Marugarh Resort & Spa

The bar at Marugarh Resort & Spa is called Sanjh Majeeth, which the hotel translates as "colour of the evening", and that name does a lot of the talking: this is a resort built for long evenings by the pool at Chopasni, on Jodhpur's Jaisalmer Bypass Road, though the site itself prefers to say it sits in the heart of Jodhpur. Part of the Hotel Marugarh Group, with a sister property in Jaisalmer, it pitches itself as a heritage-style boutique resort with traditional Rajasthani architecture, and its real strengths are space, gardens and venues rather than old-city views.

Four rooms, one simple menu

The room list is short and legible. Deluxe Rooms look over the gardens, Super Deluxe Rooms are the category the hotel calls wide and spacious, Super Deluxe Pool View rooms face the water, and Luxury Rooms come with a private balcony. Every category is listed for two adults and a child, with one bed, one bathroom, and the same practical kit throughout: mini bar, tea kettle, intercom and LCD TV. Choosing is a matter of view and balcony, nothing more complicated.

A 70-foot stage, audiences of 700-plus, and a pool bar for when the baraat has gone home.

Built for a Jodhpur wedding

Marugarh's event hardware is its most concrete claim. Venture Hall carries a 70-foot by 50-foot stage and the resort says it has hosted events with live audiences of more than 700 people; Shahi Darbar takes the corporate meetings, and the Rawat banquet hall handles theme dinners and cocktail evenings. Feeding all of this is Maru Gandha, the in-house multi-cuisine restaurant serving Rajasthani, wider Indian, continental and Chinese cooking beside the pool, with large windows facing the greenery and hills. Add a spa, a garden bar among the flowering shrubs and a second bar at the swimming pool, and you have a resort that makes more sense for a celebration or a family base than for fort-gazing, though Jodhpur's blue old city and Mehrangarh Fort are a straightforward drive across town.