And THEN we went to the Taj Mahal.

A World Heritage Site.

No doubt, one of the most beautiful man made places in the world.

And once inside the gates an almost completely 'tout' free zone.

According to Rudyard Kipling 'the embodiement of all things pure'.

According to one Indian poet 'a teardrop on the face of eternity'.

Built by the Emperor Shah Jahan as a mauseleum for his beloved wife Mumtaz Mahal, who died in childbirth with her fourteenth child in 1631.

In total, twenty thousand people from India, Central Asia and Europe worked on the building.

These pictures show a little bit of the beautiful palace of Fatehpur Sikri.

Fatehpur Sikri was built on the top of quite a steep hill/mountain in 1571, but was only occupied for about twenty years as not enough thought was given to the supply of water and it all ran out!!

Because this part of it is a mosque it is required that everyoone take off their shoes. The stones were absolutely burning hot and we had to keep trying to explore the place around the shady bits!!

Most of the time guides and people trying to sell things at these sorts of places take 'no, thank you' for an answer (certainly after a ouple of times!) and leave you alone to visit and enjoy, but the entrance to this mosque was teaming with potential guides, and touts of all sorts of food, refreshments and souvenirs. It was impossible to move and at times quite scary as we tried to struggle our way through and, to be perfectly honest it did rather spoil the visit to this special place.

But the Palace next door was a different cup of tea altogether. The mobs of people were outside but not allowed through the entrance gate. So this was a haven of serenity and beauty and we were able to enjoy it.

The people of India are trying hard to encourage tourism and they have so much to offer, but scaring people off by pushing, pushing themselves at you to accept their services is not the way to go about it. Hoever, it is necessary to remember that this could possibly be the only way that some of these people can earn a living.

These are a couple of views of the hotel where we stayed in Jaipur. At one time it was the town house of a minor Maharaja and is still run by the same family.

A lovely evening having dinner under the stars and watching the colourful costumes whirling about in the local dancing traditions of Rajistan.

The Jantar Mantar in Jaipur is a huge observatory built in 1728. The instruments are on a huge scale with sundials, constructions for timetable exclipses and the annual cycle of the entire zodiac. It was the hottest place we had visited so far and we watched (from a shady place!) all the tourists trying to find a sapot out of the heat of the day for even a short reprieve.

These are just two of the new friends we made along the way!!!

And, can you imagine, the whole of this ceiling, the far wall and the wall on the left of the picture are solid silver!!!

The whole place was quite beautiful and five hundred years old. There is a huge amount of reconstruction and renovation work going on for this original capital of Jaipur. Including the re-working of the formal gardens. It ws all so worth the long and hot climb to the top of the steep walkway.

Our first big stop was at Ajmer to see the Amber Palace. What a stunning place. You can see how high up it is compared to the surrounding area - what a climb!! It used to be possible to do this journey by elephant, but they have all been retired now and the only way is to walk!!!

From Delhi we had a great driver who also acted as our guide for the six days we travelled through the 'Golden Triangle'. He always managed to find us good places to stop for comfort breaks and lunch! Always particularly important for Gavin!

We then went to a Craft Market and amongst other things we watched this very talented man painting papier mache boxes with the finest, finest brush. His concentration was incredible and the craftsmanship was fantastic. He told us he had been an apprentice for years before he reached this standard and was able to teach others.

These are some of the papers with the writing for the carpet patterns. The carpet makers just thread one sheet at a time between the long strands on the loom and follow what is written there!! Quite incomprehensible to you and I!! The other picture is of OUR carpet!!!

We watched Tibetan refugees making the most beautiful silk carpets in the most intricate and age old designs. And lo and behold, after numerous cups of Tibetan tea and lengthy conversation with a fascinating professor we bought a fabulous carpet for our living room in France!! Not that we have the living room yet!! This will take a little longer!!

And what do you think of this carving? Hard to realise that it is about eight hundred years old!!

By the way, a big thank you should go to Christopher for reminding us to bring a copy of the Lonely Planet to India book with us to use on this trip. It has been invaluable for finding hotels and telling us about what we are seeing and what we should see and even where to get the best seafood in Panaji, Goa (but more of that later on!).

No matter how I try to lay the photographs out in an artistic fashion, they almost seem to turn up just any-old-where. Oh well, I suppose the only thing that matters is that the pictures show up at all!! After all the trouble I have had.

Anyway, these pictures show the Qutb Minar in Delhi. The QM itself is a soaring tower of vistory dating from the beginning of islamic rule in India in 1193 and is of early afghan design. It is a beautiful place and we seemed to be visiting when there were not too many people about. A difficult thing to do anywhere in India!

These pictures show the largest Mosque in India in Delhi. And there is no doubt that the place is huge. This was the first of our visits to sites of historial and architectural interest.

During March this year we were able to enjoy a two week Indian holiday. We had a marvellous time. We saw lots of forts, temples and palaces and covered a fair bit of Indian countryside. We met interesting people and stayed in some lovely hotels converted from old Indian and Portuguese homes and have collected lots of fabulous memories to be enjoyed and re-lived with a glass of wine on the terrace we will build when we retire to France in the coming months.

We visited Delhi, Jaipur and Agra in the north and then went to Goa for a weeks rest and relaxation. As you can see we started off our visit to Delhi with a leisurely outdoor breakfast!