The holiday we have just come back from was so wonderful that I’m finding it hard to describe. C had carefully planned the weekend to celebrate our 2nd wedding anniversary. I knew we were going away, but all of the details were a surprise. And what a surprise!

We took a flight to Jaipur on Friday afternoon. There was a driver waiting at the airport to bring us to the Samode Haveli hotel. We were greeted with garlands of roses and glasses of sweet lime juice. The courtyard had a series of small fountains flowing into one another, and small ponds with fish and water lilies. Our room was enormous with a high ceiling, and portraits of Indian nobility. The shower was bigger than some bathrooms I’ve been in.

I think it was in the courtyard, while we were eating our delicious selection of Rajasthani food, that I was saying how beautiful the hotel was, when C responded with “you ain’t seen notin’ yet”. And I hadn’t!

In the morning I expected that we would spend some time visiting Jaipur and head to our second destination after lunch. (By now I knew that we were staying somewhere else for the second and third nights). I was surprised when C was enthusiastic to go straight to the other hotel, but as soon as we arrived at the Samode Palace I understood why.

It is literally a palace, beautifully maintained. We were escorted up two flights of stone stairs into the first, and then the second courtyard. After checking in we were shown to our room, the King’s room, the only one in the hotel with a private jacuzzi.

The first evening we took a camel “safari” through the town of Samode out to a sand dune. The town is part of the original palace grounds, and seems to be thriving. Thanks in large part, I’m sure, to the hotel. During the camel ride we saw what looked like wild boar, wandering the streets of the town. The children were genuinely excited to see us, though I wondered if some had been trained to shout “hello” to potential customers. They waved and shouted. I was followed by one young boy who kept asking for “just one pen”. For some reason I hadn’t brought any pens with me. We were met on the dune by staff of the nearby Samode Bagh hotel who served us tea and coffee as we watched the sun go down.

After relaxing in our jacuzzi to ease the camel-consequences, we went to the terrace for dinner. They had layed out a traditional low-table, and we sat on cushions. We had the whole terrace to ourselves, though we did get some curious looks from suites that faced onto it. If I had been in a room and they on the terrace, I would have looked .

The first course was quite possibly the best soup I’ve ever tasted. Tomato and basil, with some Indian seasoning. The second was what they called a “barbeque”. That’s an unfortunate name, because it conjurs images of badly-cooked, smokey meat (for me, anyway). In fact it was extremely tasty and cooked to perfection. We just didn’t have room for the third course, a selection of rajasthani dishes in little metal bowls. But we made sure to taste each of them . We had a bottle of the local red wine with the meal. I don’t drink much wine any more, but it was so good we had it again the next night. We topped it all off with some lassi – a yoghurt drink. Again, I’m not big into yoghurt, but this lassi was yummy.

As we were on our way to the meal, one of the staff had asked for our key. We assumed that they were going to clean the room or something, but as we were eating (and discussing how unbelievably wonderful this hotel was) we noticed some candles being lit on our balcony. Shortly after our key was returned to us, the candles blew out. Soon after that someone came and asked for the key back again. By the time we finished the meal it hadn’t come back, so we decided to head on up to the room, and see what they were up to.

The whole room – and it was a big room – was now candle-lit. They had put rose petals on the bed, and in the jacuzzi! There were more candles on the balcony and around the jacuzzi. It was so beautiful. We must have stayed out there for hours.

Lunch the next day was in the Samode Bagh hotel, which is set in beautiful gardens. We knew we’d be having a big dinner that night, so we had a light lunch. Then we walked around the grounds a little. They have converted some old military accommodation into “tents” for guest accommodation. They give the illusion of being in a tent without giving up the advantages of having walls (and a bathroom, for that matter). They also have a beautiful swimming pool – original to the 150 year old garden buildings.

On our last night we had dinner on our balcony. Again, the food was unbelievably good. I can’t begin to describe the atmosphere. We spent the whole evening – no, the whole weekend – blissed out. After the meal we moved to the sun chairs on the outer balcony. Looking up, we realised that there was a pair of pidgeons roosting on our light. It was one of the sweetest things I’ve ever seen, the two of them nestled together, their silouette forming a love-heart shape.

As we were finishing our wine there was a fireworks display. It wasn’t for us, but after the weekend we had just had, it felt like it was.