A town, not a monument
Why it is still lived in: over the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries the rulers built new palaces in the town below and moved down. The families who served them stayed.
What that means today: houses, temples, schools, shops and guesthouses packed inside walls built for defence.
- The hill
- Trikuta, about 76 metres above the desert
- The size
- About 460 by 230 metres, three rings of walls
- Upper perimeter
- About four kilometres
- The stone
- Yellow sandstone from the hills around the city
- Nickname
- Sonar Qila, the golden fort
- How rare it is: most of Rajasthan's great forts are now monuments. Jaisalmer is one of very few anywhere still lived in on this scale.
- The shape: the walls follow the hill exactly, a long rough triangle with a narrow waist, so the fort looks as if it grew from the rock.
- Read the history: our Jaisalmer Fort guide covers the Bhatis, the sieges and every gate.
Up the ramp, the way residents climb it
Akhai Pol, at the foot of the hill
- What it is: the gate in the outer wall, where the town's traffic gives way to the fort.
- Look back: at the sloping pitching wall that holds the soft hillside in place. You will often see repair work here.
Suraj Pol, the gate of the sun
- What it is: the gate whose stone turns from grey to gold in a few minutes after sunrise.
- Look up: some bastions are still topped with rounded stones, the kind defenders rolled down onto attackers.
Ganesh Pol and Hawa Pol
- Ganesh Pol: named for the god of beginnings, the deity Rajasthani households greet first at any threshold.
- Hawa Pol: the gate of the wind, which catches a cool draught even in March. Pause here before the last stretch.
Dussehra Chowk, the square
- What it is: the square where the court once gathered, below the seven-storey front of the royal palace.
- What to do: have a cup of tea at a stall and watch the fort wake up.
Who lives inside the walls
Priestly families: Brahmin households who served the temples and the court, and whose old havelis still stand in the lanes.
Rajput families: descendants of the warriors and nobles of the court.
- Jain merchants: the community that paid for the seven Jain temples and protected their library of manuscripts for centuries.
- Craftsmen and traders: stone carvers, tailors, shopkeepers and the families who run tea stalls, cafes and guesthouses.
- The royal family: they moved down to the town long ago, but the Fort Palace Museum still holds the court's history.
- How to meet them: with the right introduction from a local guide, you may be asked in for tea. Accept it as the honour it is.
A day inside the fort
Before seven
- The first sounds: temple bells, a pressure cooker whistle, the slap of water on a doorstep being washed.
- The first visitors: milk carried up the ramp and boys with school bags running down it.
Seven to nine
- Worship: the Jain temples fill with hymns and the smell of sandalwood paste. Women carry brass pots to the shrines.
- Dussehra Chowk: vegetables laid out, tea stalls lit and old men reading the newspaper aloud.
Late morning to afternoon
- The crowds arrive: tour groups fill the palace and the souvenir lanes, and the stone starts to radiate heat.
- The residents retreat: behind thick walls and small windows, into rooms built to stay cool.
The last hour of light
- On the roofs: families come up onto their terraces, children fly kites and washing comes in.
- On the ramparts: the walls turn from yellow to gold as the sun drops over the desert to the west.
After dark
- The fort floodlit: from the town below or the ridge to the north, the hill seems to float above the roofs.
- Inside: quiet lanes, a few cafe lights and the evening prayers at the Laxminath temple.
Houses built for the desert
One stone: fort, havelis and temples share the same fine yellow sandstone, soft enough to carve when freshly cut and harder as it weathers.
Packed tight: buildings lean against one another to save space and to shade each other from the sun.
- Thick walls, small windows: on the sunny side, with courtyards and roofs open to the cool night air.
- The jharokhas: stone balconies screened with lattice jut over the lanes, so the women of a household could watch the street unseen. Read what is a jharokha.
- The doors: heavy wooden doors studded with iron, and often a painted Ganesh above the door of a newly married couple.
- The roofs: packed earth over stone slabs, built for a place where it hardly ever rained.
Faith on the hill
The seven Jain temples: Shvetambara temples built between the twelfth and sixteenth centuries with merchant money, joined by passages and stairs.
The Gyan Bhandar: a library of old manuscripts protected here for centuries. It is not always open, so ask your guide to check.
- The Laxminath temple: the main Hindu shrine of the fort, small and busy. Families stop by on the way home with a coin and a flower.
- The small shrines: set into walls and corners, freshly marked with vermilion each morning.
- The legend: the Bhatis claim descent from Krishna's line, and a well in the fort is linked with a prophecy that a descendant would build a kingdom here. Told as legend.
- Etiquette: shoes off, no leather inside the Jain temples, and ask about cameras at each one. See temple etiquette.
Water, then and now
How it was designed: for a town that used very little water. Brief monsoon storms ran off the hill through the drains instead of sinking in.
What changed: piped water, then tourism. Guesthouses, rooftop restaurants and shops use far more water than the old town ever did.
- The old supply
- Carried up the hill by hand, in pots
- The old drains
- The ghut nali, channels in four directions
- The problem
- Water seeping into clay layers inside the hill
- On the watch list
- World Monuments Fund, from 1996
- Most at risk
- The monsoon, after heavy rain
- Why it matters: when the clay-rich soil inside the hill gets wet, it loses strength. Foundations settle, walls crack and stone bulges.
- The damage: parts of the walls and buildings such as the Rani ka Mahal, the queen's palace, have collapsed over the years, often after heavy rain.
- The repairs: conservation groups have replaced drains, relaid paving and repaired walls with lime mortar. The fort is still fragile.
Why we sleep outside the walls
The water load: a traveller in a hotel inside the walls uses many times the water a resident family uses, and every shower adds to the load on the hill.
It is not a boycott: the fort's residents depend on visitors, so we spend generously inside the walls by day.
- You lose nothing: outside, you sleep somewhere quiet, with a pool, a garden and the fort lit on the skyline.
- You gain a view: the best room in Jaisalmer is one with the fort on its horizon, not under its floor.
- Our wider approach: see our note on travelling responsibly and our sustainable travel piece.
How to be a good guest in a living fort
Walk with a local guide: most of the fort's stories live in people, not plaques. Ours are from Jaisalmer, and many have relatives on the hill.
Ask before photographing: people, doorways and courtyards. An open door is not an invitation.
- Carry a refillable bottle: and use the bathroom at your hotel before you set out. Less water and plastic on the hill.
- Never climb loose walls: stay away from crumbling edges and parapets on the ramparts.
- Buy from makers: textiles, puppets and embroidery directly from the families who make them, not from anyone who leads you to a shop and waits outside.
- Watch for motorbikes: residents use them in the lanes, and they come round blind corners quickly.
- Tip and donate: pay your guide well, drink tea in family cafes and leave a donation at the temples.
The fort through the year
Winter mornings: residents wrap up in shawls and gather around the tea stalls. Bring a warm layer for the early walk.
Spring: the light is clear, the days warm and the Desert Festival brings music to the town below.
- October to March
- The season, warm days and cool nights
- December and January
- Cold before dawn
- February and early March
- Close to perfect
- May and June
- Stone too hot to touch by midday
- July and August
- Quiet, beautiful light, most risk to the walls
- Summer: the lanes empty by late morning, and life moves behind thick walls until the evening.
- The monsoon: brief and precious. The town is quiet and the light wonderful, but stay away from loose walls after heavy rain.
- Month by month: our best time to visit Jaisalmer guide.
Eating in and around the fort
Ker sangri: dried desert berries and beans cooked with spices, the taste of the Thar you will find nowhere else.
Bajra roti: millet flatbread, often eaten with white butter and garlic chutney in winter.
- Kadhi and buttermilk: cooling yoghurt dishes that make sense on a hot afternoon.
- Chai on the square: sweet, strong and served in small glasses at the stalls in Dussehra Chowk.
- Family cafes: small rooftop cafes inside the walls are a good way to spend money with residents. Use water carefully.
- Read more: our food of Jaisalmer guide names the dishes and the safest places.
Festivals on the hill
Diwali: in October or November the fort is lit with oil lamps along its walls and doorways, and families visit each other with sweets. See Diwali in Rajasthan.
The Desert Festival: usually in February, ending on the full moon of Magh, when the town below fills with music and the finale moves out to the dunes at Sam. See the Desert Festival.
- Makar Sankranti: in mid-January, kites rise from the rooftops of the fort and the old town.
- Weddings: in the cool-season wedding months, bands and processions squeeze through lanes barely wider than a camel.
- Our advice: festival dates follow the lunar calendar and change each year. We confirm them before you book.
What most visitors miss
The temples during worship: come before nine to hear the hymns. It is the difference between a museum and a place of faith.
A roof at the last light: we arrange tea on a family's roof on the western edge when we can, and we pay them for the privilege.
- The ramparts at home: on some bastions you find cannon, on others washing lines and potted tulsi, the sacred basil.
- The haveli museum: one old Brahmin family's house, said to be about four and a half centuries old, is open over several floors.
- The palace rooftops: keep climbing in the Fort Palace Museum. The rooms grow smaller and the views wider.
- The night view: after dinner, ten minutes on the ridge north of the fort, when the floodlit walls seem to float.
Where to stay, with the fort on your horizon
Suryagarh
- Where: about thirteen kilometres out on the Sam road, a modern fortress built in Jaisalmer stone around courtyards and a pool.
- Who it suits: families and anyone who wants calm after a morning in the lanes.
The Serai
- Where: SUJAN's tented camp on private desert land off the Jodhpur road, about forty minutes from town.
- Who it suits: couples, and guests who want the desert itself.
In the town below
- Where: heritage hotels below the walls, among them Mandir Palace, the later residence of Jaisalmer's rulers.
- Who it suits: travellers who want to walk to the fort gate in the morning.
Beyond the walls
The merchant havelis: Patwon ki Haveli, the grandest cluster, and Salim Singh ki Haveli, the most dramatic single house.
Gadisar Lake at sunrise: the old reservoir south of town, with its chhatris and ghats.
- Bada Bagh at sunset: the royal cenotaphs north of town. See Bada Bagh.
- The dunes: a night at Sam or the quieter dunes of Khuri, with Manganiyar music under the stars.
- The abandoned village: Kuldhara, a short drive west, a deserted village wrapped in legend.
- The whole plan: our Jaisalmer itinerary and the Under the Thar Sky journey.