7-Day Golden Triangle India Tour with Udaipur from Delhi

The first four days are the Golden Triangle — sandstone, forts, desert light. Udaipur is lakes, white marble and green hills, and arriving there on day five is the most satisfying gear change in Rajasthan.

Delhi

India Gate, Qutub Minar with its rustless iron pillar, Humayun's Tomb — the 1560s Mughal garden tomb that the Taj was built from the memory of — and Old Delhi's Jama Masjid and Chandni Chowk.

Agra

The Taj Mahal, ideally at sunrise, with a government-approved guide. Shah Jahan began it in 1632 after Mumtaz Mahal died bearing their fourteenth child; twenty-two years and twenty thousand workers.

Agra Fort and the Musamman Burj, where Aurangzeb imprisoned him for the last eight years of his life with a view of the tomb along the river.

Fatehpur Sikri on the road west.

Jaipur

Amber Fort on its ridge, the City Palace, Jantar Mantar and the Hawa Mahal, with time in the bazaars where the city's gem cutters and bangle makers actually work.

Udaipur

The drive south is long — around 400 km — and the landscape lifts into the Aravallis as you go.

The City Palace runs nearly a kilometre along Lake Pichola, the largest palace complex in Rajasthan, built up in pieces by twenty-two rulers across four hundred years.

Jagdish Temple from 1651, up thirty-two steps past stone elephants, busy with worshippers at every aarti. Saheliyon ki Bari, the garden of fountains and marble elephants built for a queen's forty-eight attendants.

And a boat on the lake at sunset, with the Lake Palace floating out in the middle and the hills going flat behind — the image people come home with.

Two options

Guide and air-conditioned transport only, or with four-star hotels included.

The Taj is closed on Fridays.