Into the Heart of India - Shivpuri and Gwalior
Day 1
Day 1: Gurgaon - Mathura (200km) - Agra (250km) - Gwalior (350km) - Shivpuri (450km, 9 hours)
You know that if you change jobs, from the time you hang one pair of boots and put on another,
you will usually get some time of your own to expend. Some people get a couple of weeks. Some lucky punks get even a month. I got three days. Yeah, that's right. Three whole days.
Nevertheless, that did not deter the wandering spirit and the northern wind that especially gets strong around this time of the year did its job yet again. I took the opportunity and on the very first day at the break of dawn, we set sail (drive off into oblivion).
That the break of dawn actually happened to be 10:30am, late in the morning, is a testimony of the fact that it takes far more time to get ready and get out for a whole family - complete with a tiny infant, a new mother, a bumbling father, and a reluctant grand father - than you can possibly imagine - not to mention late nights due to pending work and other life's blah blahs. But hey, like I say, this is a real blog with real travel stories, warts and all, not the glossy magazine-cover kinds thrown at you from travel catalogs.
Anyway, the first few hours of the drive were in complete randomness and an exercise in negation. We did not want to do the mountains since the baby was quite small - so Uttaranchal and Himachal were out. So was Punjab. No one dares to go on to Hapur road or the one to Bijnor unless for a reason. So those were out too. And we have had till our throats with Rajasthan. Finally, we decided to get on the Mathura road.
As always, the road from Gurgaon to Faridabad to Bhati Mines makes you feel that you are on a cross-country tour already. The Mathura road was busy as usual, with the typical traffic snarls at Kosi, Hodal etc. We decided to skip the famous dhabas of Moorthal, and went right till Mathura. By the time I pulled over for the customary stopover at McD in front of the refinary, about 10km from Mathura - we had done going through all the books and maps we had in the car and had zeroed on the destination - it would be Shivpuri this time!
Back on the road by 2:30pm, we surfed around and got contact details of the only three hotels in Shivpuri that are listed. 'Tourist Village' - run by MPT - said that they are full. Anyway, their tariffs were rather steep (Rs. 3,500/- per night). The guy at Tourist Village was kind enough to give us the contact details of a rest house in the forest. So we called the rest house, and after multiple interactions, were informed that some arrangement can be made for us for two nights. The rest house is run by the forest dept. and we were told that it will cost us Rs. 600 a night! ... Not knowing anything else, we decided to bite it and see once we reach there.
Once this was settled, we took to managing time. It was imperative that we cross at least Gwalior while there was daylight. At 2:45pm, we took the right towards Agra fort and Taj mahal in Agra. However the road thereafter this so convoluted that it took us 3:30pm to get out of Agra. We lost 45 mins just crossing the city - which every time I pass by, I say to myself - does not deserve one of world's eight wonders.
As we got on the Gwalior road, we picked up speed again. The road starts off from Agra nicely, with tiny villages on both sides. The distance is about 100km, with major towns of Dhoulpur and Morena - Muraina, to be precise. Most of the road is newly made, and therefore a pleasure to drive.
As you approach Muraina though, the landscape changes into an eerie view. This is the notorious Chambal valley - made so known by Phoolen Devi and her merry men. Even now as you cross the Chambal river (and there is a precarious bridge close to Muraina crossing it), it seems like you are part of a scene from 'Sholey' and you can half-expect a gang of horse-riding, gun-totting bandits from behind.
As we were crossing the valley of Chambal, the sun went down and by 5:00pm it was twilight zone. By 5:30pm, we reached the outskirts of Gwalior. Take a left and you go to Gwalior city. Take a right, and road goes to Indore. We took the road to the right as Shivpuri is on this one. The road started off with hugh patches of red mud, badly made and badly kept. It goes past an industrial area, and then pushes briefly through the winding gullies of the city. The influence of the Maratha rulers of yester-years is still palpable on the city. For example, the gullies host a number of temples with Marathi inscriptions. We saw a Shani temple on the way, which had some Marathi inscriptions about it being made by Jiwaji Shinde.
After a good half hour into the city, the road opened up again on a state highway, and we were back in the company of trucks and heavy vehicles, who are perhaps not allowed to take the narrow city roads. By this time, it had turned dark and I was having trouble keeping my eyes on the narrow two-way highway, with all the trucks coming in with high-beam headlights.
By around 7:30pm, we reached the tiny town of Shivpuri - the place where Tatya Tope -the Maratha general of the 1857 rebellion and the right-hand man of leader Nana Sahed Peshwa of Kanpur - laid down his life. There isn't a lot in terms of his memorial here, only a couple of boards, despite the contribution made by the great warrior in the great uprising of 1857. Today's Shivpuri is known more as a summer capital of the Scindia (Shinde) rulers of Gwalior and as their hunting ground.
We crossed the sleepy town of Shivpuri, bought some gajjak (local sweets for which M.P. is famous) on the way, and headed towards the road that goes to Jhansi. About 6-7 km after we took this road, we could see a large board of 'Madhav National Park'. The sentri at the gate let us through once we told him that we have a booking at the guest house.
Once inside, we left the tar road and found ourselves on gravel. The narrow road took us through a thick foliage and suddenly opened in front of a vast water body - the main lake inside the park. Ah, the site of the lake in the moonlight was like an elixir after a long day's drive!
We reached the guest house, which is a set of tiny rooms perched alongside the Sakhya Sagar lake and the sailing club. The setting of these 4-5 rooms is fascinating. There is also a nice porche with strange statues, overlooking the lake where you can sit, and get a grand view of the lake.
The guest house is managed by the forest department. The rooms are very rudimentary and basic. There is a bed, a limited set of pillows and covers, a bathroom with running hot water (phew!) and another smaller room with a couch and a table. Apparently there as some nicer rooms too, but it depends on your luck. If some guest of the state comes down on the same day, like in our case we had the I.G. of the area visiting on the same night, then you get the smaller and less nicer rooms as the nicer rooms go to the VIPs.
Nevertheless, the rooms are functional, and the location makes up more than enough for the lack of luxury. We had spoken earlier with the cook about our dinner, so we got a full three-course meal, complete with chicken curry, chapatties, rice, daal, curd etc. The curry was tasty, the rice was nice and long, the chapatties hot, and the yellow daal simply delicious. Sleep came easy with this meal, and after a short walk around the premises and the lake, where we could hear the fish in the water, we hit the sac only to wake up the next day at 9:30am.
Day 2 and 3:
Day 2: Shivpuri Madhav National Park, Shipuri - Gwalior (115km, 2 hours)
Day 3: Gwalior Fort, Gwalior - Agra - Mathura - Gurgaon (350km, 7 hours)
The next day morning came quite late, thanks to the exhaustion of the last day and the wonderful dinner. We were given a nice breakfast of bread, omlette, and tea, and by 11:00am we left the room, only after monkeying with the two pet fawns that roam about the guest house. We wanted to spend some time inside the national park, so we went to the gate of the park and asked if that is possible. The guard informed us that we can take the car inside, but we need to take him as a guide, which was fair since we did not know our way around. If I remember this right, they take about Rs. 400/- for the car, and another 100/- for the guide for two hours inside the jungle.
Once inside the gates, we took the car to the base of the dam on the lake, and continued in the forest. This part is a bit tricky due to the sand and the water. Within the first 15 minutes inside, we found one of our wheels stuck in mud. So all of us had to get out, and then push the car to get it out of the ditch. The exercise in the middle of the morning drew our sweat. The rest of the journey was uneventful though. We saw monkeys, langurs, deer, chinkara, chittal, blackbuck, bara-singha, nil-gai, and hundreds of species of birds - lapwings, herons, storks, and different types of kingfisher - most of these migrating from the Himalayas to the plains as it was the start of the winters.
At the highest point in the national park lies a majestic building in ruins. It is called the George Castle. It was built in 1911 by the then ruler of Gwalior Jivaji Rao Shinde when King George V of England visited India. It was supposed to be one night's passing stay for the king, where the king was planning to hunt a tiger. Can you believe it - they built a whole damn castle just for one man, just for one night - in a country with at least a hundred million people without a permanent roof on the head! ... And to make the mockery even more scathing, the King never spent that one night in this castle, because he managed to hunt a tiger somewhere in Nauwhar, even before reaching Shivpuri.
The castle remained unused, unfulfilled, and was later used sparingly by the Schindias as a game lodge. It remains unattended, open and wasted. Most of it is in ruins. The Western wing is slighly better off, with most of the wood still holding through. The rooms in the Eastern block do not share the same advantage. The bathroom fittings are old and strange. The place has a strange, errie feel to it. The view from the castle is magnificant though.
You can see almost all three lakes within the park - the larger Sakhya Sagar on which the guest house and sailing club is located, the smaller Madhav Sagar, and a third much smaller man-made lake called Jadhav Sagar at a distance. Apparently, Jadhav Sagar was built on river Mahiyar in 1918 by the then ruler of Gwalior in order to create an inter-linked sequence of water bodies.
Naturally you cannot cover the 300 sq. km of the national forest in two hours, but you do get to cover most of the important parts. The terrain is mostly flat grasslands and you hardly see any big beasts of the nature in the middle of the day. A good time to visit would be early in the morning - around 6:30am when the park gates open. We did manage to get a sighting of the famous crocodiles of Sakhya Sagar lake, along with other game.
By 2:30pm, we reached the outer gates on the other side of the park. This was a day well spent. After thanking the guide and dropping him off at the first gate, we took the road back to Shivpuri town. In another hour we were on the road to Gwalior and then it took us another couple of hours to reach Gwalior.
At Gwalior, we were in two minds. The last time we stayed at Tansen Residency, run by MPT, was a nightmare. However, since there are no other better options, we decided to risk it again. Tansen Residency is centrally located, and now has a refurbished wing that is pretty neat. MPT charged us Rs. 2,500/- for the night for three people and infant, including breakfast and taxes, which is a decent deal.
In the evening, we went to the old town to visit Tansen's makbara (resting place), right next to Mohamed Ghaus's durgah. The durgah is old and has an aura of itself. Tansen's makbara lies along side his son's, and the podium that hosts both is known to also have a renowned turmeric plant. It is said that Tansen would chew the leaves of this shrub every day to make his voice soothing. Such is the renown of this plant that every singer hopeful who visits the place robs the plant a few handful of leaves. So much so that the old shrub has now almost become barren. There is a new one planted by the caretakers, but with the world full of Himesh and company, verdict is still out whether it is as effective as the original one.
The entrance to the makbara is precarious, and you have to really ask around. It goes through a churi (bangles) market, which is as colorful as it can be, and is called 'Tijara'. We bought more gajjak on the road - called Tansen Marg - arguably the best gajjak in the trip, and then roamed about in the more modern part of the city called Wada (castle) and Lashkar - also called Shinde ki Chavani (cantonment). Sadly, the city lacks good eateries. Even the couple of new malls near the zoo lack anything worthwhile in terms of eating options. So we ended up in the restaurant at hotel Central Park close to Tansen Residency and had some very marginal food.
The next day (Day 3) was spent at Gwalior fort, which is seen towering aside the city. Most of the key artefacts from the fort are removed and are now hosted in the museum down in the city, but the fort still has its majesty. Keeping up with the history flavour of the trip, we took a guide and saw the whole place - right from the door where Jhansi ki Rani Laxmibai came asking for help during the 1857 rebellion, to the underground chamber where Aurangzeb had his brother Murad Baksh murdered, to the chamber of Raja Man Singh Tomar, who is credited for building most of the fort and is also hailed as the greatest of the Tomar Kings of Gwalior.
By 2:30pm, the sun was burning hot and we decided to head back to Delhi. After a long drive that saw us going into Agra, and spending two hours just trying to get out - in the meanwhile also buying some famous 'petha' sweets - we reached Gurgaon by around 11:30pm.
Overall, Shivpuri is a wonderful hideout with a nice, rustic, outdoor feeling. That, topped with Gwalior town is a refreshing weekend gateaway from Delhi.
Best
Shreekant
- 18 November 2011
Day 1: Gurgaon - Mathura (200km) - Agra (250km) - Gwalior (350km) - Shivpuri (450km, 9 hours)
 |
| Madhav National Park Shivpuri Guest House |
You know that if you change jobs, from the time you hang one pair of boots and put on another,
you will usually get some time of your own to expend. Some people get a couple of weeks. Some lucky punks get even a month. I got three days. Yeah, that's right. Three whole days.
Nevertheless, that did not deter the wandering spirit and the northern wind that especially gets strong around this time of the year did its job yet again. I took the opportunity and on the very first day at the break of dawn, we set sail (drive off into oblivion).
That the break of dawn actually happened to be 10:30am, late in the morning, is a testimony of the fact that it takes far more time to get ready and get out for a whole family - complete with a tiny infant, a new mother, a bumbling father, and a reluctant grand father - than you can possibly imagine - not to mention late nights due to pending work and other life's blah blahs. But hey, like I say, this is a real blog with real travel stories, warts and all, not the glossy magazine-cover kinds thrown at you from travel catalogs.
Anyway, the first few hours of the drive were in complete randomness and an exercise in negation. We did not want to do the mountains since the baby was quite small - so Uttaranchal and Himachal were out. So was Punjab. No one dares to go on to Hapur road or the one to Bijnor unless for a reason. So those were out too. And we have had till our throats with Rajasthan. Finally, we decided to get on the Mathura road.
As always, the road from Gurgaon to Faridabad to Bhati Mines makes you feel that you are on a cross-country tour already. The Mathura road was busy as usual, with the typical traffic snarls at Kosi, Hodal etc. We decided to skip the famous dhabas of Moorthal, and went right till Mathura. By the time I pulled over for the customary stopover at McD in front of the refinary, about 10km from Mathura - we had done going through all the books and maps we had in the car and had zeroed on the destination - it would be Shivpuri this time!
Back on the road by 2:30pm, we surfed around and got contact details of the only three hotels in Shivpuri that are listed. 'Tourist Village' - run by MPT - said that they are full. Anyway, their tariffs were rather steep (Rs. 3,500/- per night). The guy at Tourist Village was kind enough to give us the contact details of a rest house in the forest. So we called the rest house, and after multiple interactions, were informed that some arrangement can be made for us for two nights. The rest house is run by the forest dept. and we were told that it will cost us Rs. 600 a night! ... Not knowing anything else, we decided to bite it and see once we reach there.
Once this was settled, we took to managing time. It was imperative that we cross at least Gwalior while there was daylight. At 2:45pm, we took the right towards Agra fort and Taj mahal in Agra. However the road thereafter this so convoluted that it took us 3:30pm to get out of Agra. We lost 45 mins just crossing the city - which every time I pass by, I say to myself - does not deserve one of world's eight wonders.
As we got on the Gwalior road, we picked up speed again. The road starts off from Agra nicely, with tiny villages on both sides. The distance is about 100km, with major towns of Dhoulpur and Morena - Muraina, to be precise. Most of the road is newly made, and therefore a pleasure to drive.
As you approach Muraina though, the landscape changes into an eerie view. This is the notorious Chambal valley - made so known by Phoolen Devi and her merry men. Even now as you cross the Chambal river (and there is a precarious bridge close to Muraina crossing it), it seems like you are part of a scene from 'Sholey' and you can half-expect a gang of horse-riding, gun-totting bandits from behind.
As we were crossing the valley of Chambal, the sun went down and by 5:00pm it was twilight zone. By 5:30pm, we reached the outskirts of Gwalior. Take a left and you go to Gwalior city. Take a right, and road goes to Indore. We took the road to the right as Shivpuri is on this one. The road started off with hugh patches of red mud, badly made and badly kept. It goes past an industrial area, and then pushes briefly through the winding gullies of the city. The influence of the Maratha rulers of yester-years is still palpable on the city. For example, the gullies host a number of temples with Marathi inscriptions. We saw a Shani temple on the way, which had some Marathi inscriptions about it being made by Jiwaji Shinde.
After a good half hour into the city, the road opened up again on a state highway, and we were back in the company of trucks and heavy vehicles, who are perhaps not allowed to take the narrow city roads. By this time, it had turned dark and I was having trouble keeping my eyes on the narrow two-way highway, with all the trucks coming in with high-beam headlights.
By around 7:30pm, we reached the tiny town of Shivpuri - the place where Tatya Tope -the Maratha general of the 1857 rebellion and the right-hand man of leader Nana Sahed Peshwa of Kanpur - laid down his life. There isn't a lot in terms of his memorial here, only a couple of boards, despite the contribution made by the great warrior in the great uprising of 1857. Today's Shivpuri is known more as a summer capital of the Scindia (Shinde) rulers of Gwalior and as their hunting ground.
We crossed the sleepy town of Shivpuri, bought some gajjak (local sweets for which M.P. is famous) on the way, and headed towards the road that goes to Jhansi. About 6-7 km after we took this road, we could see a large board of 'Madhav National Park'. The sentri at the gate let us through once we told him that we have a booking at the guest house.
Once inside, we left the tar road and found ourselves on gravel. The narrow road took us through a thick foliage and suddenly opened in front of a vast water body - the main lake inside the park. Ah, the site of the lake in the moonlight was like an elixir after a long day's drive!
We reached the guest house, which is a set of tiny rooms perched alongside the Sakhya Sagar lake and the sailing club. The setting of these 4-5 rooms is fascinating. There is also a nice porche with strange statues, overlooking the lake where you can sit, and get a grand view of the lake.
The guest house is managed by the forest department. The rooms are very rudimentary and basic. There is a bed, a limited set of pillows and covers, a bathroom with running hot water (phew!) and another smaller room with a couch and a table. Apparently there as some nicer rooms too, but it depends on your luck. If some guest of the state comes down on the same day, like in our case we had the I.G. of the area visiting on the same night, then you get the smaller and less nicer rooms as the nicer rooms go to the VIPs.
Nevertheless, the rooms are functional, and the location makes up more than enough for the lack of luxury. We had spoken earlier with the cook about our dinner, so we got a full three-course meal, complete with chicken curry, chapatties, rice, daal, curd etc. The curry was tasty, the rice was nice and long, the chapatties hot, and the yellow daal simply delicious. Sleep came easy with this meal, and after a short walk around the premises and the lake, where we could hear the fish in the water, we hit the sac only to wake up the next day at 9:30am.
Day 2 and 3:
Day 2: Shivpuri Madhav National Park, Shipuri - Gwalior (115km, 2 hours)
Day 3: Gwalior Fort, Gwalior - Agra - Mathura - Gurgaon (350km, 7 hours)
The next day morning came quite late, thanks to the exhaustion of the last day and the wonderful dinner. We were given a nice breakfast of bread, omlette, and tea, and by 11:00am we left the room, only after monkeying with the two pet fawns that roam about the guest house. We wanted to spend some time inside the national park, so we went to the gate of the park and asked if that is possible. The guard informed us that we can take the car inside, but we need to take him as a guide, which was fair since we did not know our way around. If I remember this right, they take about Rs. 400/- for the car, and another 100/- for the guide for two hours inside the jungle.
Once inside the gates, we took the car to the base of the dam on the lake, and continued in the forest. This part is a bit tricky due to the sand and the water. Within the first 15 minutes inside, we found one of our wheels stuck in mud. So all of us had to get out, and then push the car to get it out of the ditch. The exercise in the middle of the morning drew our sweat. The rest of the journey was uneventful though. We saw monkeys, langurs, deer, chinkara, chittal, blackbuck, bara-singha, nil-gai, and hundreds of species of birds - lapwings, herons, storks, and different types of kingfisher - most of these migrating from the Himalayas to the plains as it was the start of the winters.
At the highest point in the national park lies a majestic building in ruins. It is called the George Castle. It was built in 1911 by the then ruler of Gwalior Jivaji Rao Shinde when King George V of England visited India. It was supposed to be one night's passing stay for the king, where the king was planning to hunt a tiger. Can you believe it - they built a whole damn castle just for one man, just for one night - in a country with at least a hundred million people without a permanent roof on the head! ... And to make the mockery even more scathing, the King never spent that one night in this castle, because he managed to hunt a tiger somewhere in Nauwhar, even before reaching Shivpuri.
The castle remained unused, unfulfilled, and was later used sparingly by the Schindias as a game lodge. It remains unattended, open and wasted. Most of it is in ruins. The Western wing is slighly better off, with most of the wood still holding through. The rooms in the Eastern block do not share the same advantage. The bathroom fittings are old and strange. The place has a strange, errie feel to it. The view from the castle is magnificant though.
You can see almost all three lakes within the park - the larger Sakhya Sagar on which the guest house and sailing club is located, the smaller Madhav Sagar, and a third much smaller man-made lake called Jadhav Sagar at a distance. Apparently, Jadhav Sagar was built on river Mahiyar in 1918 by the then ruler of Gwalior in order to create an inter-linked sequence of water bodies.
Naturally you cannot cover the 300 sq. km of the national forest in two hours, but you do get to cover most of the important parts. The terrain is mostly flat grasslands and you hardly see any big beasts of the nature in the middle of the day. A good time to visit would be early in the morning - around 6:30am when the park gates open. We did manage to get a sighting of the famous crocodiles of Sakhya Sagar lake, along with other game.
By 2:30pm, we reached the outer gates on the other side of the park. This was a day well spent. After thanking the guide and dropping him off at the first gate, we took the road back to Shivpuri town. In another hour we were on the road to Gwalior and then it took us another couple of hours to reach Gwalior.
At Gwalior, we were in two minds. The last time we stayed at Tansen Residency, run by MPT, was a nightmare. However, since there are no other better options, we decided to risk it again. Tansen Residency is centrally located, and now has a refurbished wing that is pretty neat. MPT charged us Rs. 2,500/- for the night for three people and infant, including breakfast and taxes, which is a decent deal.
In the evening, we went to the old town to visit Tansen's makbara (resting place), right next to Mohamed Ghaus's durgah. The durgah is old and has an aura of itself. Tansen's makbara lies along side his son's, and the podium that hosts both is known to also have a renowned turmeric plant. It is said that Tansen would chew the leaves of this shrub every day to make his voice soothing. Such is the renown of this plant that every singer hopeful who visits the place robs the plant a few handful of leaves. So much so that the old shrub has now almost become barren. There is a new one planted by the caretakers, but with the world full of Himesh and company, verdict is still out whether it is as effective as the original one.
The entrance to the makbara is precarious, and you have to really ask around. It goes through a churi (bangles) market, which is as colorful as it can be, and is called 'Tijara'. We bought more gajjak on the road - called Tansen Marg - arguably the best gajjak in the trip, and then roamed about in the more modern part of the city called Wada (castle) and Lashkar - also called Shinde ki Chavani (cantonment). Sadly, the city lacks good eateries. Even the couple of new malls near the zoo lack anything worthwhile in terms of eating options. So we ended up in the restaurant at hotel Central Park close to Tansen Residency and had some very marginal food.
The next day (Day 3) was spent at Gwalior fort, which is seen towering aside the city. Most of the key artefacts from the fort are removed and are now hosted in the museum down in the city, but the fort still has its majesty. Keeping up with the history flavour of the trip, we took a guide and saw the whole place - right from the door where Jhansi ki Rani Laxmibai came asking for help during the 1857 rebellion, to the underground chamber where Aurangzeb had his brother Murad Baksh murdered, to the chamber of Raja Man Singh Tomar, who is credited for building most of the fort and is also hailed as the greatest of the Tomar Kings of Gwalior.
 |
| Fort Gwalior |
By 2:30pm, the sun was burning hot and we decided to head back to Delhi. After a long drive that saw us going into Agra, and spending two hours just trying to get out - in the meanwhile also buying some famous 'petha' sweets - we reached Gurgaon by around 11:30pm.
Overall, Shivpuri is a wonderful hideout with a nice, rustic, outdoor feeling. That, topped with Gwalior town is a refreshing weekend gateaway from Delhi.
Best
Shreekant
- 18 November 2011
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