Adi-Kadi Vav

Tucked into a rocky fold of Uparkot Fort on a Junagadh day-trip from Somnath, Adi-Kadi Vav is one of the most arresting stepwells in Gujarat, remarkable less for ornament than for the sheer audacity of how it was made.

• Where most Gujarati vavs are built up in dressed masonry, this one was carved straight down into living rock: a single long, narrow flight of steps descends between towering stone walls to a well shaft far below, the daylight narrowing to a bright slot overhead as you go.
• The descent runs to well over a hundred steps, and the cool, echoing corridor of stone feels less like architecture than like a wound cut cleanly through the hill.
• The vav takes its name from a local legend of two women, Adi and Kadi, who are said to be tied to the well's origins and to whom offerings were once made at a nearby tree.
• Like much of Uparkot, its precise dating is debated; it is generally placed in the medieval centuries when the fort served as the citadel of Junagadh's rulers, and it would have been a vital water source during the long sieges the hilltop fortress endured.
• Nearby stands its very different companion, the deep circular Navghan Kuvo, so the two wells are usually visited together.
• Uparkot itself is a rewarding half-day of secular heritage, layered with Buddhist rock-cut caves, old cannons, gateways and ramparts overlooking the town toward the sacred hill of Girnar.
• Adi-Kadi Vav is the fort's most photographed corner: the light, the shadow and the vertiginous perspective down the staircase reward an unhurried visit.
• Wear sensible shoes, mind the uneven steps, and go early or late to avoid the harsh midday glare in the open cut.
• For food, Junagadh is comfortably vegetarian territory.
• Around Uparkot and the Kalwa Chowk area you will find pure-veg Gujarati and Kathiyawadi thali houses serving unlimited rotli, shaak, dal-bhaat, farsan and jaggery-sweetened touches, alongside simple pure-veg snack counters for fafda-jalebi, dhokla and khaman.
• Stick to the many clearly pure-vegetarian thali restaurants and bhojanalayas in the old city; carry water, as there is little for sale inside the fort itself.