Agra (Taj Mahal)

We got picked up from our hotel at 2pm, and although the traffic in Varanasi was dreadful I thought we would make quite good time. Especially as we had talked to our driver about not sleeping, so we were good to go. I booked a cheap hotel online thinking we would be there at the latest 10pm. Well at 3am, we finally pulled into the Agra area. Our driver, bless him had driven non stop, but the roads were dreadful and queues at the tolls were massive. 

He drove around in a bit of a daze for a while asking for directions which just seemed to take us round in circles. Eventually a man on a motorbike offered to lead our taxi there for £1, very reasonable I thought.

We eventually managed to wake someone in the hotel and for some reason started the longest check in process ever. During this he asked me 5 times for the Agoda voucher, now I have used Agoda for pretty much the entire trip and all I have had to do is show the voucher in pdf on my phone. He wasn't having any of this saying he needed a printed voucher, well I wasn't in the mood and told him so, and after realising there was nowhere we could get this done at 3.45am he let us up to the room. Which was revolting and not at all what i booked, after being shown the 3rd room we gave in, and both collapsed.

It wasn't the best half a nights sleep, at 4.45am there were some Indian men having what sounded like drinks on our balcony (which as it turned out was shared with another room), but I didn't know this, so was a little disconcerted. Then at 6am someone from the hotel knocked on the door 3 times to ask if we wanted to tea and coffee. I couldn't really get back to sleep after that so at 8am set out to find a new, less grim hotel. I picked up a friendly tuk tuk driver and he took me around to see a few, they were all pretty grim, like prison cells, with no windows. Eventually we found M House, this guy had really nice airy rooms, but the cherry on the cake was the room on the roof. It was literally an add on, on the roof, had its own bathroom, tv, aircon and a massive comfy bed.

I hopped in my tuk tuk and went back to collect Craig and the bags. Just as we were leaving the same guy from the night before stopped us and said that we could not leave until he had the printed voucher. Long story short this meant a 45 minute argument in the baking sun, not having has much sleep or any food. Eventually the manager turned up and I told him about my displeasure at his hotel, which he apologised for. He then said there was no problem and we could go, but before we go would we like to sign the comments book, oh how we laughed!

We eventually got settled into our new hotel and arranged for our tuk tuk man to pick us up at 5am the following day to go and see the Taj Mahal. That afternoon we decided to head for Agra Fort.

The 94-acre fort has a semicircular plan, its chord lies parallel to the river and its walls are seventy feet high. Double ramparts have massive circular bastions at intervals, with battlements, embrasures, machicolations and string courses. Four gates were provided on its four sides, one Khizri gate opening on to the river. The site is very important in terms of architectural history. It was recorded that five hundred buildings in the beautiful designs of Bengal and Gujurat were built in the fort. Some of them were demolished by Shah Jahan to make way for his white marble palaces. Most of the others were destroyed by the British between 1803 and 1862 for raising barracks. It was only during the reign of Akbar's grandson, Shah Jahan, that the site took on its current state. Unlike his grandfather, Shah Jahan tended to have buildings made from white marble, often inlaid with gold or semi-precious gems. He destroyed some of the earlier buildings inside the fort in order to make his own. At the end of his life, Shah Jahan was deposed and restrained by his son, in the fort. It is rumored that Shah Jahan died in Muasamman Burj, a tower with a marble balcony with a view of the Taj Mahal.

Agra is not a big city and everything is centred around the Fort and the Taj Mahal. The touts in these areas are totally relentless, more so than anywhere else we have been. To the extent that they will watch you get out of one tuk tuk and then ask if you want a tuk tuk, then if you say no, they follow you, its ridiculous. A couple of times we got scratches on the legs from the cycle rickshaws getting to close, because obviously running your customer over is good sales technique.

Anyway the Fort, once you fight your way through the touts and into the Fort it is quite peaceful. It is a massive place, and has some really lovely gardens and there are chipmunks & monkeys everywhere. The day we were there it alternated between baking sunshine and torrential rain, so we spent quite a bit of it running from one shelter to another.

 

Once you climb to the top, we got our first view of the Taj Mahal

 

The further you get into the fort complex the marble becomes a lot more evident.

 

And on the way out we came cross a dog, who was going to get the pigeon no matter what!

 

For the rest of the afternoon we plotted up in one of the rooftop restaurants surrounding the Taj Mahal, it did have pretty good views, but not as good as we will get to see tomorrow.... The shopping in Agra is very disappointing unless of course you are in the market for a fake marble Taj Mahal, or the Taj Mahal in a snow globe! Neither of which I felt a yearning for, so what could have been a nice walk back to the hotel through the alleys was just constant hassle by touts for things we didn't want.

We spent the evening admiring the beautiful views from our rooftop room

 

At about 2am the following morning we were woken by a very violent thunderstorm and torrential rain, this carried onto until about 6am, so no chance of seeing the Taj Mahal at sunrise. Nether less, we were pretty excited about seeing it, so we set off once everything started to dry off at about 10am. Now the tuk tuk drivers love to tell you how expensive the tickets are for the Taj for foreigners, it seems to be their favourite topic. As it goes it is 20 rupees (20p) for Indians, and 750 rupees (£7.50) for everyone else, I'm not really sure what they want you to say in response. £7.50 to see one of the greatest buildings in the world when we happily pay £40+ for a day at Legoland or Alton Towers doesn't seem to much of a stretch.

We had be warned numerous times to ensure we were taken to the right gate, there are four. From what I could gather one is for tour groups and one is for individual travellers, I don't know what the other two were for. The scam seems to be to drop you at the one for tour groups and then you are told you need to hire a camel to take you to the right gate. Not having any of that we gave our tuk tuk driver very strict instructions on the gate, and miraculously he dropped us there, with no threat of a camel.

You have to walk through the alleyways, and then pay for your ticket, there they give you free water and shoe covers.

So as much as my brother doesn't like my Wikipedia based information, here comes some more, I feel in this case it is essential. The Taj Mahal was built by Mughal emperor Shah Jahan in memory of his third wife, Mumtaz Mahal, who died during the birth of their 14th child in 1631. Construction of the Taj Mahal began in 1632 and was completed around 1653. The court chronicles of Shah Jahan's grief illustrate the love story traditionally held as an inspiration for Taj Mahal. The Taj Mahal is widely recognized as "the jewel of Muslim art in India and one of the universally admired masterpieces of the world's heritage". The total cost has been estimated to be about 32 million Rupees at that time.

The Taj Mahal was constructed using materials from all over India and Asia and over 1,000 elephants were used to transport building materials. The translucent white marble was brought from Makrana, Rajasthan, the Jasper from Punjab, Jade and Crystal from China. The turquoise was from Tibet and the Lapis laxuli from Afganistan, while the Sapphire came from Sri Lanka and the Carnelian from Arabia. In all, twenty eight types of precious and semi-precious stones were inlaid into the white marble.

A labour force of twenty thousand workers was recruited across northern India. Sculptors from Bukhara, calligraphers from Syria and Persia, inlayers from southern India, stonecutters from Baluchistan, a specialist in building turrets, another who carved only marble flowers were part of the thirty-seven men who formed the creative unit

Instead of lashed bamboo, workmen constructed a colossal brick scaffold that mirrored the tomb. The scaffold was so enormous that foremen estimated it would take years to dismantle. According to the legend, Shah Jahan decreed that anyone could keep the bricks taken from the scaffold, and thus it was dismantled by peasants overnight.

Emperor Shah Jahan himself described the Taj in these words:

Should guilty seek asylum here,
Like one pardoned, he becomes free from sin.
Should a sinner make his way to this mansion,
All his past sins are to be washed away.
The sight of this mansion creates sorrowing sighs;
And the sun and the moon shed tears from their eyes.
In this world this edifice has been made;
To display thereby the creator's glory.

So when you eventually get through the metal detectors, the security guards with big guns and manoeuvre around the group of 150 year old Indian woman that are crowding the entrance steps. You are greeted by the first gate.......

 

The whole area is really clean and tidy and the gardens are beautiful. Once you walk through that gate you get your first view of the Taj Mahal....

 

I will say this, when we saw it yesterday from the rooftop restaurant, it didn't look as big as I expected. In reality I don't think it is as big as the pictures show, I think the water makes a big difference. But it is a really beautiful building, the marble is stunning. They do a very god job of ensuring that motorised vehicles do not come within a certain distance of it, to reduce the threat of dirt from the pollution. In 2002 the Taj was treated to a face-pack to save it from the effects of industrial pollution. A blend once used by Indian woman on their skin called multani mitti made up of soil, cereal, milk and lime is smeared onto the marble and then washed off after 24 hours with warm water. This apparently draws out any black or yellow imperfections, you have to admit it looks pretty gleaming white.

 

All those photos that you see on the internet of the Taj are obviously taken when it is closed because, every year there are more then 2 millions visitors. To be fair it felt like most of them were there that day, every photo was literally a battle to get. But I think we got a few good ones, maybe even a Princess Di!

 

There is a marked entry and exit way, and once you walk onto the marble you have to put on shoe covers. We did not realise till later but as "high price" ticket holder there was a quick way in, but as it was we had a very nice walk around the perimeter with all the Indians

 

Its once you get up close though that you can see the work that went into this building. Even though there is some very intricate detail, there is not too much, so it seems that less is more existed even back then. And it really works.......

 

Throughout the temple passages from the Qur'an are used as decorative elements. The calligraphy on the Great Gate reads "O Soul, thou art at rest. Return to the Lord at peace with Him, and He at peace with you." Much of the calligraphy is composed of script, made of jasper or black marble, inlaid in white marble panels. Higher panels are written in slightly larger script to reduce the skewing effect when viewed from below. Quite stunning.....

 

Once you walk in the main door, you enter a labyrinth of corridors that lead to the tomb. The tomb is the central focus of the entire complex of the Taj Mahal. The large, white marble structure stands on a square plinth and consists of a symmetrical building with an arch-shaped doorway topped by a large dome and finial. The room forms an unequal octagon that is approximately 55 metres (180 ft) on each of the four long sides. The main chamber houses the false sarcophagi of Mumtaz Mahal and Shah Jahan; the actual graves are at a lower level. It did say that you were not allowed to take pictures but everyone else was so I took a sneaky couple

 

The route then leads you back outside and into the gardens. The whole place is lovely, despite all the people parts of it felt very serene. I think it achieves its purpose to show how much this guy loved his wife, that he would build this for her body. The tomb itself was very cool, but once you got back into the gardens it was baking. So we had a little meander to watch the wildlife, took a couple more pictures of the Taj to add to the 50+ we have and then headed off in search of a cold drink.

 

Back into the madness....

 

That evening our friendly tuk tuk driver said that we could watch the sunset over the Taj Mahal from just over the river, so ever trusting that we are off we went. It took about 45 minutes to get to the other side of the river with the rush hour traffic. 

 

When we got there he said you can pay to walk into the park or just go around the outside you get the same view. Here we got our first proper look at a camel, they are used here to ferry tourists around but they also pull carts like the buffalo. This one was taking what I imagine to be a well earned rest.

 

The view of the Taj Mahal was really nice across the river, but there was no way you were going to see the sunset over it from there. I am not sure that had we been there at sunrise we would have seen it either, the angles don't seem right. But still some more nice Taj pictures, and from there we could just see the burning Ghats.....

 

With not too much time left to be hanging around we are catching the train tomorrow to Jaipur (The Pink City), this is a daytime train. So we are hoping should be quite a pleasant experience. I am really glad we made it to Agra, the Taj Mahal is definitely worth a visit. The rest of Agra is not a great deal to write home about, but then I suppose when you have the Taj Mahal what else does a town need really?

It totally blows my mind to think of the amount of work that went into this building, and with no machinery, its crazy stuff!!!