This Is A Lake - A travel blog

So here’s the thing: when I organize a trip, the way I build an itinerary is I read through a guidebook and I start getting a sense of what places I want to see, and how many days I can spend in each of them. When I read about Agra, I thought it was a one-day city, that I could do just two nights here and then squeeze in another destination at the end. But, I was given the excellent advice that in India it’s better to simplify your travel as much as possible, so I decided to do two full days here and drop Darjeeling from my itinerary. I figured I could do the Taj one day and Agra Fort the next. As it turns out, I did both of those yesterday, so I didn’t quite know what to do with myself today. One possibility was to visit Fatehpur Sikri, the archeological site of an ancient Rajasthani city, but the issue is that it’s in an entirely different region 50 km from Agra. In Japan, that’s the distance you cover when you sneeze in a shinkansen, but in India it’s not as easy. I looked for...

The Taj Mahal, Agra Fort Today, at the convened hour, my driver was waiting for me with his rickshaw to take me on my full tour of all things Agra. Before we started, I double-checked the itinerary and the price and everything, to make it extra clear what I wanted and what I didn’t. I said explicitly that I reserved the right to say no to any bazaar/market tourist trap he may want to take me to, but that I would still pay him the full agreed fee, and to sweeten the deal I told him I’d let him take me to a restaurant of his choosing for lunch. We agreed on that, and took off! The first priority, of course, was to get to the Taj, which was just a five or ten minute ride from the hotel. The driver dropped me off at the Western Gate (there is also an Eastern Gate, and a Southern Gate that is currently closed), where I bought the most expensive ticket I’ve yet come across in India. For 1300 rupees (€16.40) you get your admission ticket, which gives you a discount at all other Agra a...