Western Madhya Pradesh includes the holy cities of Ujjain, one of the sites of the Kumbh Mela, and Maheshwar as well as the holy island of Omkareshwar on the sacred Narmada River. It is also home to Mandu which offers one of India’s finest examples of Afghan architecture.
Category: Madhya Pradesh And Chhattisgarh
The best time to visit this 445-hectare safari park (2674278; [email protected]; Indian/foreigner Rs 15/200, camera/video Rs 40/300, autorickshaw/car Rs 20/40; 6.30am-5.30pm Sat-Thu Mar-Sep, from 8am Oct-Feb) is at 4.30pm, when animals including two white tigers, an albino sloth bear and a lion pace the edges of their cages waiting to be fed. You may want to hire a rickshaw – it’s 5km from the entrance to the basic interpretation centre at the end.
Ujjain initially seems like an outpost of Indore – a nondescript city where sadhus (spiritual men) squatting on the pavement are occasional flashes of colour. But sit at a chai stand on the ghats at sunset, alongside fellow customers clapping along with the music drifting across the water, and it becomes clear what has drawn the sadhus. An energy undeniably pulses through the temples – perhaps because of their Hindu significance or perhaps because the Tropic of Cancer runs through Ujjain.
Rising from the plains, 46km northeast of Bhopal, is a rounded hill topped with some of India’s oldest Buddhist structures.
Judging by the buildings shooting up in the city centre, Raipur will soon look like a state capital should. For now, there isn’t much to recommend it, but it is worth stopping here to change money and have a decent meal before moving south to Bastar.
Pench is but a pug mark compared with Kanha National Park, but there are plenty of reasons to take a trip into this corner of the southern Satpura Hills. Apart from its tigers, leopards and literary associations, the 758-sq-km reserve has the highest concentration of prey of any park in India and some 250 species of bird. You’re also unlikely to get stuck in a jeep jam here.
The Satna road passes the Madla Gate of this 543-sq-km tiger reserve (07732-252135; 1/2/3 drive Indian Rs 25/40/60, foreigner Rs 500/750/1000, video Rs 200, compulsory guide Rs 75, jeep entry/hire Rs 30/800, elephant ride Indian/foreigner Rs 100/600; 6.30-10.30am & 2.30-4pm 1 Oct-15 Feb, 6-10am & 3-5pm 16 Feb-30 Jun) along the Ken River, 32km from Khajuraho. It has a variety of wildlife, including 37 tigers, leopards, nilgais (antelope), chittals (spotted deer), langur monkeys and sambars.
Madhya Pradesh’s hill station feels a long way from steamy central India. The mountain town is surrounded by waterfalls, cave temples, the forested ranges of the Satpura National Park and rock paintings dating back 10, 000 years. Visitors flock here to attend mass religious meetings held by big-name gurus and to scale Chauragarh, or simply to go trekking in a cool climate.
Entered by a gate crowned with a red Ganesh, Orchha’s name (Hidden Place) is singularly appropriate. Temples, palaces and chhatris fight their way out of the encroaching jungle, their spires and domes overshadowing a few ramshackle streets. At sunset, vultures peer down from the temple tops at the Hindu faithful drifting in to chant incantations to Lord Rama, who they believe lives and breathes in Ram Raja Temple.
A regular mini Varanasi, Omkareshwar is an Om-shaped island that has long attracted sadhus in droves but is only beginning to show up on travellers’ itineraries. When the sadhus aren’t sleeping off their pilgrimages in the island’s warren of lanes, among colourful stalls selling souvenir linga, they attend Shri Omkar Mandhata. This cavelike temple, which houses the only shapeless jyothi lingam, is one of many Hindu and Jain monuments on the island.