I had a short holiday trip to Vadodara last year during Navratri. Vadodara is a city of Gujarat situated on the banks of the river Vishwamitri. The city is also known as Baroda. This is one of the prominent cities of Gujarat. I along with my family stayed at Aatithya serviced apartments as pre-booked with the help of holidayrentals.co.in. The rooms allowed us were very clean and comfortable.
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Vadodara[/caption]
The city is famous for its beautiful gardens, magnificent palaces and educational institutions. The city has now become a prosperous industrial and commercial centre. We explored almost all tourist spots in Vadodara as we were there in the city for almost 10 days.
Lakshmi Vilas Palace was the first place we visited in Vadodara. This palace is built in the Indo-Saracenic tradition, with a varied mix of Indian, Islamic, and European elements. There is a golf course and Sayajirao's personal museum inside the palace grounds. There I could see the original paintings of Raja Ravi Varma.
ISKCON Temple is just 2 kms from the railway station. The temple was crowded as we visited at the evening.
Makarpura Palace is located in the outskirts of the city. The Palace is built in an Indo-Italianate style of architecture. This was once the residence of the Gaekwad family. This is now a training school for the Indian Air Force. We just got a chance to peep at from the outside as the building is not open to the public.
Another main place we visited in the city was an interesting museum, the Maharaja Fateh Singh Museum. There I saw a great collection of art works collected by Maharaja Sayajirao Gaekwad III. The museum also displays the works of the renowned painter Raja Ravi Varma.
Kirti Mandir is another place we visited in Vadodara. This is a memorial to the deceased members of the Gaekwad family.
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Navratri Celebration in Vadodara[/caption]
As we visited Vadodara during Navratri we could see the nine night festival of dance in worship of the Mother Goddess. We enjoyed watching people performing traditional dances called Garba and Dandiya Raas to please Goddess Amba.
We also enjoyed eating traditional Gujarati thali and delicious Gujarati snacks such as dahiwadas, samosas, etc. The very next day after the nine days of Navratri celebrations in Vadodara we packed our bags back to Pune. From our holiday trip we could say that the best time to visit Vadodara, the city of dreams is during Navratri.