jaisalmer

View of the fort from an old town haveli

Jaisalmer appears across the desert like a mirage - just like it says in the guidebooks. Soon we are at the hotel, a haveli that I believe is largely new but has incorporated some older features well. I had hoped to be right in the centre near Gandhi Chowk but this is fine with a bar opening onto a central garden that is peaceful and a rooftop restaurant with a great view of the fort.

The first day I go out at sunset to a Brahmin burial site. The cemetery is a calm, almost eerie place, with the ash piles left to blow away in the wind, and small monuments to the dead. The fort looks magnificent - huge, with bastions all around the edge of the defensive rock that brought the maharajas here. 99 of them, big, rounded tapering piles like a sand castle builder's idea of a walled city. I watch the light change in the last sunset rays. The Golden City lives up to its nickname tonight.

Next morning I'm up for an extensive tour of the Fort and the Old City. I'm taken round by a local guide, Manu, laid on by our good friends at Abyss. He gabbles 20 to the dozen, having been doing this for 12 years, so it's a bit difficult to get the gist.

I would have preferred to go around on my own, though he probbaly reduced the hass factor considerably. The whole town is given over to tourism, and every 2 steps someone is trying to drag you into their little emporium of genuine Rajasthani artworks, pashmina scarves or cushion covers. In a city of 50,000 where the only industry is tourism, it's inevitable that everyone is looking for chances to empty our wallets, and I can't blame them a bit.

We start off at the entrance to the fort, where the only route in twists through a series of elephant proof gates, six in all, designed to protect against invasions, of which there have been many, but none successful. Muslims from Pakistan and Afghanistan, the Moghuls, other Rajput clans - everyone's had a go at some time.

Just inside is the main square, bustling with people and with some of the finest examples of the carved sandstone for which the town is famous. Carved as fine as hardwood, delicate pierced screens and ornamentation.

The fort encloses a dense network of narrow lanes, most less than 2m wide. Wading throught the touts for tourist trinkets we arrive at the Jain temple perhaps the most impressive individual building here. Actually, it's two temples side by side, one daylit, the other extremely dark and secret, with areas recessing into pitch darkness.

I'm busy taking a photo looking out of one of these when a voice hisses next to me: 'Hey Keith, fancy bumping into you here!' In the tomb-like darkness somehow Rita has spotted me, and scared em half to death. Rita I've met at two successive lunch stops on the way from Delhi, and got to know on a tourist on the road sort of way. She moans about her guide, and how she wants more space and quiet. Meanwhile I'm trying to soak up the space and quiet of the sanctuary.

The intricately carved interior includes scenes from the sex lives of the gods. The priests get me to sit and contemplate for about 2 minutes (Rita has slipped away) but even they are on the lookout for a donation, it seems.

We also visit one of the Hindu temples, and I watch the people going abut their rituals: a genuflection to the image, a chant, lighting of candles, layinbg of flowers, touching various points, ringing bells.

There's still a population of 1000 in the Fort itself, but only Brahmins and Rajputs, the two highest clan groups, are allowed to live here. They are also of course the closest supporters of the Maharaj, who still lives in the palace. However, most of those that live here appear to be very poor. Most of the city outside the fort is Muslim now, 95% of it in fact, though it's hard to tell by dress in most cases.

We continue, dropping down to the old town outside the fort, for a tour of the best haveli. One is designed for two brothers to live in, and the two halves of the facade, though harmonious, are different in detail.

The best are group of five, built for 5 Jain brothers in a row, and with amazing quality to the details. One of them is open to the public and you can get a feel for how they worked - inward looking but with all rooms open to the central courtyard, and at the top some of them open to the sky. There are some of the best views of the fort and the city from the upper levels. They rise up 5 storeys from street level and reputedly have 5 levels of cellars below. The brothers were merchants, the Jain non-violent philosophy prohibits them from taking up most other professions. Who do I find on the roof? It's Rita, with guard in tow.

Manu tries to drag me through his mates' shops but I manage to avoid most of it, which doesn't do much for his commission, and he shows it.