Cup Day - Taj Mahal to Orchha

After waking extremely early, we got out the door by 5.30am and made it to the front of Taj Mahal with about 3000 others trying to do the same thing. The guys and girls had to line up sepearately (as at many other important landmarks and museums for security clearance). Aurore was still feeling very weak but made a supreme effort to come. Suzanne and I tried to protect her from the absolute crush of people and see if we could get her in ahead of some to sit down but a particularly nasty group of Spanish ladies were accusing us of using her as a 'ploy'. After about 45-mins we eventually made it through security and observed at least 3 people be turned back for having 'contraband' in their day packs. You couldn't take water (other than the 500 ml bottle they issue), batteries, pens, paper, gels or many other things. The Indians are seriously worried that the Taj Mahal could become a terrorist location. We even saw in the newspaper that the Indian Army has created a special Air Radar protection zone over the site.

We only had about 35-mins in the complex and whilst it was amazing and as glorious as you'd imagine, the weather was not in our favour. There was a very low mist as the Taj Majal sits right on a major river and so it wasn't very clear. We managed to get Aurore around the complex and then had to head out to catch the train.

We managed to get the train on time and arrived in Orchha about 3.5hrs later. It was another extremely hot day but we stopped at a Paper making factory to see one of the Intreprid projects that our travels were funding. It was quite interesting to see them convert the scraps of cotton t-shirts into fine paper for University degrees.

After the tour, we arrived at the Orchha resort which was really lovely. Mark and I had a swim in the pool and Mark had a massage as well! We went to a 17th C palace on the Betwa river and then went to a locals place for a cooking demonstration and dinner which was lovely.

We finished off the night with some folk dancing by the pool and we got roped into dancing whcih was not a pretty sight! But at least Sarah and Aurore also got in the act.