An Antipodean Adventure

On the road to Agra, I was able to stop off at the deserted palace of Fatehpur Sikri in Uttar Pradesh. I say deserted because not only was the palace abandoned just 15 years after building was completed (due to water shortages) but also because there were hardly any tourists there. The many buildings in the palace complex were magical as sunset approached and at times I was able to look around the vast courtyards and not see anyone else.

Agra was absolutely packed: apparently it was a good day to get married, so the streets were full of several different wedding processions. When I got to my hotel, I was rather surprised to find that it had a revolving restaurant on the top floor! Unfortunately the food was appalling (perhaps as punishment for giving up on my three weeks of vegetarianism) and the views weren’t particularly impressive.

I managed an early morning start the next day to go see the Taj Mahal for sunrise and before most of the crowds arrived. At the entrance I bumped into the Aussies from Rathambhore, so we walked around the complex together. It turned out that the early morning start wasn’t really worth it that day, as the air quality in the city, combined with the morning mist, made my first view of the Taj distinctly gloomy. However after an hour or so and when the sun started to warm things up, things started to look much better.

Alex in front of the Taj Mahal

This entry was posted on Monday, 6 December 2004 at 02:57 and is filed under India. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.