Pushkar

Pushkar, 145 km west of Jaipur in the Aravalli hills, is one of India's most extraordinary small pilgrim towns — compact, walkable, and built entirely around a sacred crater lake (believed to have formed where Lord Brahma dropped a lotus flower) ringed by 52 ghats (stone bathing platforms) and more than 500 temples.

• The Brahma Temple here — a 14th-century marble mandir with a distinctive red shikhara on the lake's northern edge — is among the world's only dedicated temples to Brahma (the creator deity of the Hindu trinity rarely has temples because of a mythological curse); the temple is the town's spiritual centrepiece and pilgrim magnet, drawing worshippers from across India.
• The Savitri Temple (45-minute climb via 700 stone steps to the hilltop above town, or 3-minute ropeway) offers the most panoramic view of the lake, the white ghats, and the encircling brown Aravallis — the best sunrise viewpoint in Rajasthan.
• The Pushkar Camel Mela (held during the full moon of the Hindu Kartik month, October-November) is the world's largest camel and livestock fair: 50,000 camels, horses, and cattle traded across a 5-km desert camp alongside folk musicians, turban-tying competitions, camel decoration contests, and a night fair of lights.
• The combination of pilgrimage and fair draws 200,000+ visitors over a 10-day period, making it India's most internationally attended cultural event.
• For vegetarian travellers, Pushkar is exceptional: the entire town is officially declared a strictly pure-vegetarian and alcohol-free zone as a condition of its sacred status — every single restaurant, café, and hotel dining room in the town is vegetarian.
• The bazaar lanes that ring the lake offer India's most diverse international vegetarian food street: Israeli falafel and hummus wraps, Rajasthani thali, banana pancakes with honey, fresh lassi, Italian pasta, and organic café menus coexist on a single lane, making Pushkar a pilgrimage destination and backpacker hub simultaneously.
• The Sunset Café on a rooftop ghaat terrace is the essential travel-meal experience — a vegetarian thali watching the lake turn gold at dusk. October-March is comfortable.