Hotel Sheela Agra

Hello All, Arrival in Delhi, and madness ensues! Please repeat after me: "I will never complain about traffic on the 401 ever again." But, let's start at the beginning. 14 hours is a long time on a plane. That is very clear. However, if you have two seats to stretch out on (albeit near the latrine)... and a new upstanding young friend named Sishir who is studying engineering at U of Windsor and absolutely insists on giving you the home number in Delhi of his parents, (When calling with any cr...

The next day we travelled by road and the green farming land of Agra gave way to the more arid desert landscape of Rajahstan. Our accommodation for the evening was an old Mogul fort on the top of a hill, still owned by members of the Indian royal family. Here, we were invited to meet with them for a while and to adopt the local dress style - turbans for the guys and Saris for the ladies. Very dashing everyone looked too especially when the music sparked up and we were all press-ganged into jo...

Bharatpur will go down in my books as a pretty good place. It's the first time in India that I have a hot shower. The shower head is acceptable as well, which means I'm doing okay. Other than that Bharatpur is famous for its bird sanctuary, a very nice place that the cows of Delhi surely dream of at night. Here we are driven around leisurely and told about birds - we spot a jackal and some antelope and that's alright with me. But Agra...Agra is the place we have all been waiting for, as Agra ...

Well im writing this in Agra, the home of the Taj Mahal which I went to yesterday. It was amazing and detailed etc but not like the pictures as there was a pollution haze covering it. We got a train first thing yesterday morning from Orchha where we had spent 2 days, a really small town that is the home of the Ram Rava Temple and some amazing palaces. We arrived at this palatial hotel which was bliss having come from Varanasi with the filth and beggars and after the 14 hour overnight train it...

· Agra, Uttar Pradesh, India · GMT +5:30hrs Marble-ous Itīs still 750 rupees to get into the Taj Mahal, just like it was 5 and a half years ago. Thatīs over €12, a lot of money in India. My guidebook calls the price `gallingī (good word) but it does go on to say that most foreigners donīt actually mind paying the fee once they cast their eyes on the Taj itself and see how `Marble-ousī it is (Pats play on the word marvelous... ingenious, eh?). And it is. You canīt but be impressed with it...

We were up and ready at 5.45 to walk the short distance to the East Gate of the Taj and already there were heaps of people there! The boys queued for the tickets and the girls stood in line and got the water and shoe coverings. You can't take in any bags so it was cameras only. We eventually made it in a little after 6 after going through security & walked super fast to make it to the second podium -- everyone stops at the first to take pics so if you go straight to the second there are h...

Namaste! Hope i can keep this level of updates going, but so far today the power in Agra has cut twice so it may be an issue in even poorer regions! Anyway, on with the story of how I ended up in a dodgy internet cafe in Agra... Up at 5am to get the early train to Agra - We paid about 4 quid for the air conditioned seats and so glad we did... after boarding and getting comfortable we were brought the mornings 'The Times of India', then given a sealed litre of water, followed by our own kettle...

none

Seeing the Taj Mahal in person was the soul reason Paul agreed to go to India. He says it was all worth it. We stayed at Hotel Sheela, just 2 mins walk from the East Gate entrance to the mausoleum. Seeing the most extravagant monument ever built for love was a once in a lifetime experience. It is almost impossible to put describe this place, the Indian poet Rabindranath Tagore calls it "a teardrop on the face of eternity", or according to the British writer Rudyard Kipling it is "the embodime...

Agra is fascinating, if a little traumatic at first. The main reason being that it's well and truly on the tourist trail, and so from the minute you reach the station to the minute you get to your guest house there are touts coming afrter you ('Come see my shop', 'You want auto-rickshaw?', 'Where you from?'). Although endearing at first the novelty wears off pretty quickly!! So to try and beat the touts at their own game, and to see it in the best light we got up super early and saw the Taj M...