Our recent 3 weeks MP (Madhya Pradesh) road trip has been one of the longest time we have stayed away from home in our travel history. After a successful Goa Workcation, staying in south Goa for couple of weeks and working from Biera Mar Beach Resort, we decided to take the plunge. And roam around MP for a week, before settling down for yet another workcation in India, this time from Orchha. If you want a recap of our trip, here is the sequence for you (some posts to be added soon):-
Start of the MP road trip with a trip to Bhedaghat and Jabalpur
A trip from Jabalpur to Bandhavgarh National Park & Tiger Safari in Bandhavgarh
From Bandhavgarh, a trip exploring the temples of Khajuraho and overnight stay in Khajuraho
From Khajuraho, we arrived in Orchha on Friday. We spent the day settling down, checking the internet connectivity and making ourselves comfortable. Since, this was going to be our home for the next week. And we were to work from here. While on Saturday and Sunday, we roamed around exploring Orchha including the Grand Orchha Fort, the Chaturbhuj Temple, Raja Ram Temple, The Chhatris of Orchha and other iconic places.
Start of our workcation in India from Orchha
To start with, we checked the internet speed for the wifi provided by the resort where we stayed. Turns out, their wifi router was far from our room and was not very strong. So, the bandwidth kept dropping. Upon reporting it to them, they gave us a jio dongle, which worked like a charm. Alongside their dongle, we had our own airtel dongle and jio hotspot in one of our phones. What we discovered was we couldn’t rely on any one single device for our workcation. Rather, we had to switch between them. When one network seemed weak, we shifted to another. But, altogether, we were able to work smoothly, take all our conferences and calls from here. So, we will say, our workcation in India, from a small town like Orchha, was successful.
However, what we didn’t like was certain things about the accommodation. Particularly their hygiene standards were not up to the mark, both with respect to the food and the cleanliness. Before we could realise it and make a decision, both our kids had got food poisoning. But luckily they recovered the next day. The resort was called Hotel Bundelkhand Riverside Orchha. We will definitely not recommend long stay here. Although we must add the staff were all very courteous, very helpful and ready to provide any assistance that they could. Although it was the upkeep of the property from the owner which was lagging a lot. This hotel was located almost 2km from the Orchha Fort. Further on the same road as one goes towards the Chhatris, there are a lot of other standard accommodations. Book a suitable one as per your needs.
How did our workcation from Orchha look like
The USP of the place where we stayed was that it was right on the banks of the river Betwa. In fact, the balcony attached to our room faced the river. And it was east as well. Which means the first rays of morning sun greeted us right from across the river. Every morning I sat for couple of hours in this veranda enjoying the sun while I worked.
Few mornings, when we managed to wake up earlier, we went all the way to the banks of the river. And did some yoga and meditation sitting there. It was an absolute bliss. Evenings, we often went to the banks of the river and just sat there dipping our legs in the water. It was very relaxing.
One evening, as we were able to wrap our work early, we went to visit the Chattris of Orchha right on the banks of the river. We enjoyed hot tea from nearby tea stall while the kids enjoyed some icecream. It was a rainy day. The sky was covered with black clouds and there was a little drizzle now and then. It made our little trip all the more exciting!
All in all, we had the bliss of working remotely. To be able to concentrate on just our work and our kids. And relax in a peaceful environment without having to worry about daily household chores.
Would we recommend a workcation in India from Orchha or other small towns?
You can do a workcation in India from a small town like Orchha if you are able to find an accommodation which provides you with uninterrupted network connection. Or, if you have good airtel and jio dongles. We will recommend check the hygiene standards about the place. If you are staying with family, use mineral water for your kids so that they don’t get food poisoning or any other water borne diseases. Since, it looks like many hotels here use water directly from the river which is just filtered out. When our kid got food poisoning, it got me extremely worried. Since Orchha being a small town, you can’t expect the best of medical care that we are usually used to in cities. But you can always travel to Gwalior or Jhansi which are very close by. So, do consider these points when deciding on a workcation, not just from Orchha but any remote and small town as such.
Apart from this, the location was very peaceful, the people very friendly. The market, although small, had all the basic facilities – general stores, medicine shops, stationery and garment shops etc. And it is located on the main road near the fort. We could buy mineral water, snacks, some stationery for our kids and some medicines from here.
From Orchha we continued our journey. Come Saturday, travelled to Bhopal visiting the Stupas of Sanchi and the Udayagiri Caves on the way. And from there we proceeded to Pachmarhi on Sunday. We had a much more pleasant workcation in Pachmarhi when compared to Orchha. Although, I was thinking that finding a good network in Pachmarhi will be difficult given it is in the middle of the jungle. To the contrary, our resort had a good wifi in Pachmarhi and we could completely rely on it for our work. Adding to that, the weather was much more pleasant and the resort was much cleaner, comfortable and beautiful. Soon to follow : our workcation experience in Pachmarhi and how we carved out time to explore Pachmarhi while working from there.
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