Monday, December 17th
After taking a back road detour due to an accident on the main highway, we arrived at Fatehpur Sikri which was Emperor Akbar's palace. A pretty neat place, but by now we've seen quite a few palaces.
Leaving Fatehpur Sikri, it was a relatively short drive to Agra. Along the way, we passed several bears with their handlers along the road. The bears are captured in the Himalayas and dragged down to tourist areas, taught to do some 'dances', and treated pretty poorly from what we hear. We didn't stop to pay for a show.
Once in Agra, we checked into our hotel and grabbed a quick lunch at Pizza Hut. Like McDonald's, their menu is quite different from their American restaurants. Also, this was the first time Abhi's mom had had pizza!
Then it was off to the crown jewel of India, the Taj Mahal. We had to park a few kilometers from the Taj because polluting vehicles are not allowed near the Taj, and hop into an electric cab. Once there, Andrea and I were charged the standard 2500% of what Indians are charged (though the rest of our travel group was splitting the costs with us and Anshu was asked many questions by the guards who doubted that he was actually an Indian citizen) and everyone was very thoroughly searched. Not only do they not allow firearms and food into the Taj complex, things like cellphones and calculators are prohibited. We never found out what was wrong with calculators..
The Taj Mahal is an awesome structure. The craftsmanship is very impressive. For more detail, see the comments with the pictures.
After the Taj, we headed back to the hotel then out for some more shopping in the evening.
Tuesday, December 18th
First thing in the morning we took a very fast tour of the Red Fort. That is one big fort. The walls and moats were so cool!
Done with our last sightseeing of the trip, we piled onto the bus for the drive back to Delhi.