Weekend Getaways From Jaisalmer

Lodurva, the ancient capital of Jaisalmer and an important Jain pilgrim centre lies 16 km to the west. Among the ruins of the city is a complex of magnificent Jain temples with ornate archway at the entrance, perhaps the finest of its kind in Rajasthan.

The Akal Wood Fossil Park (17km) on the road to Barmer is an interesting stop to the fossilised remains of a forest that grew 180 million years ago. Not far from there is another prehistoric site at Kandiala where different kinds of fossils are found – still older, but undated fossilised rocks, with tiny sea shells embedded in them, that show that this sandy desert wasteland was once part of the ocean bed!

The Sand Dunes at Sam: No trip to Jaisalmer is complete without a visit to the sand dunes at Sam, 42 km away, on the edge of the Desert National Park. The varying patterns, ripples and waves that the wind creates on the undulating, ever changing dunes is awesome to behold. The sunsets at Sam are particularly beautiful, with the desert changing into a kaleidoscope of red, orange and copper before darkness engulfs the desert in a blanket of sheer black.

The Desert National Park (45km) stretches across 3000km of protected biosphere, where the fragile ecosystem of the desert is preserved in its natural environs. The native flora consists of cacti, thorny shrubs, bushes and trees and vegetation that survives in the dry and arid soil grow here and some of the local fauna- few animal species like the monitor lizard, desert foxes, porcupines and herds of black buck live in this protected park.