SUJÁN The Serai

The Serai is what happens when a royal caravan decides never to move again. Twenty-one tents stand on a private stretch of the Great Thar, built on cool Jaisalmer stone and dressed in hand-stitched canvas the colour of the desert at noon.

The camp. Fourteen Luxury Tents, each with its own veranda onto the scrub. Six Luxury Tented Suites add private heated plunge pools. And the Royal Tented Suite is a camp within the camp, its own walled encampment with plunge pool, massage area and pergola tents for dining under the sky.

The days. Jeep out for the Great Thar Sundowner as the dunes turn to fire. Ride camels through villages older than maps. Walk Jaisalmer's Golden Fortress, a UNESCO site and India's only living fort. At camp: an organic farm breeding one of India's rarest indigenous cattle, Ayurvedic therapies, craft workshops in pottery and weaving, and the Manganiyar bards, thirteen centuries of desert music, playing by firelight while the Kalbelia dancers turn.

Getting there. The camp sits on the desert edge outside Jaisalmer, fly in (seasonal direct flights) or make the classic drive across from Jodhpur.