The campsite is seen from a higher altitude, showing the isolated and tranquil setting among the gentle desert terrain - MANVAR Resort & Desert Camp

Experiences

Most travellers meet the Thar at a roadside dune, at dusk, among a hundred others. Manvār offers a different desert — a protected reserve of our own, a working farm, living villages, and the long quiet in between. Here the experiences are not attractions to be queued for. They are the day itself, unfolding at the pace of the sand.

 

All rates shown are per person and exclusive of applicable taxes. All experiences are subject to availability and are best arranged in advance.

The Land

Reading the desert — best understood the way those who live in it do: slowly, and with someone who knows where to look.

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Manvār Desert Safari Signature

  • 90 minutes
  • Dawn & dusk
  • Open 4×4
  • From ₹2,000 per person

Ninety minutes in an open 4×4, out through the desert and into our own protected reserve, ten kilometres from camp — less a thrill ride than an unhurried excursion to read the landscape and see how people live in it. Shrub dunes open here and there into clean soft sand, laced with trails known only to the men who grew up among them. Along the way, the chance to step inside a desert home and to see how the land is farmed wherever there is water, while the chinkara come down to drink and the desert fox keeps to the shade. Jeeps run on a shared basis; a private jeep can be arranged on request. Slots are booked in advance.

 
  • Shared jeep — 0–2 guests ₹4,500
  • 3–4 guests ₹3,000
  • Above 4 guests ₹2,000 per person
  • Private jeep on request

Nature Walk

  • 60 minutes
  • Dawn & dusk
  • ₹1,250 per person

The camp sits on a generous stretch of desert, and the finest way to know it is on foot. At sunrise or sunset, when the ground wakes, a guide walks you through the camp grounds — where nilgai, the blue bull and the largest of the Indian antelopes, graze, gerbils and desert hare dart through the scrub, and a great variety of birds come and go. Along the way, the tracks left in the night, the medicinal shrubs named, and the small lives a vehicle would pass straight over.

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Camel Ride

  • 45 minutes
  • Dawn & dusk
  • from ₹1,500 per person

The oldest way to cross this country, and still the most fitting. Local camel owners lead you, unhurried, to the highest dune near the camp — beside the Oran, the village’s sacred grove — where the desert opens into a full three-hundred-and-sixty-degree view. There is no better place to watch the Thar take the colour of a sunrise, or let it go at dusk.

 
  • Sharing ₹1,500
  • Exclusive ₹2,500
  • per person.

The Table

A meal in the open — at Manvār, dinner is rarely taken indoors. It is carried out into the landscape: to a farm, a dune, a private clearing beneath the stars.

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Desert Grove Lunch

  • Noon, November to February · 2 hours
  • ₹6,500 per person · min. 2 guests

Five kilometres from camp lies our farm — now given less water and left to restore itself, the desert quietly returning to it. Lunch is laid in its shade, beneath a great neem or among a grove of khejri trees, and cooked in front of you: village women at the choolah, patting out bajri rotis over a wood fire. Slow, seasonal, and entirely of this place — best taken at noon between November and February, when the desert wears its kindest light.

Thar Sundowner

  • Dusk
  • 2 hours · ₹6,500 per person
  • min. 2 guests

As the day cools, you are dropped at the highest dune near the camp — by jeep or on foot — or the sundowner is added to the close of a camel ride, at a little extra. Tea, coffee and a table of snacks are set out for the one hour the Thar never fails to perform: the sun going down over the shrub dunes. A bar can be arranged, charged as taken.

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Private Dining at Camp

  • Nights
  • 3 hours
  • ₹6,500 per person
  • min. 2 guests

Dinner laid for two in a secluded corner of the camp — lit low, the shrub dunes silvered under a clear sky. Traditional Rajasthani cooking, brought to the table with quiet, attentive service, and the desert kept entirely for yourselves. A quiet dinner, without music — just the two of you and the desert. To be booked in advance, and subject to availability.

Camp High Tea

  • Evenings
  • 2 hours
  • ₹1,000 per person
  • min. 2 guests

An unhurried evening hour at the camp — tea and a quiet table of Indian and western things, laid out to a clear view of the sunset. The gentle close to an afternoon, before the night sets in.

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Traditional Manvār Desert Dinner Signature

  • Nights
  • 4 hours
  • ₹13,000 per person
  • min. 10 guests

Dinner on top of a dune in Manvār Reserve, reached by jeep as the light goes. Soft lamplight, the feel of sand underfoot, a feast of carefully prepared Rajasthani dishes — and not another soul in sight under the open sky. A bar can be set up, and the live music of the Thar arranged to carry into the night.

The music of the evening

Arranged on request, by the hour: the double-flute algoza or sarangi; the whirling Ger dancers; the Langa singers; the Kalbeliya; or all three traditions together, the Thar at its most alive.

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The People

The living desert — the Thar is not only a landscape. It is a way of living, and the families who keep it are part of what you come to meet.

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Village Walk

  • Mornings
  • 60 minutes
  • ₹1,250 per person

A short walk from camp are the desert hamlets that many of our team call home. With one of them to introduce you, step into the houses of the Rajput, Bhil and Meghwal families who have lived here for centuries, and see how a life is made out here — the animals, the water drawn and carried, the swept courtyards, the quiet rhythm of a desert household. There is a lesson in it, too: in how little is wasted, and how sensibly a desert household uses everything the land gives. Less a tour than an introduction, and the warmer for it.

Crane Spotting at Khichan

  • October to March
  • Early morning
  • In your own vehicle

Forty-five minutes from Manvār lies Khichan, a village that each winter receives a remarkable guest — eight to ten thousand Demoiselle cranes, arriving from Central Asia. It is an early-morning drive in your own vehicle, timed to reach Khichan before sunrise, when the cranes sweep in to the feeding ground in their thousands to feed — a sight to still you. What began with one man feeding a handful of birds is now a whole village’s daily ritual: hundreds of kilos of grain set out each morning, with no outside funding. In local lore the cranes carry messages between distant lovers, and it remains one of India’s quietest conservation triumphs.

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Your Days at Manvār

Every experience is shaped to you, and arranged on request. Tell us a little about how you like to travel, and your host will set the rhythm of your stay — the dawns, the dusks, and the long quiet between.

BOOK YOUR STAYENQUIRE WITH US

All rates are per person and exclusive of applicable taxes. All experiences are subject to availability and are to be booked in advance. Timings follow the light and the season.

 

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