Philippa Gregory

India

Mail on Sunday

The sun, at first only a glow behind high rocky hills, is suddenly up in the sky, casting long morning shadows of the scrubland trees over the horses, dozing grooms, kitchen tent, and cluster of pavilion type tents. Last night’s campfire, stirred into life, throws out a delicious warmth against the chill of the desert night. I have a hot cup of tea cupped in my hands and this is my last day of our riding safari in Rajahstan, India.

Indians themselves call Rajahstan the most romantic and glamorous of all the districts of India, though they roll their eyes in impatience at the self-conscious importance of the dozens of Maharajahs who still wield all the influence in this north-west district. It is an area of the sub-continent where connections run very deep: from kin to kin, from lord to vassal and from the past to the present. To ride through it on horseback, preceded by the rippling flag of a Maharajah’s cousin is a combination of the powerful present: the saddle sores, the heat, the joy; and the past: an experience so untouched by time that one might almost be a 15th century hunting party as you see enamelled on plates in the rich Indian museums.

All the more so, since the horses are the direct descendants of those drawn on the plates and woven on the rich tapestries. Our little group of just nine visitors are riding Marwari horses, from the stud at Dundlod Castle where Bonnie Singh – a character straight from the pages of Rudyard Kipling – has dedicated his life to saving the pure bloodline of these mediaeval horses.

They are the most extraordinary horses that you will ever see. Rangy, lean, tough as doormats with hoofs that can scrabble over rock like goats, they can canter all day and barely show a sweat and then the next morning be fresh and ready to go again; fresher than us riders at any rate, who each fell in love with our own allocated horse. Most engaging are their Arab-like pretty faces and intelligent eyes, most extraordinary the trademark of the Mawari – their curly ears which touch at the top when they are going forward and happy, and swivel back to point outwards when they are curious or listening to their rider’s voice.

Bonnie Singh, the ‘lord’ of Dundlod Castle has created a stud for these beauties to save them from extinction or dilution of the breed. He reckons there are about 200 pure Marwaris left in India, and he travels the country finding the very best and bringing them to his stud in the shadow of his story-book castle. He personally chooses the horses to suit the abilities of the visiting riders, and plans and leads the route. Most days we ride for a few hours in the morning, stop for a hot Indian lunch cooked in the shade of a grove of trees, or once, most memorably, on the verandah of Bonnie’s cousin’s half-ruined summer palace, and then ride on till sunset to clatter in through the fortified doorway of an ancient castle or through the grand gate of another cousin’s luxury hotel.

Among the many great pleasures of this holiday is the vulgar pleasure of showing off: riding-in preceded by Bonnie Singh’s standard bearer and flag, in his smart dark green uniform and immaculate horse, and dismounting in the courtyard of an exquisitely pretty castle watched by less fortunate tourists who have just tumbled out of a bus and are still feeling travel sick. We might be dirtier, we might have bruises where they have not, we might have spent four days in the same clothes – but we are the absolute focus of envious attention. Like most horse rides, the best bit was the end.

Facilities in the castles were in inverse ratio to the picturesque. In general, the more beautiful the castle, the more twisted the stone stairs and dizzying the battlements, the more unreliable the electricity. But we had a private bathroom with hot and cold running water every night, and a lumpy bed with immaculately clean ancient linen, and the pleasure of knowing that the horses were being tenderly massaged and washed down and fed and bedded down themselves at stables nearby and that in the morning we would ride out again.

We rode from Dundlod Castle, to Bhaironji three hours from Jaipur, and had an introduction to rural India that I would not have missed for the world. We rode through villages which were little more than a cluster of shanty houses around a well, under a shady banyan tree where everyone gathered. We rode on sandy tracks weaving through miles and miles of fields where women and children were harvesting millet, and gathering kindling, where men were felling trees and ploughing behind a single, dainty-stepping camel. This land would be desert but for the meticulous care of the farming: every field edged with a bank and embroidered with irrigation gutters, every successful crop watered, weeded and harvested by hand. We were in a land where what we would call poverty is a traditional way of life. In villages, in fields, there were always smiling people and excited children who raced to the gateways and doors to wave and call out as our little cavalcade rode by. In the smaller towns the horses picked their way around street sellers cooking food on the pavement, barbers shaving clients, bead-makers, fabric sellers, produce sellers, furniture makers, cobblers, and everywhere there was the cacophony of Hindi music, calls to prayer, horns, bicycle bells, shouts, laughter, and the noise and colour and sounds of exuberant life.

I have been to some wonderful places; but I have never before had a culture explode into my senses as India did: from the dishevelled beauty of the high forts, to the noisy joy of the bazaars, from soaring eagles to the squawking green parakeets.

It was a trip of two very distinct halves, and luckily, we did the dusty bit first, otherwise, I doubt we would have had the courage to do it at all. Once we said an affectionate farewell to our horses (Chimeri and Queen of the Night) we slid into the back seat of our Ambassador car (don’t think limousine, think Morris Minor) closed our eyes through the most terrifying driving on some of the worst roads in the world, and arrived at the Hotel Rambagh Palace in Jaipur. Jaipur was built at about the same time as Bath in England and it is a grander more adventurous more exciting city by far, from the famous Palace of the Winds, where the enclosed wives and concubines of the Rajah could sit behind a beautiful carved three storey façade and see the market but not be seen, to the explosively busy streets below. The Maharajah Ram Singh, decided, to celebrate the visit of King Edward VII by painting the entire city seaside-rock pink, and pink it remains to this day. Think of the terraces of Bath, painted pink, and crammed with an orchestra of traffic and street sellers and sacred cows everywhere… no – it cannot be done. But that is Jaipur.

Outside Jaipur we visited the Amber Palace, a massive fort enclosing a palace of exquisite beauty. This is India – what can I say? – We approached it, riding on an elephant, and on the way back, walking down on foot, another elephant ate my garland of marigolds. There are moments of happiness that one cannot easily explain, but having an elephant eat my marigolds does it for me.

We lunched at the Samode Palace Hotel on the best tandoori chicken that has ever been made in this universe or any other, The manager allowed us to peep into the Maharajah suite (as used by the owner, the Maharajah). From the private Jacuzzi on the turret you can look up to the towering rocky mountains above you, and no-one will look down but an eagle. To relax you can sit on a silver plated sofa, and dine in your private turret from a marble inlaid table, and all for around £200 a night.

On the morning we were due to visit the Taj Mahal I will confess to being so excited that I woke all through the night in order to sit on my bed, drinking my early morning cup of tea and watch the familiar white dome and minarets emerge from the mist. We had that delightfully absurd ‘poster experience’ when you cannot help but remark that it looks just like the poster, and then the much rarer surprise of discovering that in real life it is even more beautiful, that close-up it is covered in an exquisite tracery of inlaid gems, and richly carved.

We had a full day in the great city of Delhi and took a cycle rickshaw ride through the bazaar through streets to narrow that we were almost brushed by the brilliant sari silks hanging up for sale, and caught tantalising glimpses of cool wealthy interiors set back behind high walls, safe from the scuffle and noise of the bazaar. And we saw ‘new’ Delhi, British Delhi and the massive certainty of the Lutyens-Baker deigns for the civil service, and experienced that other strange sensation of the traveller; ‘It’s just like home!’ since every town planner in the Victorian period knocked up a civic building on the grandiose lines of the British Raj.

And then, far too soon, it was time to leave. I had an astounding, breathtaking, emotional imaginative inspiring experience. Should you go? Go as soon as you can. It is magic.