Delhi: Taj Mahal & Jaipur: 2-Day Heritage Sightseeing Tour

The triangle compressed into two days

This covers Agra and Jaipur in 48 hours from Delhi. It is fast, and it works because the night falls in Jaipur rather than back in Delhi — which removes about four hours of pointless driving from the itinerary.

Day one: Delhi to Agra to Jaipur

Early start down the Yamuna Expressway, about three hours.

The Taj Mahal with a licensed guide. Shah Jahan began it in 1632, the year after Mumtaz Mahal died bearing their fourteenth child — twenty thousand workers, twenty-two years, marble hauled 300 km from Makrana.

Your guide covers the things you would walk past: the calligraphy cut in increasing sizes so it reads the same height from the ground, the pietra dura flowers of dozens of inlaid stones each, the minarets tilted very slightly 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, placed off-axis by his son.

Then Agra Fort: Akbar's red sandstone city of 1565 with Shah Jahan's marble palaces inside it, and the Musamman Burj, where he spent his last eight years imprisoned by Aurangzeb with the Taj visible along the river.

Afternoon drive to Jaipur, roughly four hours, arriving for the night.

Day two: Jaipur

Amber Fort first thing — the Ganesh Pol gateway, the Sheesh Mahal, the courtyards climbing the ridge above Maota Lake. Go early; the crowds arrive with the coaches.

Jal Mahal from the causeway, four of its five storeys underwater. City Palace and Jantar Mantar in the old city. Hawa Mahal, the 953-window screen, from the street opposite.

Then the drive back to Delhi, around five hours.

Two options

Air-conditioned transport with a guide and a four-star hotel, or the same at five-star.

The Taj is closed on Fridays, which fixes the start dates.