Kumbhalgarh Fort As We Visited In Dec 2012

Kumbhalgarh Fort.

During our amazing trip to Mewar area of Rajasthan, we had a memorable stay at Club Mohindra Resort at Kumbhalgarh. We landed at {recently opened in 2008) Maharana Pratap Airport, Udaipur which is a cute small state of the art Airport in the country. I am impressed the way India is rigorously developing both domestic and International tourism.

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At The  Udaipur Airport

The Club Mohindra is about 100 Kilometers and about 2hours drive from the Airport. On our way, we bought very fresh Salad and fruits from one of the village shops. Harvinder is very keen to shop at wayside vegetable venders as she feels that the produce is very fresh. it was indeed very fresh as we tasted the reddish at the shop itself after washing it with bottled water.

Preparations For the Night Show in The Resort

Stone Sculptured Walls

Magnificent Entry

Front Lobby 

Kumbhalgarh Fort is at a walking distance of our resort. But we were advised to take a cab as the area is full of wild animals. I was told by our driver that he had seen a tiger only a day before near a water stream quenching his thirst.

Built on a hilltop 3500 ft above sea level, the fort of Kumbhalgarh has perimeter walls that extend 36 kilometres, the second largest in the world after The China Wall. The frontal walls are fifteen feet thick. Kumbhalgarh has seven fortified gateways. There are over 360 temples within the fort, 300 ancient Jain and the rest Hindu. From the palace top, it is possible to look tens of kilometers into the Aravalli Range and miles of Thar Desert of Marwar.

It is amazing to see the intricate details of the design of the fort which includes a Spa for Ladies.

Kumbhalgarh in its current form was built and ruled by Rana Kumbha  and his dynasty who were Hindu Sisodia Rajputs descendents. Kumbhalgarh in its present form was developed by, and believed to have been designed by a famous architect of the era Madan. Rana Kumbha's kingdom of Mewar stretched from Ranthambore to Gawalor and included large tracts of erstwhile Madhya Prades as well as Rajasthan. Out of the 84 forts in his dominion, Rana Kumbha is said to have designed 32 of them, of which Kumbhalgarh is the largest and most elaborate.

This is also the birth place of Maharana Pratap of Mewar.

A view of the Fort surrounded by 15ft wide frontal wall

The Spa used by the Royal Mewar Ladies

Frontal wall