Agra

Agra and our first Sleeper train experience

In mid-September, we had our first experience of Indian trains with an overnighter from Amritsar to Agra.  It left on time but was two hours late by the time we disembarked at 10 am the following day.

We booked our 1st class tickets online.
Booking train tickets can be complicated. That is until you have set yourself up with an IRCTC account.  This looks daunting but is possible.  If you need your hand held then there is a very helpful guide at ‘The man in seat 61’

The Indian railways ticketing website is also very easy to navigate but you may have to resort to Google Maps to ascertain the exact names of the railway stations you are trying to connect to, after you have discovered this key information then the rest of the job is easy.  If you can keep your dates and or travel times flexible, be aware of High Days and Holidays and fathom out how to use an international credit card to pay for the ticket – then you will find the system brilliant!

Sleeper train berths are allocated an hour before departure. During our trip around India we travelled on three overnight sleeper trains. With the two 1st class tickets we secured, we were allocated a coupe. A two-berth cabin with a lockable door.  The second class differs from 1st only by a curtain replacing the door. The food options and service remain the same.  The seats, convert to bunks at night,  The linen is crisp and the pillow provided is comfortable.  The ‘Prison’ grade scratchy blanket worked well to keep the coldest blasts of the very active air conditioning at bay.  I slept well despite the continued movement of the train. 

Of course, the toilet was grim. Then it also is after a few hours on a First Great Western train at home in the U.K.  Usually, there is an option of a Western toilet. But sometimes there are only squat toilets. It’s best to perhaps Google how to use those if you are in the dark on the matter.

Our trip from Amritsar to Agra felt like good value at £25 each.

After we arrived at Agra we took a tuk-tuk to our hotel, our driver becoming our guide for the day. This allowed us to easily ‘tick’ off several ‘must see’ items from our list. I mistakenly assumed that many of the sites in Agra were easy walking, but they are not. Not only had I not correctly assessed the distances, but I had not factored in the lack of pavements or the 35C heat.  Between disembarking the train and 5 pm we saw the ‘Baby Taj’, the Taj itself (from a viewpoint across the river). We fed ourselves and our driver. Now completely native in a paisley trouser/shirt/scarf (Kurta) combo acquired to visit the Taj in the morning, our final stop was at the Taj Fort which was somewhat unimpressive.

We returned to our hotel. Here we were allocated a wonderful room on the roof, with an extraordinary view of the Taj Mahal.  Having purchased our tickets online for the morning we had supper. Mindful of our early start, we retired for the evening.

The following morning we were at our designated ‘foreigners’ queue at 5.30 am.  Everything opened promptly and we were there to see the sunrise.  It was already hot and the combination of the mist from the river and the pollution smog all added to the early morning pictures. It’s slightly overwhelming when something seen in a book as a child is suddenly in front of you, for real.  The Eagles circled, and the monkeys and chipmunks were curious about the tourists. The green parrots high in the trees and …..the architecture.  The curious and rapid change in the light from dark, through all the shades of eerie tones as the sun reaches up to a brand new day.  It is majestic and slightly overwhelming.

You had to pinch yourself and remind yourself of the age of the Taj itself. In a land where the default position on historic buildings was ‘old and crumbling away’; the care taken to keep this mausoleum pristine was impressive.  Also impressive were the original costs and the years it took to construct. Foundations can still be seen. A mirror copy was planned, a ‘Black Taj’ on the opposite river bank. Although his obsession had already bankrupted the city; the King now had designs for a new construction.

It was little wonder that the son declared his father a ‘mad man’. He locked him up in the Taj Fort before he could spend any more of the town’s money.  His prison was a marble palace within the Taj Fort and his son took his throne. 

With over five thousand people a day visiting the Taj Mahal; perhaps it was a shrewd investment in the future of the city after all.