5 Day Kota & Jaipur Trip: Detailed Itinerary

November is a month when I go for a trip each year with my sister, her husband and their cute little daughter. We had decided months ago that we would go to Jaipur for the trip.

During the itinerary planning process, we realized that 3 days were sufficient to explore Jaipur. For us who go on trips once or twice a year together, 3 days were not enough time. We started looking for another place closer to Jaipur, which can be covered in a day or two and is connected to Jaipur by train. After considering Alwar, Ajmer, and Pushkar, we decided on Kota primarily due to 7 Wonders Park which features the miniature models of famous monuments of the world.

Winter had already started knocking on the doors in Delhi. As heard from many people that in Rajasthan days are hotter and nights are colder, I had packed two jackets in my bag, which I never got in use as days were indeed hot, nights were also hot as so much so that we had to sleep with AC on.

If you are planning to go to Jaipur and Kota, or even going to one of the places, here is my 5-day itinerary to help you plan your vacation.

Table of Contents
1 Trains
2 Hotels
2.1 Lilac Hotel in Kota
2.2 Days Hotel in Jaipur
3 Day – 0
4 Day – 1 (Kota)
4.1 Abedha Mahal
4.2 Garh Palace
4.3 7 Wonders Park
4.4 Dinner at Amar Punjabi Dhaba
5 Day-2 (Kota)
5.1 Chatra Vilas Garden
5.2 Brij Vilas Palace Museum
5.3 Kota Zoological Park
5.4 Train to Jaipur
6 Day-3 (Jaipur)
6.1 Amer Fort
6.2 Jal Mahal
6.3 Hawa Mahal
7 Day-4 (Jaipur)
7.1 Breakfast at Hawk View Restaurant
7.2 City Palace
7.3 Jantar Mantar
7.4 Albert Hall Museum
7.5 Choki Dhani
8 Day-5 (Jaipur)
8.1 Patrika Gate of Jawahar Circle
8.2 Birla Mandir
8.3 Movie at Rajmandir
8.4 SRC Museum of Indology
8.5 Dolls Museum
8.6 Return to Delhi

Trains

• Delhi to Kota: New Delhi-Mumbai Rajdhani (3AC)
• Kota to Jaipur: Kota-Shri Ganganagar Sf Express (Sleeper class)
• Jaipur to Delhi: Duarai-New Delhi Shatabdi (Chair class)

Hotels

Lilac Hotel in Kota

3-star hotel located just a kilometre away from the railway station. We had booked 2 rooms; each room cost us around Rs 2500 for a night with free breakfast. They also provide complimentary pick and drop facility from Railway station.

Breakfast included pure vegetarian Indian dishes with a variety of options to choose from both in food and beverages. Breakfast was really good but the service was as slow as snail. But the thing that truly ruined my stay was linen full of lint. It kept me uncomfortable and awake half of the first night. Next day, I got it changed but replaced linen had lint as well. On questioning, I was told that there was a problem in laundry and every linen had lint.

I expected Lilac which boast itself as a premium business hotel to have a much better customer-centric service. All in all, I don’t consider hotel living up to the standard of its star rating and thus, don’t recommend it.

Days Hotel in Jaipur

A 3-star hotel located close to the airport. Hotel is surrounded by upscale international hotel chains like Radisson Blue, Hotel Marriot. I believe that the location had something to do with the quality of rooms in the Days Hotel. Rooms were strikingly clean as if we were the first ever people to stay in the rooms. Each room cost us around Rs 2300 for a night without breakfast. Although the hotel is a bit far from the city centre, broader roads and less traffic jam mean it won’t cost you more than 15-20 minutes of your time. I must say the Days Hotel is a steal for the price.

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Day – 0

We boarded the New Delhi-Mumbai Rajdhani train in the evening. The fare was a bit pricey but understandable, considering that train was to stop next at Kota only. Our co-passengers in our compartment didn’t board the train, thereby giving the whole compartment to 4 of us. We reached the Kota in 4.5 hours and soon retired in our rooms.

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Day – 1 (Kota)

Abedha Mahal

Situated near the Chambal river of Kota, Abedha Mahal is in a dilapidated state. Young boys have marked every corner of the building with the love for their girlfriends. Water alongside the Mahal is dirty and smelly. We hardly spent 30 minutes there. It is located outside of the main city and both money and time for a mere old building were not worth spending.

Garh Palace

Minimum entry fee of Rs 40 provides access to the museum which has a collection of regalia, arms, ammunition. The museum was average, with nothing great to show. An additional fee is charged for access to Sheesh Mahal which includes rooms like durbar and bedroom used by Maharaja Ummed Singh II during his rule. Bedroom wall is decorated with beautiful murals.

7 Wonders Park

The topmost attraction of Kota, 7 Wonders Park houses the replicas of famous monuments of the world like Eiffel Tower, Taj Mahal, Statue of Liberty and others. Replicas are not very big in size. We went there in the evening with few people around. But as it gets dark and lights effect start to illuminate the replicas, more people start to come in. We left soon after it got dark as mosquitoes had started to invade the place.

ALSO READ: What to Expect at 7 Wonders Park

Dinner at Amar Punjabi Dhaba

Amar Punjabi Dhaba is owned by Amar Punjabi groups who also owns Lilac Hotel. Food was delicious and of top-notch quality at very affordable rates. So much so that we had also booked our food from it for our next day train journey.

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Day-2 (Kota)

Chatra Vilas Garden

Located next to Kishore Sagar Lake, Chatra Vilas Garden is humongous in size and a great picnic spot for families because of the presence of boating and toy train ride. Park seems to be the recreational place for monkeys as well, as we ourselves must have seen 50 odd monkeys in the park. There are many playground equipments which niece enjoyed a lot. Even baby monkeys were having fun playing with them.

The toy train is the highlight of the garden. The train circles the garden in around 15 minutes. In that little time, it goes underground, through a couple of tunnels, and over the water bridge. This was by far the best toy train ride I have experienced so far.

Brij Vilas Palace Museum

Brij Vilas Palace Museum is located near to Chatra Vilas Garden. It has a huge collection of artefacts belonging to Kota and its nearby region. The highlight of the museum is a vast collection of archaeological sculpture from 4th – 12th century. They also have a small section dedicated to paintings, armoury, and royal costumes. You will rarely see such a magnificent collection in any museum which highlights the heritage of local culture.

Kota Zoological Park

We had some spare time before our departure to Jaipur. We thought of going to Kota Zoological Park. It is a very small zoo and houses a little over a dozen animals, birds, and reptiles like tiger, black buck, duck, hyena, turtles. It hardly takes 30 minutes to cover the whole zoo.

Niece was amazed to see the turtles. It was the first time that she saw the turtles and she was completely spellbound by their walk.

ALSO READ: Kota Travel Guide

Train to Jaipur

We went to Amar Punjabi Dhaba to get Paranthas and Aaloo Sabzi packed for dinner in the train. Staff told us that they would send the food at the platform around 30 minutes before the departure. And there was a delivery boy on the platform right on time. Those paranthas and sabzi were like home-cooked and were very delicious.

We had booked the sleeper class in Kota-Shri Ganganagar Sf Express due to AC class tickets were on the waitlist. During the whole 4 hour journey, our coach was full with the unreserved ticket holder.
Travel Tip: I would not recommend travelling in Sleeper class; rather pay extra bucks to book a 3AC ticket for a comfortable journey.

This train also goes through Durgapur railway station. We were unaware that Durgapur falls in Jaipur and was a lot closer to our hotel than Jaipur Junction station. Deboarding at Durgapur railway station would have saved us around 45 minutes.

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Day-3 (Jaipur)

Amer Fort

Amer Fort is Jaipur’s most visited attraction. We took the elephant ride up to the entrance of the fort. We had to pay the complete price of 2 elephants for 3 of us as we could not find the 4th person to share an elephant. The fort is very huge and beautiful. We were glad that we booked the guide otherwise we would have wandered aimlessly inside the fort. Our guide was very knowledgeable and gave us the tour at our own pace. We spent close to 2.5 hours in there. We booked the jeep ride to return.

ALSO READ: The Ultimate Guide to Amer Fort

Jal Mahal

Jal Mahal is not opened for visitors and can only be enjoyed from outside only. We were on our way to Hawa Mahal and we stopped there for 30 minutes to see this magnificent creation and click photographs.

Hawa Mahal

Hawa Mahal is the Instagram spot of Jaipur. It is the palace with 953 small windows decorated with intricate latticework providing some amazing background for photographs. My best photographs of the whole trip were from Hawa Mahal.

ALSO READ: 13 Photos from My Visit to Hawa Mahal

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Day-4 (Jaipur)

Breakfast at Hawk View Restaurant

On our way to City Palace, we stopped at Hawk View restaurant, which is a roof-top restaurant, for stuffed paranthas and tea. Meal tasted even more delicious in the backdrop of stunning Jaipur view.

City Palace

Once the seat of the Maharaja of Jaipur, City Palace is now converted to the museum. It is a very huge complex and requires 2-3 hours to cover everything. We initially regretted of not taking the guide but after hearing the couple of guides who were just mostly repeating the exhibit description, we were glad we didn’t opt for the guide. It also allowed us to cover the palace at our own pace.

Jantar Mantar

A UNESCO World Heritage site, Jantar Mantar feature the largest stone sundial in the world, and is a must visit in Jaipur. Although there are 4 other Jantar Mantar in different cities, this is the only one where one can measure the time accurately. Service of a guide is must in there. The guide showed us how to measure time and altitude. Without the guide, we would not have been able to understand a thing by ourselves.

Albert Hall Museum

Albert Hall Museum is a state museum and has a huge collection of artefacts like paintings, porcelain, Jain statues, and European statues. They also have a section for Egyptian mummy. We found the museum quite boring as they have stuffed lots of artefacts without any description. Only Egyptian mummy section has detailed description. The museum location is as much lovely as much mundane is the museum itself. Thousands of pigeons have made the building as their home and provide a great sight to the eye.

Choki Dhani

Choki Dhani is a village themed park which provides Rajasthan village experience. We experienced horse, camel and elephant ride; saw the magic show, puppet show, fire act, acrobatics on bamboo, folk dance and music show. I am not a big fan of traditional Rajasthani food, so I didn’t like dinner much but from what I have heard, dinner is a treat for Rajasthani food lovers. We had a great time there and it was a truly mesmerizing experience.

ALSO READ: Jaipur Travel Guide

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Day-5 (Jaipur)

Patrika Gate of Jawahar Circle

Patrika Gate is the 9th gate of Jaipur and is the most colourful and vibrant one. The most striking feature of Patrika Gate is the handmade paintings of temples, forts, palaces, portraits of Jaipur rulers on the pillars of the Gate. They are treat to the eyes and truly the masterpiece.

READ MORE: 20 Photos to Inspire You to Visit Jaipur

Birla Mandir

We had lots of time left before our train back to Delhi. So, we added Birla Mandir to our itinerary. It is constructed in modern style and mainly dedicated to Lakshmi-Narayan. Unlike many famous temples of India which have long lines and are often crowded, Birla temple was not crowded and we were able to offer prayers and move around the temple comfortably without getting pushed.

Movie at Rajmandir

We had gone to Rajmandir on the evening of our 1st day in Jaipur as well but couldn’t get the entry as the show was houseful. This time we had booked the tickets online for the morning show. The main lobby was glitz and glamorous; viewing hall had the giant screen with velvet draped curtain. That time Hindi movie ‘Thugs of Hindostan’ was showing. The movie was as awful as the cinema hall was royally beautiful. We came out of the viewing area after bearing the crap for 30 minutes.

Anyway, we had visited Rajmandir only for the beauty of the cinema hall and had neither interest nor time to watch the full movie.

SRC Museum of Indology

This museum is in ramshackle and suffered from years of negligence after the death of its founder Acharya Ram Charan Sharma. We had felt like as we had come to some old government building. We were not given any guided tour as we were told that the guide was on leave. But by looking at the condition of the building – flickering tube light on the ground floor, non-working lights on the top floor, and poor maintenance of artefacts, I highly doubt that they have hired a guide. Entry ticket of Rs 100 is too high a price for a self-guided tour of old junk.
Travel Tip: I wouldn’t recommend anyone to go there unless you have lots of time and nothing else to do.

Dolls Museum

This museum houses the rich collection of dolls from about 40 different countries. It is a nice small museum which tries to showcase the culture of different countries through dolls in their traditional costumes. 30 minutes are more than sufficient to walk through all the doors.

Return to Delhi

We boarded the Durai-New Delhi Shatabdi train (Chair class) from Jaipur Junction railway station and reached Delhi in 4 hours.

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It was a very enjoyable and memorable 5-day trip. Although Kota may seem a bit stretched to two days, we had a good time both the days. While 7 Wonders Park is the only premium attraction in Kota, Toy train ride in Chatra Vilas Garden must not be missed.

On the other hand, Jaipur has some wonderful and one of a kind attractions in Amer Fort, Hawa Mahal, Jantar Mantar, Patrika Gate, Rajmandir cinema, and Choki Dhani and is a must visit destination in India.