Private Golden Triangle Tour with Jodhpur & Jaisalmer 8D/7N in Delhi

The Golden Triangle, then west until the road runs out

Jaisalmer is 560 km past Jaipur, almost at the Pakistan border, and it is the reason to take eight days rather than five. Shorter itineraries always drop it, and it is the place people remember longest.

Day 1: Delhi

Met at the airport or station. India Gate, the President's House from the road, the Lotus Temple if time allows, and the markets in the evening.

Days 2–3: Agra

The Taj Mahal, best at sunrise, and Agra Fort with the Musamman Burj where Shah Jahan spent his last eight years as Aurangzeb's prisoner, looking at his wife's tomb along the river. Fatehpur Sikri on the drive west.

Day 4: Jaipur

Amber Fort above Maota Lake, the City Palace, Jantar Mantar and the Hawa Mahal.

Days 5–6: Jodhpur

Mehrangarh is the fort that changes people's minds about Indian forts — 120 metres straight off the rock, never taken, with the best-run museum in Rajasthan inside. The cannonball scars on the second gate are from a Jaipur siege.

Below it, Jaswant Thada in marble thin enough that sunlight passes through it, and the blue lanes around the clock tower. The blue was a lime-and-copper wash that kept termites out.

Days 7–8: Jaisalmer

Sonar Quila, the golden fort of 1156, is one of the last living forts on earth — around three thousand people still live inside its walls, in houses their families have held for generations. The yellow sandstone turns honey-coloured at sunset.

The Jain temples inside are carved to the point of lace. Patwon ki Haveli is five merchant mansions built side by side in the 1800s. Gadisar Lake, a 14th-century reservoir, is best at dawn.

Then Sam dunes for a camel ride at sunset and a night in a desert camp.

Three options

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

Practical

October to March. April to June in the Thar passes 45°C; December and January nights in the desert drop close to freezing.