Spent our last night in Jaipur out for dinner and decided to travel in tuk-tuks, and although we had seen Indians crammed into them, we didn't expect to fit 7 of us in a single one! Certainly an experience! For dinner itself, Vipul took us to the restauant at the Narain Palace Hotel which was a former private residence and very grand. We were recommended the Lal Maans (local mutton curry) which was really good and nowhere near as spicy as we had expected real Indian curries to be. They had traditional music and dance as entertainment and after some beer and much cajoling, Andrew, Simon and I ended up on the stage thowing some shapes and having a go at some of the Indian dances too. Poor Simon had the worst time of it and ended up wearing some sort of horse/camel costume and having to dance around in that. Much banter ensued! When we got back to the hotel we pre-ordered a packed breakfast (which turned out to be a very anaemic omelette sandwich?!?) ready for a very early start.

Left the hotel at 5.30am to catch a 6am train to Agra. Quite sad to leave the lovely surroundings of the hotel in Jaipur, such a quiet and calm place, but obviously VERY excited about Agra and India's most famous landmark... the Taj Mahal! The train from Jaipur to Agra was different to the one we had already travelled on as it was a sleeper train carriage which had had the beds folded away to seat 3 on each side (at a slight squish). Was a good opportunity to see exactly what they were like before we actually slept on one in a couple of days time on the overnight sleeper train to Varanasi although we both hope that we don't get a top bunk seeing as they squeeze 3 tiers of beds onto a wall! The train journey dragged a little bit with nothing much to see out of the windows except the newly formed "guess the crap" game. Funny til we saw a person mid poo.....! Arrived in Agra at about 11ish and went straight to our hotel to get some lunch and rest before the big outing at 2.

Before the Taj Mahal we visited the other main attraction for visitors to Agra - the Red Fort, so named as it is predominantly made of red sandstone. It was massive and quite spectacular - huge drawbridges and two moats. Back in the day, the first moat was filled with water and had crocodiles and poisonous snakes and serpents in it and the second was jungly and contained lions, tigers and other big cats/dangerous animals. Quite the security system . Tourists are only allowed to visit about 30% of it and it still takes almost two hours to see that much. The rest is still used as an army base, despite seemingly being overrun by monkeys! From the Red Fort we got a wonderful view of the Taj Mahal standing a few miles away. We went back to our cars and started the journey to the Taj Mahal, but had to get out a kilometre away as no fossil fuel vehicles are allowed any closer to the monument to preserve it. They provide a battery powered bus to the entrance where we were unbelievably harassed by people selling souvenirs and beggers - they clearly aren't stupid and know where they are gonna get their money! Sadly for Jo (and Mike), upon entry to the Taj Mahal complex, Chicky was confiscated so he could not be included in any pictures there. Sad times! To use a lazy cliche, the Taj Mahal really is beyond words, but the cliche is so fitting. Any amount of photos and descriptions could not do the scale, structure and wonder of it justice. It is HUGE! Far bigger than we had expected from the pictures. After Sanjeev, our local guide, told us some of the history of the Taj Mahal, we spent an hour just wondering around with our jaws wide open and taking as many pictures from as many angles as possible to try to capture the majesty of it but failing (whilst still getting some very nice shots of course!). As a monument to a man's love for his wife it will take some beating. (Jo thinks going out with an engineer this should be possible but alas Dan is too lazy/unbothered for such gestures ;o) hehe) We were told that Emperor Shah Jahan had also planned a black version across the river but he was imprisoned by his son before it got any further than the foundations. It would have been even more incredible had there been a second one, but perhaps that would have made the one that was built less special. After all the excitement we headed back to the hotel to de-sweat and chill, before heading to a lovely local vegetarian restauarant which already made a nice change from curry!

All that can really be said about Agra is that you have to visit it for yourself to really understand how incredible the Taj Mahal is. As a place it was hard to judge seeing as we were only there for the day and only saw the tourist attractions, but for the most part it was somewhere between Delhi and Jaipur for chaoticness, but was becoming more westernised, having a Pizza Hut and a Costa Coffee just around the corner from our hotel!