THE ULTIMATE DESERT SAFARI

It was a full moon night when we were in the Thar Desert. The January winter was at its peak and the chilly wind was blowing. Our camp was 32kms away from Jaisalmer, in the Sam sand dunes, the place where the endless fun began. A bonfire was lit and was warming up the whole atmosphere and Rajasthani folk music and dance were adorning the night with their excellence. Our usual friends’enjoyment session was going on and when the folk music session was over, we took on the party with our trance music collection which we played in the background and everyone started dancing to the tunes. The fun kept on increasing with every second and we all jumped and danced around the bonfire. At that time, one of the owners of the camp who was our age became our friend and started talking to us. We started telling him how we wanted to see the stars in the open sky while standing on the sand dunes in the vast desert. He suddenly got up and told us to come with him. He had a vintage jeep and he drove it towards the sand dunes where the desert began to appear. The wind became more chilly and it was absolutely amazing. We went towards the sand dunes where camels were sitting quietly in the lonely desert in the dark night. We started climbing the sand dunes which were very difficult to climb because of the excessive sand of course. It was fun climbing those huge sand dunes and then we sat there talking. The full moon was so bright that it lit up the whole area and the sand was shining magnificently in the white light.

Then he took us to another sand dune just nearby and the view was absolutely amazing. The sand was brightly lit up and we rolled down the dune and just lied there to enjoy the scenary. The night was quite and there was absolute silence which was blissful. We were lying there for quite sometime and then decided to return when we spotted a jeep. The jeep belonged to the other camp owner and they were basically taking people to do dune bash in the desert. So at this point of time, we came to know about Dune Bash which basically meant that the people will sit in the jeep and the driver will drive the jeep with full speed into the desert and through the enormous sand dunes. We tried dune bashing and it was absolutely mindblowing. It was an out of the world experience and we all enjoyed it a lot. Then we returned to the camp late at night and were too excited to even sleep. The next day, we set out to explore the adjoining areas and visited the haunted village of Kuldhara. The village is rumored to be haunted since a long time and there are no roofs above any of the houses in the area due to a curse prevalent there. It is basically a deserted village with no one living there. We also set out to see the windmills in the area and the amazing coral rocks. Then we treated ourselves to the amazing Pyaaz ki Kachori and Mirchi Vada which are the special delicacies of Rajasthan. The trip took us close to the heart of the desert state and camping was in itself a unique experience altogether.