sunset on the highways. The road from Mumbai to Daman, being a part of Mumbai-Ahmedabad road was very good, once we got on to the highway. However crossing Mumbai and getting on to the highway does take a good 2 hrs.

See you in Daman!!!!