Views fit for a maharajah (+photos)

The palace, viewed from the lake at sunset. Photo / Jill Worrall

Laundry is being slap, slap, slapped against the steps that lead down into the soupy green water of Lake Pichola in the Rajasthani city of Udaipur.

Only a few hundred metres away from the two women doing the family washing, a couple with designer luggage are disembarking on the steps of the Lake Palace, an 18th century confection of white marble that seems to float on the lake waters.

If they are staying in the Grand Presidential Suite for the night it will cost them nearly NZ$5300 and that's without breakfast.

The ladies in their fluorescent lime green and pink saris stooped over their washing and the pair in their cream trousers and tailored shirts could be from different planets in terms of income.

But no matter what the rich tourists have paid for their night in five-star luxury, they will have no better view of this magical city and its lake than the rest of us.

I fell in love with Udaipur 10 years ago - it's the perfect place for hopeless romantics to totally part company with reality, at least for a few hours.

Let me describe the scene from the arched windows of the Maharajah of Udaipur's palace high above the lake edge.

Not of course from his private quarters, but from one of two hotels incorporated into this massive complex, - the largest palace in Rajasthan.

It's late afternoon and the dust-laden sky is beginning to glow burnished gold, the colours warming the white marble of the Lake Palace directly in front of me.

Behind the palace and the far side of the lake, ridge upon ridge of hills stretch towards the sun, blurring and shimmering in deep blues through to pearly greys as they merge imperceptibly with the sky.

Parakeets are flying home, emerald screeching darts coming to rest in the mango trees.

A boat putters past below, briefly drowning out the sounds of the last of the day's laundry routines.

Behind me a waiter with curling moustache is clinking teacups collected from the maharajah's durbar (royal hall), which is lit by some of the largest chandeliers in India.

Above him is a gallery containing a collection of English crystal ordered by a 19th century maharajah. He died before it arrived and the crystal languished in boxes in a royal attic for about 110 years and was unearthed only recently. It includes two crystal lounge suites and a crystal bed.

I don't fancy the glass bed though - give me a few cushions in a boat cruising around the lake and I'd be as happy as any maharajah.