Our guide told us that our next stop Orchha, reminded him of the Jungle Book. We were thinking that it had to be pretty much downhill after Taj Mahal. Not so.
It is a four hour train ride from Agra to Orchha. Our car was the assigned seating, air conditioned car. The others were bench, standing room only and folks hang on to hand rails right at the open doors. We were lucky enough to arrive on time which I understand be a rare treat. From the train station we hired five tuk-tuks and rode through the countryside for about 30-minutes until we reached Orchha and our spa destination. Our hotel backs right up to several cenotaphs.
These are empty and wide open. Since they are “empty tombs” there was unrestricted access and no tourists. We could have been the Jungle Book’s band of monkeys romping on the ruins. Look, there’s one now!
Afterward, we went to another fortified palace. Again we were all alone in the place with unrestricted access. This one was definitely Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom creepy, but there were still some places where you could see the lapis lazuli inlay in the walls. It had to have been fabulous at one time.
