Warning: This post will be long.
It's amazing the difference a three-hour train ride can make. We went from the grimy chaos that is the Delhi train station to the spotless luxury that is the ITC Mughal Hotel in Agra. We splurged a bit on this stay, and I'm so glad we did. We easily fit everyone into one suite, which had comfy beds for all, a huge bath, a huger shower, fluffy robes, fresh flowers, a big flat-screen TV on which to watch Bollywood, and anything else you care to think of. They even provided pets.
Guess which feature was everyone's favorite? Here are some clues:
Samuel preferred this bench, which he said was his motorcycle. The boy is obsessed, but that's a post for another day.
Looking at these photos again makes we want to go back, and not just for the massage chair. Agra was pretty incredible. We spent a very busy day touring the Taj Mahal and Agra's Red Fort, and we all agreed we could easily have spent another entire day doing the same thing.
India is trying to protect its national treasure from the effects of pollution, so it's illegal to drive within 200 meters of the Taj Mahal. This means that you have to walk a gauntlet of souvenir vendors and men who want to be your tour guide in order to get to the gates. It's quite the cultural experience. I mean that in a good way, actually.
Because of a mix-up about tickets, we ended up having to walk from the east gate around to the south gate. This took us through some winding streets and past a group of not-very-bright men who were teasing one of the huge monkeys that leap from building to building over the narrow streets. Ask Caroline how I heroically jumped between her and the rabid beasts (the monkeys, not the men). Actually, all I did was put my arm in front of her and tell her when to run, but it did fulfill my duty as protector.
Inside the grounds, the first thing we saw was the Great Gate, which is pretty awesome all on its own. It's made of sandstone and white marble and is decorated with verses from the Koran. The calligraphy gets bigger the higher it is on the gate so that it looks uniform from below. The same trick is used on the Taj Mahal itself.
Shah Jahan and his architects were design geniuses. This entire complex is just beautiful, with stunning view after stunning view. Here's the first glimpse you get of the mausoleum itself, through the Great Gate.
Here's the first view as you go through the gate.
There was a traffic jam just outside the Great Gate, because the sight of this gorgeous building is almost too much to take. You might think I'm being melodramatic, but no. It's breathtaking. If I don't admit that I had tears in my eyes, John will get on here and broadcast it anyway, so I admit it. This is one place that lives up to its hype.
Another reason for the traffic jam is that several hundred people are all trying to get pictures like these:
You have to have something to prove that you were actually there. Caroline kept tapping me and saying, "We're at the Taj Mahal!" The grounds are beautiful, too, and you can see the obsession with symmetry everywhere. There were tons of people, but it somehow didn't seem too overwhelming.
We got stopped several times so people could admire the kids. Caroline even has a new Indian pretend boyfriend! Some guy and a professional photographer kept bugging her until she finally agreed to snap a photo with him. Awkward. Irresistability runs in our family.
As you get close to the mausoleum, you have to either remove your shoes and leave them in a cubby or wear protective booties. Then you're allowed to get a close-up look at the Taj Mahal.
I had always assumed that the Taj Mahal was pure white, but that's not true. The white marble is actually inlaid with thousands of semi-precious stones in beautiful floral patterns.
Evie just loved the inlay. She spent some time looking for pink stones.
The carving and inlay is even more spectacular inside the tomb, but you're not allowed to take pictures and, let me tell you, they are deadly serious about this. A guy near us took out his cell phone, and the guard was on him in about half a second. The guard confiscated the phone and dragged the guy out of the tomb. So be warned.
The inside of the tomb has a carved marble screen surrounding the cenotaphs of Mumtaz Mahal and Shah Jahan, the Mughal emperor. Mumtaz Mahal was Shah Jahan's favorite wife and died during childbirth in 1631. He had the Taj Mahal complex built as a memorial to her, and she's buried right in the center of the building. Shah Jahan's cenotaph is off to one side (he died years later) and is the only thing that throws off the building's symmetry.
The central chamber and passages around it are lit with sunlight that comes through carved marble windows. Their design is simpler than those at Humayun's Tomb, but the symbolism of the spider's web is the same.
The mausoleum is on a huge, raised marble platform, so after we saw the inner chambers we walked around the outside of the building. There's a decorative minaret at each corner of the platform.
There's a red sandstone mosque on the west side of the Taj Mahal, and a matching building (purpose unknown except for maintaining symmetry) on the east side. It's a working mosque, so the entire complex is closed on Fridays except to those attending prayers. File that away for when you come visit.
We spent so much time on the platform, that the kids started finding subtle ways to protest.
We didn't want to leave, though, without seeing the Taj Museum. Our trusty Lonely Planet guide instructed us not to miss it, and who are we to argue with Lonely Planet? Since we were getting new views of the Taj Mahal on our walk across the grounds to the museum, we had to take a few more pictures.
The museum was small but really cool. It had 17th-century architectural drawings of the complex, original paintings (including miniatures of Shah Jahan and Mumtaz Mahal), and these really cool celadon plates that were supposed to break or change color if they came into contact with poison. John waited for the guard to step out of the room before taking this illicit photo of a celadon plate.
... And he got busted by a security camera! Ha! Ha! The guard came running into the room and gave John quite the dirty look, pointing at the security camera like "gotcha!" We did manage to escape without having the camera confiscated or getting thrown out of the museum.
By this time, the kids were tired and we were all hungry, so we walked back to the car so we could head out for lunch. We shared the road with a couple of bulls, which is nothing remarkable in India. They were walking so slowly and peacefully that we were lulled into a sense of safety, and Evie nearly got trampled when they suddenly locked horns in a fight! Was it an episode of Animal Encounters? Nope. Just another day in India.
It's amazing the difference a three-hour train ride can make. We went from the grimy chaos that is the Delhi train station to the spotless luxury that is the ITC Mughal Hotel in Agra. We splurged a bit on this stay, and I'm so glad we did. We easily fit everyone into one suite, which had comfy beds for all, a huge bath, a huger shower, fluffy robes, fresh flowers, a big flat-screen TV on which to watch Bollywood, and anything else you care to think of. They even provided pets.
 |
| Meet Natasha and Dino. |
Samuel preferred this bench, which he said was his motorcycle. The boy is obsessed, but that's a post for another day.
Looking at these photos again makes we want to go back, and not just for the massage chair. Agra was pretty incredible. We spent a very busy day touring the Taj Mahal and Agra's Red Fort, and we all agreed we could easily have spent another entire day doing the same thing.
India is trying to protect its national treasure from the effects of pollution, so it's illegal to drive within 200 meters of the Taj Mahal. This means that you have to walk a gauntlet of souvenir vendors and men who want to be your tour guide in order to get to the gates. It's quite the cultural experience. I mean that in a good way, actually.
 |
| This camel is patiently waiting to haul tourists to the east gate. |
Inside the grounds, the first thing we saw was the Great Gate, which is pretty awesome all on its own. It's made of sandstone and white marble and is decorated with verses from the Koran. The calligraphy gets bigger the higher it is on the gate so that it looks uniform from below. The same trick is used on the Taj Mahal itself.
Shah Jahan and his architects were design geniuses. This entire complex is just beautiful, with stunning view after stunning view. Here's the first glimpse you get of the mausoleum itself, through the Great Gate.
 |
| The mausoleum is raised just enough that its background is always nothing but sky. |
There was a traffic jam just outside the Great Gate, because the sight of this gorgeous building is almost too much to take. You might think I'm being melodramatic, but no. It's breathtaking. If I don't admit that I had tears in my eyes, John will get on here and broadcast it anyway, so I admit it. This is one place that lives up to its hype.
Another reason for the traffic jam is that several hundred people are all trying to get pictures like these:
You have to have something to prove that you were actually there. Caroline kept tapping me and saying, "We're at the Taj Mahal!" The grounds are beautiful, too, and you can see the obsession with symmetry everywhere. There were tons of people, but it somehow didn't seem too overwhelming.
We got stopped several times so people could admire the kids. Caroline even has a new Indian pretend boyfriend! Some guy and a professional photographer kept bugging her until she finally agreed to snap a photo with him. Awkward. Irresistability runs in our family.
As you get close to the mausoleum, you have to either remove your shoes and leave them in a cubby or wear protective booties. Then you're allowed to get a close-up look at the Taj Mahal.
I had always assumed that the Taj Mahal was pure white, but that's not true. The white marble is actually inlaid with thousands of semi-precious stones in beautiful floral patterns.
Evie just loved the inlay. She spent some time looking for pink stones.
The carving and inlay is even more spectacular inside the tomb, but you're not allowed to take pictures and, let me tell you, they are deadly serious about this. A guy near us took out his cell phone, and the guard was on him in about half a second. The guard confiscated the phone and dragged the guy out of the tomb. So be warned.
The inside of the tomb has a carved marble screen surrounding the cenotaphs of Mumtaz Mahal and Shah Jahan, the Mughal emperor. Mumtaz Mahal was Shah Jahan's favorite wife and died during childbirth in 1631. He had the Taj Mahal complex built as a memorial to her, and she's buried right in the center of the building. Shah Jahan's cenotaph is off to one side (he died years later) and is the only thing that throws off the building's symmetry.
The central chamber and passages around it are lit with sunlight that comes through carved marble windows. Their design is simpler than those at Humayun's Tomb, but the symbolism of the spider's web is the same.
 |
| In case you're wondering, this photo's legal, since we were outside the central chamber. |
There's a red sandstone mosque on the west side of the Taj Mahal, and a matching building (purpose unknown except for maintaining symmetry) on the east side. It's a working mosque, so the entire complex is closed on Fridays except to those attending prayers. File that away for when you come visit.
We spent so much time on the platform, that the kids started finding subtle ways to protest.
We didn't want to leave, though, without seeing the Taj Museum. Our trusty Lonely Planet guide instructed us not to miss it, and who are we to argue with Lonely Planet? Since we were getting new views of the Taj Mahal on our walk across the grounds to the museum, we had to take a few more pictures.
The museum was small but really cool. It had 17th-century architectural drawings of the complex, original paintings (including miniatures of Shah Jahan and Mumtaz Mahal), and these really cool celadon plates that were supposed to break or change color if they came into contact with poison. John waited for the guard to step out of the room before taking this illicit photo of a celadon plate.
... And he got busted by a security camera! Ha! Ha! The guard came running into the room and gave John quite the dirty look, pointing at the security camera like "gotcha!" We did manage to escape without having the camera confiscated or getting thrown out of the museum.
By this time, the kids were tired and we were all hungry, so we walked back to the car so we could head out for lunch. We shared the road with a couple of bulls, which is nothing remarkable in India. They were walking so slowly and peacefully that we were lulled into a sense of safety, and Evie nearly got trampled when they suddenly locked horns in a fight! Was it an episode of Animal Encounters? Nope. Just another day in India.
Wow. That's just about all I can say. Wow. And those kids are sure getting big!
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