Saturday 16th Feb - Day 13

Another 6 hour drive (man this country is big, maybe that's why they call it a subcontinent) gets us to Agra and a chance to see the Taj Mahal. I've been eagerly awaiting to see one of the 'wonders of the world'.

It doesn't stand alone You have to enter into the area through one of the gates. It's a long queue and we're persuaded by a ticket tout the can get us in in five minutes if we follow him and pay 250 rupees. He leads us to the east gate, which is a good 5 minutes walk, to a shorter queue and I join it having bought a ticket from a booth for locals. I get questioned by one of the gaurds at the entrance. "Are you a NRI ?"
"No, I'm from Punjab." He starts talking to me in Hindi - I'm busted. I have to go to the ticket booth again and pay 750 Rupees.

It's a little bigger than I imagined, but not very different in shape as I've seen many photos and little statues of it. Behind it is a river. Apparently, there is a plinth on the other side of th river where a black Taj Mahal was started but never built. We wonder around it taking photos and just taking in the experience. There is not much to see inside, just a couple of coffins behind somekind of grill.

After a couple of hours we leave having made our pilgrimage. Another six hour drive to Delhi. Did I mention India is big ?