New Delhi - Agra (day 2)

Today started off right with the news that our luggage had arrived! After a short night we had to get up early to catch the train to Agra. This was quite the experience. First of all you were handed out an extensive breakfast, just like in an airplane. Second of all the train drove passed shantytowns. This is where you see the poverty of the people in the purest form and where people do their needs along the train tracks (walking on the train tracks is normal to do here). After 2 hours of travelling with the train we arrived at Agra train station. Here we were awaited by our guide who took us to the car where we were reunited with our driver (his name is Major Singh by the way). From the station we drove to the hotel, which looked beautiful by the way.

After an hour of freshing up and finally putting on some clean clothes it was time to hit the streets again. The first part of the program for today is visiting the Taj Mahal. This looks really beautiful, inside you'll find the mausoleum (because that's what the Taj Mahal actually is) photographing isn't allowed here.  So if want to know what it looks like, you should see it with your own eyes (and I can recommend it to you!). But you can photograph the outside, and that's what I did as much as possible. Also because filming on the site isn't allowed, so my dad had to put his videocamera in a locker. After seeing this beautiful world heritage, we went to the Red Fortress (also called Agra Fortress). This is where once a king lived who found harems very important (can't disagree with him 😜). You can notice this from the fact that once there were statues of harems implemented in the walls everywhere. But because of the Islamic influence (who disagree with the statues), these statues aren't visible nowadays. Simply because the statues got destroyed by the muslims. At the cottage of the king there are around the market square (this was specially for the royal ladies of the king) the quarters of the harems in the gallery. This fortress is by the way only for 25% open to public. The other 75% is used as military headquarters. Besides that the fortress was built in 3 parts: a part with paintings, a part with marble and a part with gems. This has all to do with the family of the Taj Mahal builder and his wife who are buries there. The great-grandson made these buildings consisting of these 3 elements in honor of his family. This is because these elements were loved in the family.

The gems of the Taj Mahal are laid in the marble (which is the strongest and hardest kind of marble in the world) by hand. How this was done in the old times we got to see in a museum where we went to as a tip of our guide. Here is was explained how it was done and we got to see the final result. (and we bought something small, seen the fact that the bigger works are quite expensive). Finally we were brought back to our hotel. So far day 2, tomorrow we will be leaving to the first city in Rajasthan (Bharathpur). Next time you will read what we are going to do there! :)

Day 1

Travel overview

Day 3