From Pune: Overnight Taj Mahal/Agra Tour with Return Flight

Agra from Pune, without three days of travel

Pune to Agra is roughly 1,200 km. By train that is a day in each direction; by flight it is a couple of hours, which is what makes a two-day trip realistic. This package covers the flights, the ground transport in Agra, a licensed guide, and the night.

Day one

Flight north, then a private air-conditioned car from the airport. Agra Fort in the afternoon — Akbar's red sandstone city of 1565, rebuilt in marble by his grandson Shah Jahan.

Behind the double walls are the Diwan-i-Am where the emperor heard petitions, the Khas Mahal and its gilded pavilions, and the Musamman Burj — the octagonal marble tower where Aurangzeb imprisoned his own father for the last eight years of his life, with the Taj visible along the river.

Optionally Mehtab Bagh across the Yamuna for sunset, which gives the reflection view of the Taj.

Night in Agra.

Day two

The Taj Mahal at sunrise, when the gates open half an hour before the sun. The marble reads grey, then pink, then white, and in winter there is mist on the river behind the dome. The crowd at that hour is a fraction of what it will be by ten.

Your guide covers the parts that are easy to walk past: calligraphy cut in increasing sizes so it reads uniformly from the ground; pietra dura flowers carrying dozens of inlaid stones each; minarets tilted fractionally outward so that an earthquake would drop them clear of the tomb; and the single asymmetry in the whole composition — Shah Jahan's own cenotaph, added off-axis by his son.

Flight back to Pune in the evening.

Three options

Flights, car, driver and guide with your own room; or the same with a three-star or five-star hotel included.

Practical

The Taj is closed on Fridays, which fixes which days this can run. Entrance fees are ₹1,300 for foreign nationals at the Taj including the mausoleum chamber, ₹650 at the fort.