01 — A field guide to the city of lakes

Bhopal, a city built around water.

Two lakes in the middle of town, a dam older than most of the city, and evenings that end at the water's edge. A slow guide, written for walking.

Walk the lakes See it painted

Sunset over the Upper Lake in Bhopal, small boats moored on the water

02 — Bada Talab

The Upper Lake,
a thousand years full.

Raised behind an earthen dam in the eleventh century, it still sends drinking water across the city every morning.

Clouds lit orange over the Upper Lake at dusk

03 — Every evening

Days here end
at the water.

Walk the lake road around six and half the city is out with you: tea, boats, kites, the long orange light.

Upper Lake · drawn in code, live

[ The city ]

Most cities grew along a road or a river. Bhopal grew around lakes it made for itself: an eleventh-century dam across the Kolans, a lower lake dug in 1794, and a skyline of domes and minarets that still checks its reflection every evening.

Older than the city. Still here.full.home.

31^km²

of open water in the Upper Lake alone. Together with the Lower Lake it forms the Bhoj Wetland, protected as a wetland of international importance.

Mist over the Upper Lake early in the morning

11th c.

The dam on the Kolans river that made the Upper Lake, credited to Raja Bhoj

The Lower Lake with the city on its far bank

1794

The Lower Lake is dug below it, a second mirror for the old city

2002

Both lakes are listed together as the Bhoj Wetland, a Ramsar site

04 — A walk along the water

0.0km

From the mosque
to the deer park.

Five stops, one lake road, about seventy minutes on foot. Start early, before the light gets hard.

Lakes and route: © OpenStreetMap contributors

05 — Before photographs

The same view,
in watercolour.

Two plates from Hayat-i-Qudsi, a life of Nawab Qudsia Begum, printed in English in 1918. One looks across the Upper Lake, the other back at the city from the water. Stand at the Boat Club and you can still find both.

Printed 1918Public domain