The Taj Mahal - Part 1

By the time we arrived in Agra early Saturday afternoon, the haze and fogginess we had been experiencing since Delhi had finally lifted. We had been undecided about whether or not to go to the Taj Mahal on Saturday or Sunday morning, but since the sun had come out, we decided to visit the Taj Mahal then. We were definitely glad we had made that decision when we woke up on Sunday morning – the fog was so thick you couldn’t see things that were three feet away!

Our driver told us we had a complimentary tour guide (we still have no idea how or why), and he met us at the hotel and rode over to the Taj Mahal with us. Because of the delicate nature of the marble, cars are not allowed within 1 kilometer of the monument. Visitors must park and can get to the Taj Mahal by walking, taking an electric car, a horse and buggy, or our choice – a camel cart. After climbing down from the camel cart, we approached the gate, bought our tickets and entered. You’d never guess that this unassuming wall was hiding something so magnificent.

All the buildings that surround the Taj Mahal are made of red sandstone, and are pretty stunning in their own right. You’ll notice that there are 11 minarets on top of the Great Gate, which signifies that it took 22 years to complete the building. They added one minaret every two years until construction was complete. There were touches of marble inlay on the Great Gate – but they were nothing compared to the amount of inlay on the Taj Mahal itself. In fact, the inlay is why construction took so long. The building itself only took 8 years – all the decorative touches took another 14!

And when you walk through the archway in the Great Gate …

There are roving photographers all around the monument. They take your photo in a variety of poses and develop the pictures while you are touring. You can buy the photos you like for 100 rupees ($2) each. Of course, we eagerly participated in this slightly crazy photoshoot, and bought full albums from the photographer. I’m sure they count on the American tourists to meet their daily quotas – we’re a little souvenir crazy sometimes.

Below are the “action shots” as taken from our cameras – the professional pictures look much better, but I think these are too funny to not share!