Have camel, will travel.

The sun was sliding over the horizon of the silent desert when, like a mirage, the short, bandy legged man in a lunghi materialized out of nowhere, trudging up the side of the sand dune.  He raised the bulging burlap sack in his hand and said, “You would like to buy some Kingfisher?”

It was New Year’s Eve, not one of us had thought to bring any alcohol to ring in the New Year.  Not to mention we’d spent a hot, dusty day on camel back.  The only answer was – “Of course we want it!”  We bought the lot and toasted the enterprising beer-wallah and the end of another year with warm swigs of Vijay Mallya’s finest.

Doesn't he look haughty yet Muppet-like?

The day had started with me sitting on the balcony of my hotel room on the walls of the ancient fort city of Jaisalmer, Rajastan.  The sheer glamour of staying in the fort walls made me feel a bit like Aishwarya Rai in Jodha Akbar.  Without the jewels, silk, or Miss Universe looks…. but still, it was a spectacular place to watch the sun rise. 

My group for the camel trek met our guides early and we were driven out into the desert in jeeps to meet our camels and camel drivers.  My camel’s name was Fidel.  “As in Castro?” I ask the proud owner, whose name turned out to be Cuba.  Go figure.

Fidel looked like a cross between a Muppet and a haughty butler.  (Don’t all camels?) He glared at me balefully and looked like he wanted to spit on me, but Cuba assured me that his camels were all gentle, obedient creatures.  Fidel spat out the thing he’d been chewing, raised his head and made a sound exactly like a toilet backing up.  Then he picked up his snack and got back to ruminating.

“What’s he eating?” I asked Cuba.

“A bone.”

“Why is he eating a bone?”

“Non-veg camel,” said Cuba. 

Mounting a camel is nothing like mounting a horse. It’s more like scrambling up the side of a garden shed.  And that’s when the camel is kneeling down.  It took a couple of tries and a shove from Cuba for me to get up.  I was feeling pretty proud of myself when Fidel gave a sudden lurch that nearly shot me forward down his neck and head first into the sand.  Turns out that when a kneeling camel stands up, it goes hind end first and then the front end follows.

The first stop on our two day trek was to a camel watering stop, where not one of them drank a drop.  You can lead a camel to water….

Riding Fidel wasn’t hard since I didn’t have to steer.  I just had to sit there and he fell into his place in line.  We walked at a steady pace with the occasional trot.  (The men all complained about pain and discomfort on the trots… sorry, guys!)  I had plenty of time to admire the desert scenery and imagine that I was part of caravan on the Silk Road hundreds of years ago.

Two days in the saddle was quite enough for my unaccustomed rear, but they were two of the best days ever.  The strange beauty of the desert, the banter of Cuba and his colleagues, our unexpected beer-wallah, the way our campfire felt so tiny in the middle of the desert, sleeping with nothing but a bedroll between me and the stars… there were too many wonderful moments.  My favourite one was shortly after six am, when one of the camel drivers quietly woke us all up so we watch the first sun of the new year rise over the Thar Desert. Utterly spectacular.

P.S. I could have stayed there for the rest of my life -- Cuba made me an offer of marriage, but with no camels or goats to offer for my dowry, I didn’t think it fair to accept.