From Delhi: 3-Day Golden Triangle Tour w/ Hotel & Transport

Three days, and the first one does double duty

Delhi sightseeing in the morning and the drive to Agra in the afternoon — which is what makes three days work at all. You lose nothing except a lie-in.

Day 1: Delhi, then Agra

Jama Masjid, finished in 1656 and still India's largest mosque: red sandstone and white marble around a courtyard that holds twenty-five thousand people. Shoulders and knees covered; robes are lent at the gate.

A cycle rickshaw through Chandni Chowk, optional and worth taking — the street is still organised trade by trade, silver in Dariba Kalan and spices in Khari Baoli.

India Gate, Parliament House and Rashtrapati Bhavan from the road, then Qutub Minar or Humayun's Tomb depending on the traffic.

Then the Yamuna Expressway to Agra, about three and a half hours.

Day 2: Agra, then Jaipur

The Taj Mahal at sunrise. Shah Jahan began it in 1632, the year after Mumtaz Mahal died bearing their fourteenth child; twenty-two years and twenty thousand workers.

Your guide covers the calligraphy cut in increasing sizes so it reads uniformly from the ground, the pietra dura flowers of dozens of inlaid stones, the minarets tilted outward so an earthquake would drop them clear of the tomb, and the one asymmetry in the whole building.

Agra Fort afterwards, then Fatehpur Sikri on the road west — Akbar's capital of 1571, abandoned after fourteen years and standing complete because of it.

Day 3: Jaipur

Amber Fort early, before the coaches. Then Jal Mahal from the causeway, the City Palace, Jantar Mantar and the Hawa Mahal, and the drive back to Delhi.

Three options

Car, driver and guide; or with three-star or four-star hotels.

Practical

Around 700 km of driving across three days. The Taj is closed on Fridays, which sets the ordering.

Entrance fees are separate — roughly ₹2,600 a head for a foreign adult.