Abra in India: Taj Mahal (and Baby Taj too!)

I'll warn you now... this is going to be a photo heavy entry... especially since I haven't been able to upload anything to Flickr the past couple of days.

So today was a great day. A GREAT day. And a good reminder of why we came to the North of India in the first place. The Taj Mahal was absolutly breathtaking.

We woke up this morning bright and early when the electricity went off at 7:30 am and the generator kicked in... helicopter landing on the roof of our hotel room. Breakfast was not quite as charming as at our delhi hotel - three pieces of white bread, 2 bananas and boiled eggs. But there was some yummy chai which was really all I needed. Right away we noticed that the sun was out and the fog/smog was way better than the day before - we had been hearing horror stories about how bad it had been in the morning the

past couple of days so we were delighted to see that it was clear.

Our driver took us over to the Taj and dropped us off a few blocks away because the area is blocaded off to reduce pollution. Security was tight and took a while to get through, but then we walked through a courtyard area up to the gate to go in to the Taj... walking through the gate and getting my first glimpse of the Taj was breathtaking... it is absolutely the most gorgeous building I have ever seen in my entire life. It took us 5 or 10 minutes just to absorb it, and then we started walking around. I don't even know how to describe it to you but it is just amazingly impressive and beautiful and totally worth seeing if you ever, ever get the chance.

We walked around the building and then went in to see the tomb - in case you aren't familiar, they say the Taj Mahal is the greatest monument to love ever constructed. It was built by Shah Jahan as a tomb for his favourite wife when she died

(shortly after giving birth to 14 kids in 20 years...). You can't see the actual tomb - that is sacred and in the basement. But they have a public version available inside that you can walk around. Then we came back out and took a million photos - serious ones and goofy ones and then some more serious ones. And then we finally dragged ourselves away to move on to the next site, knowing we could come back to watch the sunset over the building at the end of the day.

Our next stop was the Agra Fort, which we didn't expect to impress us, since we were still bathed in the glow of the Taj.

But actually the fort held its own - it was a series of courtyards leading to courtyards, each one a new and interesting suprise when we stumbled onto it. And there were lots of monkeys, and many views back over the river to the Taj.

After the Fort we tracked down a rather unimpressive mosque that our driver warned us not to bother with, and then he took us to the mini Taj Mahal, which we promptly nicknamed Bebe Taj, which was actually magical in its own right.
Then we raced the setting sun back to the other side of the river from the Taj Mahal so we could watch it turn pink (ish... it never really achieved the full effect) in the company of a little entourage of 8 year old boys, a camel, a cow, some goats, several other tourists and a guy selling little wooden backgammon sets (we passed).

We tried to end the night with some shopping but unfortunately all the places we went were overpriced and uncomfortably pushy - indian guys following us around from the moment we walked in the door. So we escaped to dinner and then came back to the hotel.