8 Days in India: The Golden Triangle, Jodhpur and Udaipur by Private Car

Flights into Delhi tend to land in the early morning or the middle of the night, so we plan Day 1 as a half day.

• If you arrive before dawn, tell us and we will have your room ready, so that you can rest before the afternoon.
• In the afternoon your guide takes you through New Delhi to Humayun's Tomb.
• It was completed in 1572, and it is the first great garden tomb of the Mughal empire.
• It is also the direct ancestor of the Taj Mahal.
• Seeing it first means that on Day 4 the Taj arrives as the end of a line and not as a surprise.
• If you have the energy, add the Qutub Minar and a drive past India Gate.
• Then stop.
• Distances in Delhi are long, traffic is real, and tomorrow is a full day in the old city.

Old Delhi in the morning is not the same place as Old Delhi at two in the afternoon.

• Begin at Jama Masjid, the largest mosque in India.
• If the southern minaret is open, the climb gives you a view over the rooftops.
• Then you go down into Chandni Chowk with your guide.
• A cycle rickshaw is the practical way through the lanes.
• The spice market at Khari Baoli and the silver bazaar are too narrow for a car and too far apart to cover comfortably on foot.
• Lunch is built into the walk.
• Parathas, kebabs, a kulfi if you have room, and a lassi, which is best ordered in a small glass.
• In the afternoon, visit the Red Fort, or choose a quiet hour at Raj Ghat if the morning has been enough.
• Do not add a fourth stop.
• Tomorrow you leave early for Agra.

The drive from Delhi to Agra on the Yamuna Expressway takes about three to three and a half hours.

• Your driver leaves after breakfast and you can stop wherever you like.
• A fast train covers the same distance in around 100 minutes, but the car carries your luggage and your timing is your own, so the plan uses the car.
• Today is deliberately not a Taj Mahal day.
• The afternoon goes to Agra Fort, a walled city in red sandstone that was the seat of the empire before Delhi was.
• Shah Jahan added marble palaces inside it.
• From the octagonal tower where he spent his final years, held by his son Aurangzeb, he could see the Taj downriver.
• The view means more before you have stood in front of the tomb itself.
• Next comes Itimad-ud-Daulah, the Baby Taj.
• It is small, often quiet, and it is among the first Mughal tombs faced in white marble with inlaid stone.
• The day ends at Mehtab Bagh across the Yamuna, where the Taj is reflected in the river and there are few people beside you.

Be at the gate before it opens.

• Shah Jahan started the Taj Mahal in 1632 for Mumtaz Mahal, and the work took about two decades.
• In early light the Makrana marble shifts from grey through pink to white, and you notice how much of the surface is inlaid stone rather than carving.
• Get close to the plinth.
• The flowers set into the marble are what the building is truly about.
• Two hours inside is right.
• Your guide manages the East Gate and the security line.
• Carry a phone, a wallet and your original passport, and leave bags in the car.
• Then comes breakfast, check-out and the road to Jaipur, about four hours.
• An hour out of Agra is Fatehpur Sikri.
• Akbar built a whole capital here in the 1570s and left it after some fourteen years, most likely over the water supply.
• Very little has fallen down and very few people are inside, which makes it the best roadside stop on the itinerary.
• You reach Jaipur by late afternoon.
• It is a long day, and the only honest advice is to keep the evening free.

Begin at Amber Fort at eight.

• It lies about eleven kilometres out of town, up a hillside above Maota Lake.
• The mirrored Sheesh Mahal is small and draws a queue by mid-morning.
• The ramparts and stepped courtyards do not, and they are the better part of the visit.
• Then return inside the walls.
• Jaipur was laid out on a grid in 1727, which makes it a city you can read from a map.
• The City Palace museum, the stone instruments of Jantar Mantar and the honeycomb front of the Hawa Mahal sit within a few hundred metres of one another.
• Jantar Mantar in particular is puzzling alone and absorbing with a guide.
• If you would like something to do with your hands, Jaipur is the place for it.
• Block printing and blue pottery are real local crafts, and a short workshop visit can be arranged.
• Finish at Nahargarh on the ridge for the last half hour of light over the whole city.

This is the longest road day of the plan: five and a half to six hours from Jaipur to Jodhpur, across flat, dry country that grows emptier as you go.

• Leave by seven if you can, because an early start gives you more daylight at the fort.
• A flight on this route usually connects through Delhi and takes longer door to door, so we use the car.
• Go straight to Mehrangarh on arrival.
• The fort stands on a cliff of about 120 metres above the old city.
• The palace rooms inside are intact rather than rebuilt, and the audio guide is unusually good.
• From the ramparts, the blue houses of the old town spread directly below you.
• With one night, you have to choose, and the best choice is the fort in the late afternoon followed by a walk down through the blue lanes to the clock tower and the Sardar Market at dusk.
• If time is short, leave out Jaswant Thada.
• Do not leave out the walk.

Jodhpur to Udaipur is about five hours, and it is the most scenic road of the trip, dropping out of the desert and into the Aravalli hills.

• Leave at eight and you reach Udaipur for a late lunch with the afternoon intact.
• Ranakpur lies roughly on this road and adds about two hours.
• On an eight day trip most travellers should leave it for another visit.
• Udaipur is the change of tone the route has been building toward.
• The city is built around Lake Pichola, with the City Palace running for a quarter of a mile along the eastern shore.
• It is quieter, greener and smaller in scale than anything since Delhi.
• Visit the palace in the afternoon, then walk through the old town to Jagdish Temple.
• End the day on the water.
• The sunset boat takes about an hour, passes the Lake Palace and stops at Jag Mandir island.
• For many travellers it is the part of the trip they remember most.

Udaipur has direct flights to Delhi and Mumbai, and most eight day trips end here in the afternoon.

• Flights are not included.
• The morning is left open on purpose, because after seven days of forts an unplanned morning is the right use of it.
• Walk the ghats before the shops open.
• Have a long breakfast with a view of the water.
• If you want one more place, go up to Sajjangarh, the monsoon palace on the ridge, for the view over the lakes and the hills behind.
• Or spend an hour at Bagore Ki Haveli, a restored merchant's house on the waterfront, which has a folk performance in the evening if your flight is late.
• If you are flying out on the morning of Day 9, the day trip to Kumbhalgarh and Ranakpur is the best full day available from Udaipur.
• Kumbhalgarh is a fort with the second longest continuous wall in the world, and Ranakpur is a Jain temple with 1,444 carved marble pillars, none alike.
• It takes about ten hours, so it only fits if the whole day is free.