Polo Forest

Polo Forest sits in the Aravalli foothills of Sabarkantha district, near Vijaynagar, spread across roughly 400 square kilometers of dry deciduous forest along the banks of the Harnav River. The name comes from the Marwari word "pol," meaning gateway — the forest historically served as a natural entrance between Gujarat and Rajasthan, and a town flourished here from the 10th to 15th centuries under successive Parihar and Rathod rulers before being abandoned, leaving behind a scatter of ruined Hindu and Jain temples now half-reclaimed by forest. Polo Forest suits travelers wanting a genuinely quiet nature-and-heritage weekend within a few hours of Ahmedabad — there's no entry fee and no crowds by comparison to Gujarat's better-known destinations, just forest trails, a three-story carved Shiva temple, Jain derasars, and the Harnav Dam, all connected by walking paths through sal and teak-dominated woodland. The forest turns especially vivid during and after monsoon, and its position at the base of the Aravalli range gives it a topographical variety — hills, river, ruins — that's rare to find this concentrated and this close to a major Gujarat city.