Agartala

Tripura was ruled by the Manikya kings for centuries, and they wrote their own history to prove it — the Rajmala, a verse chronicle that traces the line back further than anyone can check. The capital moved more than once, from Udaipur in the south to what is now Old Agartala, and in 1849 to the present city, a few kilometres from what has since become the Bangladesh border.

The kings built as if they were somewhere much larger. Ujjayanta Palace went up in 1901 under Radha Kishore Manikya, white and domed above formal pools; Rabindranath Tagore, a friend of the court, is usually credited with its name. It housed the state assembly for decades after Tripura joined India in 1949, and is now the State Museum. Neermahal, the summer palace Bir Bikram Kishore Manikya raised in the middle of Rudrasagar Lake in the 1930s, is still reached the only sensible way — by boat.

Agartala is largely Bengali; the hills around it belong to Tripura's indigenous communities, the Tripuri the largest among them, who speak Kokborok and keep their own calendar of worship. The two meet at Kharchi Puja each July, when the fourteen deities of the old royal house are worshipped for a week at Khayerpur, and at Garia Puja in April, a harvest festival older than any palace. Durga Puja in October belongs to the city and is done with full Bengali seriousness.

Tripuri cooking is the reason to eat outside your hotel. Berma, fermented dried fish, seasons almost everything; mui borok is the umbrella name for the cuisine. Look for chakhwi, a bamboo-shoot stew thickened with alkali from the ash of banana plants, and wahan mosdeng, pork tossed with raw chilli and onion. The Queen pineapple grown on these slopes is small, sweet and worth asking for by name between June and September.

Unakoti is the one place visitors underestimate. It is around 170 km north, the better part of a day on hill roads, and the carvings — a Shiva head roughly nine metres tall cut into a jungle cliff some twelve centuries ago, with lesser gods scattered down the ravine — deserve more than the hour a day trip leaves you. Sleep near Kailashahar and walk down in the morning light. At the Tripura Sundari temple in Udaipur, one of the Shakti peethas, the prasad is a peda; buy it from the stalls outside. Chabimura's cliff reliefs are seen from a boat on the Gomati, and are easiest after the monsoon has passed. Carry cash outside the capital.

Tripura is small and lightly visited, which means you will be noticed. Ask before photographing anyone, especially in Tripuri villages, and dress modestly at Udaipur and the Kharchi Puja grounds. Buy bamboo and cane work and risa, the handwoven Tripuri cloth, from the weavers and cooperatives that make them. At Neermahal, the lake is a wetland as well as a moat; leave nothing on the water.

Agartala sits at the far edge of the Northeast, and most travellers continue into the hills. Meghalaya is the obvious next step — a short flight to Guwahati and a drive up to Shillong, where the weather turns cool and the rain gets serious.