Delhi: 2 Days Taj Mahal & Delhi Guided Tour By Car

Two days instead of one very long one

The Delhi–Agra day trip is fourteen hours with seven of them in a car. Split across two days with a night in Agra, the same sights stop being an endurance test — and you get the Taj at sunrise, which the day trip cannot give you.

Day one: Delhi

Qutub Minar, begun in 1193, the tallest brick minaret in the world, with the iron pillar in its courtyard that has stood 1,600 years without rusting.

Humayun's Tomb, built in the 1560s by the emperor's widow — the first great Mughal garden tomb in India, and the direct model for the Taj sixty years later. Same four-part garden, same double dome, far fewer people.

India Gate and the drive along Rajpath past Rashtrapati Bhavan, 340 rooms under a dome Lutyens borrowed from a Buddhist stupa.

Lotus Temple, the Bahá'í house of worship of 1986, nine sides, twenty-seven marble petals, silent inside — and closed on Mondays.

Lunch at a good restaurant, then the drive to Agra on the expressway, about three and a half hours. Night in Agra.

Day two: Agra

The Taj Mahal as the gates open, half an hour before sunrise, when the marble runs grey to pink to white and the crowd is a fraction of what it becomes. Your guide covers the calligraphy sized to read evenly from the ground, the pietra dura flowers of dozens of inlaid stones, the outward-tilted minarets, and the single asymmetry in the whole building.

Then Agra Fort — Akbar's red sandstone city of 1565, Shah Jahan's marble palaces inside it, and the Musamman Burj where Aurangzeb held his father prisoner for eight years within sight of the Taj.

Back to Delhi in the afternoon.

Practical

The Taj is closed on Fridays. Private air-conditioned car, driver and licensed guides throughout; entrance fees and hotel are arranged separately unless stated.