How to choose a camp in Jawai
Not a national park: there is no single gate and no park lodge.
Scattered camps: camps, lodges and homestays spread across the farmland and granite around the Jawai Bandh reservoir, near villages such as Bera.
Each runs its own safaris: with its own vehicles and naturalists, so the choice matters far more than in a tiger reserve, where everyone shares the same zones and rules.
- First
- Naturalists and trackers
- Second
- Ethics on drives
- Third
- The community
- Fourth
- Comfort
- Park gate
- None; each camp runs its own drives
- The naturalists and trackers: how well they know the individual leopards and the landscape, and how calmly they behave at a sighting.
- Ethics: any link to baiting, chasing or spotlighting, how many guests share a jeep, and whether the camp holds back when vehicles crowd a cave.
- The community: whether it employs local people, pays fairly for land and supports the herders who bear the cost of living with leopards.
- Only then, comfort: the tents, the food, the pool and the quiet.
- The 2026 ruling: since 2026, a Rajasthan High Court ruling requires safari vehicles and operators to be registered and fitted with GPS.
- What it prohibits: night safaris, baiting, artificial lights, drones and the gathering of vehicles near leopard caves.
- The 2015 order: the court also ordered strict enforcement of a state order barring new hotels and resorts within one kilometre of the leopard conservation reserves.
- A good camp: will be happy to tell you how it complies.
- Read more: our main Jawai guide explains the landscape, and our page on wildlife lodges sets out what we look for everywhere.
SUJAN JAWAI
- Opened
- 2013
- Founders
- Anjali and Jaisal Singh
- Size
- A small tented camp
- Member of
- Relais and Chateaux
- Sister camps
- SUJAN Sher Bagh, The Serai
- Book
- Well ahead for the cool months
The camp and its story
The family: created by Anjali and Jaisal Singh, the family behind the SUJAN camps, including SUJAN Sher Bagh at Ranthambore and The Serai near Jaisalmer.
Their words: they describe it as a conservation tourism project.
- One of the first: among the first luxury camps in Jawai, opened in 2013.
- The setting: among the granite outcrops and scrub.
- The design: drawn from the dress of the Rabari and the colours of the landscape, with wildlife portraits, vintage furniture and canvas.
- Recognition: a member of Relais and Chateaux.
The tents
Small by design: a handful of tented suites spread among the boulders, so the camp never feels crowded and the evenings stay quiet.
For two: suites for couples, each with a private deck looking out over the granite and the scrub.
- For families: larger arrangements that share a verandah or sit a little apart, for families or friends travelling together.
- For a whole party: a private encampment can sometimes be taken for a group, with its own lounge, dining area and fire circle under the stars.
- How we book: we match the tent to your party and your pace when we plan, and confirm what is available for your dates.
What you do there
The Jawai rhythm: wilderness drives at dawn and in the late afternoon, led by naturalists who know the leopards well.
Between drives: walks and hikes with Rabari guides, temple trails to the hill shrines, village walks and birding.
- On horseback: rides through the fields and riverbeds on Marwari horses.
- Local team: many of the field staff come from the surrounding villages.
- Meals: in camp and often out among the rocks, with long, memorable evenings around the fire.
Before you book
Suites go first: the camp is small, and the family suites and private encampment are booked earliest, especially over Christmas and New Year.
Allocation: we request the suite that suits you, but the final choice stays with the camp.
- In winter: tents have heaters, hot water bottles and warm bedding.
- Tell the camp: the ages of children, mobility, diet and any fear of heights or open vehicles. Some activities have age limits.
- Thanking the team: tipping your naturalist, tracker and driver at the end of a stay is customary.
Getting to the camp
By road: about 160 km from Udaipur and 165 km from Jodhpur, roughly two and a half to three hours.
- By train: Falna station is about half an hour from camp.
- By charter: private aircraft can use the Sirohi airfield, a little over an hour away.
Who it suits
As little compromise as possible: serious wildlife with real comfort, and a camp whose ethics we trust.
- Who: couples, photographers and families, who can take the larger family tents.
- The honest note: it is the most expensive way to see Jawai, and for many guests the right one.
A day at a good Jawai camp
Before dawn
A soft knock: a tray of tea or coffee arrives while it is still dark.
- Into the jeep: in layers, with blankets and a hot water bottle in winter, as the first light touches the granite.
- Already listening: the naturalist and tracker are alert for alarm calls.
Morning
- Breakfast: often among the rocks or back at camp, with fresh fruit, parathas, eggs to order and more chai.
- Before the heat: a Rabari walk, a visit to the reservoir or a ride.
Midday
- Rest: lunch is light and unhurried, then guests swim, read or sleep.
- The best seat in Jawai: in the cool months, a shaded deck with a view of the hills.
Late afternoon and evening
Tea and something sweet: before the evening drive to the ridges as the leopards wake.
- Sunset: the jeep pulls up at a granite outcrop for drinks by a fire.
- Dinner: under the stars, with stories of the day's sightings.
At night
Your tent: the bed warmed, the lamps low and the canvas glowing.
- Listen: nightjars in the scrub, an owl on the rocks, a dog barking in the village when something passes.
- Safety: staff walk guests to their tents after dark, and nobody wanders the camp alone.
Other camps and lodges
The range: smaller tented camps, farm lodges and resorts, from simple to genuinely comfortable.
Ethics vary more than comfort: some operators have been accused of baiting leopards with livestock, chasing animals, using lights at night and crowding cave mouths with jeeps.
- Rules take time to bite: these are exactly the practices the 2026 ruling sought to end.
- Our rule: we only book camps we have visited ourselves, whose naturalists we have driven with and whose practices we have seen.
- No list here: because the field changes quickly, we do not name other camps on this page.
- Ask us instead: tell us your style and budget, and we will recommend the ones we currently trust and explain why. It is the most important decision of a Jawai stay.
Questions to ask any Jawai camp
Registration: are your vehicles and operators registered, and fitted with GPS?
Space: how many guests do you put in a jeep?
- Crowds: what do you do when other vehicles are already at a sighting?
- Bait and lights: have you ever used bait, or lights at night?
- People: are your naturalists and trackers from the local villages, and how do you support herders who lose livestock to leopards?
- The test: a good camp answers openly and without hesitation.
Farm lodges and homestays
The style: a few families host guests in farmhouses and small lodges, simpler and more personal, with home cooking and an inside view of village life.
- The best of them: work with excellent local naturalists.
- Ask about facilities: bathrooms, heating in winter and cooling in summer, because they vary.
- Same ethics questions: as for any camp. Our page on rural homestays explains this kind of stay.
Location matters more than you think
A patchwork: granite domes, fields, villages, thorn scrub and water, with the leopards' favourite hills and the camps scattered across it.
Outside the tent: we check whether you look at granite and fields or at a road, and whether the camp is quiet at night.
- Distance to the hills: how far the best leopard hills are by jeep.
- Lawful land: under the 2015 state order the High Court has told the authorities to enforce, no new hotels or resorts may be built within one kilometre of the leopard conservation reserves.
- Good neighbours: the best camps hire from the village, buy from its farmers and keep their lights low and music quiet.
- Why it matters: the herders and the leopards both live within earshot.
- Missing the point: a camp that feels separate from the place around it usually is.
What a luxury tent in Jawai means
Permanent or semi-permanent: luxury tents in Rajasthan stand on raised plinths, with wooden floors, rugs and furniture.
Full comfort: proper beds and full bathrooms with hot water, and many have a private deck or verandah.
- Built on
- Raised stone or wooden plinths
- Inside
- Proper beds, full bathrooms, hot water
- Winter
- Heaters and hot water bottles
- Trade-offs
- Some sound, dust, summer heat
- Through the day: cool in the shade by day and, in the best camps, warmed on winter nights.
- What you hear: birds at dawn, wind over the rocks, perhaps a hyena calling far off.
- Honest trade-offs: canvas lets in some sound and dust, winter nights can still be cold, and the afternoon heat of summer is felt more than in stone.
- Light sleepers and summer travellers: ask about the specific tents and how they are heated or cooled.
- More on tented stays: our guide to luxury desert camps and our luxury desert camp guide.
Heritage stays nearby
- Rawla Narlai
- About an hour
- Kumbhalgarh
- About two hours
- Mount Abu
- About 2.5 hours
- Udaipur, Jodhpur
- About three hours
Rawla Narlai
The house: about an hour from Jawai, in the village of Narlai, a seventeenth-century hunting lodge of the Jodhpur royal family.
As a hotel: restored and opened in 1996, and still run by the family behind Ajit Bhawan in Jodhpur.
- What a rawla is: a nobleman's country residence, smaller than a palace and less formal than a fort.
- The setting: beneath a great granite hill crowned by a white stone elephant, among more than twenty old carved temples.
- Known for: dinners in a stepwell by the light of hundreds of lamps.
- Who it suits: travellers who want temples, village life and one leopard drive, on the way between Jawai and Udaipur or Ranakpur.
- The background: our journal piece on rawlas and thikanas.
Kumbhalgarh
Where: about two hours away, in the hills around Rana Kumbha's fortress, with several comfortable resorts and heritage stays.
- Why: a night here, combined with Ranakpur, breaks the journey to Udaipur beautifully.
- Compare them: our guide to luxury hotels in Kumbhalgarh.
Udaipur and Jodhpur
Close enough for a long day: both are about three hours away, though we do not recommend it.
- Why stay over: leopards reward patience, and the dawn drive is often the best.
- If you must: choose from our guides to luxury hotels in Udaipur or luxury hotels in Jodhpur, and leave before dawn.
Mount Abu
- Where: about two and a half hours south, the hill station of Mount Abu, with old palaces and summer homes of the princely families, some now hotels.
- When: a good next stop if you are continuing to Gujarat. See our page on Mount Abu palace stays.
Which stay for which traveller
Honeymooners and couples
Where: one of the suites for two at SUJAN JAWAI, set a little apart.
- How: dinners for two among the rocks and nothing to do between drives but rest.
- Pair it: our honeymoon journeys often combine Jawai with Udaipur's lakes.
Families and groups of friends
A family of four: one of SUJAN JAWAI's family arrangements, two tents sharing a verandah.
- A larger family or group: a private encampment, when one is free, with its own pool and fire circle.
- Children: those old enough to sit quietly on drives usually love Jawai.
Serious photographers
The camp: one with experienced naturalists, and a private vehicle.
- Why: you can stay with a relaxed leopard and position yourself for the light.
- How long: three nights is the minimum we suggest.
Travellers who want culture with a little wildlife
Where: Rawla Narlai, with the temples and villages around it.
- What else: Ranakpur and Kumbhalgarh, and a single leopard drive with a naturalist we trust.
- The result: you leave having seen far more than leopards.
Food at the camps
From nearby farms: the best camps cook with local vegetables, milk and grains.
Two kitchens in one: Marwari dishes mixed with lighter international cooking.
- Marwari dishes: bajra rotis with white butter, ker sangri, gatte in yoghurt curry and dal baati churma, with laal maas for meat-eaters.
- Lighter food: salads, grills and simple European dishes.
- The Rabari kitchen: built around milk, buttermilk and ghee. Walk with a herding family and you may be offered tea brewed over a small fire.
- Dietary needs: tell your camp in advance, including Jain or vegan food.
- The dishes explained: our Rajasthani food guide.
What money buys in Jawai
The people: the best naturalists and trackers are experienced, calm, deeply knowledgeable and in demand.
Space in the jeep: not shoulder to shoulder with strangers.
- Time with a leopard: the freedom to stay as long as it is relaxed.
- The rest: a camp on land chosen with care, food cooked well, warm tents on cold nights and staff who know the herders by name.
- Restraint: an ethical camp will sometimes leave a sighting early, refuse to join a crowd of jeeps, or turn down a guest's request to get closer.
- Community investment: made whether or not anyone notices. It costs money and protects the very thing you came to see.
- On a modest budget: spend on the naturalist and the vehicle rather than the tent. A simple room with an excellent guide in a small jeep beats a grand tent with a rushed, crowded safari.
- The wider picture: our guide to the cost of luxury in Rajasthan.
Seasons, closures and booking
October to March: the main season, with warm days, cool nights and soft light.
November to February: migratory birds on the reservoir.
- Main season
- October to March
- Winter birds
- November to February
- Book months ahead
- Christmas, New Year, holiday weekends
- Hot months
- April to June
- Monsoon
- July to September
- The busiest weeks: Christmas, New Year and Indian holiday weekends, when the best tents book out months ahead.
- April to June: serious heat, though some photographers come for leopards that can be easier to find near water and shade.
- Closures: some camps close in the hottest or wettest months, and the monsoon can interrupt drives. Check before planning around a particular camp.
- Month by month: our best time to visit Jawai guide.
Building Jawai into your journey
From Jodhpur: drive south in the morning, breaking the road at a Bishnoi village or the stepwells and temples on the way, arriving for lunch.
From Udaipur: by way of Ranakpur, or with a night at Kumbhalgarh.
- A soft landing after: a night at Rawla Narlai or a stay in Udaipur's lake palaces.
- Big cats and birds: Jawai is one of three stops on our big cats and birds journey.
- Other journeys: it fits beautifully into Mewar and Marwar, Rajasthan for two and our photography journey.
- The days on the ground: our Jawai itinerary.
Booking tips from our planners
Two nights, ideally three: four to six drives.
Vehicle sharing: ask how many guests share one, and consider a private jeep if you are a keen photographer.
- The 2026 rules: ask how the camp complies on registration, GPS, night drives and crowding at caves.
- Heating and cooling: check whether tents are heated in winter and cooled in the warmer months.
- Tell the camp in advance: dietary needs, mobility and the ages of any children. Some activities have age limits.
- Arrive by lunch: so you are rested for the first evening drive.
- On the map: plan your journey so Jawai sits between Udaipur and Jodhpur, with Ranakpur or Kumbhalgarh on the way.
