Morning
Land at Delhi (DEL)
Indira Gandhi International, Terminal 3. The Airport Express metro reaches New Delhi station in about twenty minutes; prepaid taxis are outside arrivals.
Check the Delhi AQI before you plan
Delhi's winter air is genuinely bad. February is much better than the December peak but still often unhealthy — carry N95 masks and keep an indoor option each day.
Afternoon / Day
Check in: The Imperial
Janpath, off Connaught Place. Open since 1936 on eight acres, with colonial-era prints and paintings hung the length of the corridors.
Lodhi Garden
Lodhi Road. Ninety acres of fifteenth-century Sayyid and Lodhi tombs used as a public park — the easiest possible first walk after a long flight.
Evening
India Gate and Kartavya Path
Kartavya Path. The war memorial arch lights up after dark and the lawns fill with families; ten minutes by car from Janpath.
Dinner at Bukhara
ITC Maurya, Sardar Patel Marg. North-West Frontier cooking straight off the tandoor, menu barely changed in decades. No cutlery. Book well ahead.
Morning
Red Fort (Lal Qila)
Netaji Subhash Marg. Shah Jahan's walled capital, closed every Monday — which is why this falls on a Sunday. Buy the ASI ticket online and arrive at opening.
Jama Masjid
India's largest mosque, finished in 1656 and a five-minute walk from the fort. Shut to visitors during the five prayer times; cover arms and legs, shoes off.
Afternoon / Day
Parathas in Gali Paranthe Wali
Off Chandni Chowk. A handful of shops have fried stuffed parathas in ghee down this lane since the 1870s; finish with rabri from the counter.
Khari Baoli spice market
Khari Baoli Road. Asia's largest wholesale spice bazaar — go for the chilli dust in the air as much as the cardamom. Sacks are cheaper upstairs.
Cycle rickshaw through Kinari Bazaar
Kinari Bazaar. Agree the fare before you sit down. These lanes sell wedding trim — zari, tinsel, turbans — and are too narrow for anything with an engine.
Evening
Dinner at Lakhori, Haveli Dharampura
2293 Gali Guliyan. A nineteenth-century haveli restored to a UNESCO Asia-Pacific conservation award; eat in the courtyard, and book — it isn't large.
Gurudwara Bangla Sahib
Hanuman Road, Connaught Place. Open late, free, head covered and shoes off. The langar kitchen feeds thousands a day and welcomes visitors who want to help.
Morning
Humayun's Tomb
Mathura Road, Nizamuddin East. Built in the 1560s and the direct architectural ancestor of the Taj — see this first and the Taj reads differently.
Sunder Nursery
Nizamuddin, next door to the tomb. A sixteenth-century Mughal garden restored into a ninety-acre heritage park; separate ticket, good coffee cart.
Afternoon / Day
Lunch at the Andhra Bhavan canteen
Andhra Pradesh Bhavan, 1 Ashoka Road. The state guesthouse canteen: unlimited rice thali on a banana leaf, a queue at the door, and absurdly cheap.
Qutub Minar
Mehrauli. A 73-metre victory tower begun in 1193. In the ruined courtyard beside it stands an iron pillar that has barely rusted in 1,600 years.
Evening
Khan Market
Rabindra Nagar. Bahrisons for books, Good Earth for ceramics, Fabindia for block print. Most shops shut on Sundays, so a Monday evening works.
Dinner at Indian Accent
The Lodhi, Lodhi Road, five minutes from Khan Market. Tasting menus that push Indian technique somewhere new. Reservations are required, not optional.
Repack for Agra and Jaipur
You come back to this hotel on day seven. Leave the big case in left luggage and take one small bag for the two nights away.
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Morning
Gatimaan Express to Agra
Hazrat Nizamuddin to Agra Cantt on the 12049 — a semi-high-speed run and the quickest way down. It works six days a week and never on a Friday.
Taj Mahal
Tajganj. Open thirty minutes before sunrise to thirty before sunset, and closed every Friday. Book on the ASI site; entering the mausoleum costs Rs 200 more.
Afternoon / Day
Check in: ITC Mughal
Tajganj, about four kilometres from the Taj. The only Indian hotel to win an Aga Khan Award for architecture; low sandstone courts and Mughal water channels.
Lunch at Peshawri
Inside ITC Mughal. The same North-West Frontier tandoor as Bukhara in Delhi — kebabs and blistered breads, eaten with your hands.
Agra Fort
Rakabganj. Its own ASI ticket — the Taj ticket buys you nothing here. Shah Jahan spent his last years held in the Musamman Burj, with the Taj in view.
Evening
Itimad-ud-Daulah (the Baby Taj)
Moti Bagh, on the north bank. The first Mughal tomb built entirely in white marble, twenty years before the Taj, and usually near-empty. Small separate ticket.
Sunset at Mehtab Bagh
Nagla Devjit, across the Yamuna and exactly in line with the Taj. Small ASI ticket; arrive an hour before sunset and stay for the colour change.
Dinner in the ITC Mughal gardens
Tajganj. After Mehtab Bagh the drive back across Agra is slow and dark — eat where you are sleeping, in the lit courts.
Morning
Check out and meet the car
There is no useful train from Agra to Jaipur, so this leg is a hired car and driver — roughly 250 km, and the two stops on the way are the whole point.
Drive west to Fatehpur Sikri
Forty kilometres out of Agra on NH-21, under an hour. Park at the lower lot; a shuttle bus runs the last stretch up to the gate.
Fatehpur Sikri
Akbar's red-sandstone capital, lived in for barely fourteen years. The palace complex is a separate ASI ticket; the Jama Masjid and Salim Chishti's dargah are free.
Afternoon / Day
On to Jaipur
Roughly four hours on NH-21 through Bharatpur and Dausa. Break the drive at Abhaneri rather than pushing straight through to the city.
Highway lunch on NH-21
There is nothing formal between Fatehpur Sikri and Abhaneri. Eat at a roadside dhaba — dal and roti off the tawa — or carry food from the hotel.
Chand Baori stepwell, Abhaneri
Abhaneri village, Dausa district, a short detour off the highway. Thirteen storeys and some 3,500 steps, cut in the eighth or ninth century.
Evening
Check in: Samode Haveli
Gangapole, inside the old walled city. A 225-year-old family haveli of hand-painted murals and bougainvillea courtyards; ask about the guided old-city walk.
Dinner in the haveli courtyard
Gangapole. After six hours on the road, eat where you are sleeping — Rajasthani cooking under the painted arches, and no taxi required.
Morning
Amber Fort
Devisinghpura, Amer, eleven kilometres north. Ticketed by Rajasthan's own archaeology department, so nothing from Agra carries over. Go at opening for the Sheesh Mahal.
Panna Meena ka Kund
Amer, five minutes downhill from the fort. A symmetrical stepwell of criss-crossing stairs — free to look at and a fraction of the crowd.
Anokhi Museum of Hand Printing
Chanwar Palkiwalo ki Haveli, Keri Gate, Amer. Hand block-printing shown in a restored haveli. Tuesday to Saturday 10:30 to 5, Sunday 11 to 4:30, closed Mondays.
Afternoon / Day
Jal Mahal photo stop
Amer Road, on the way back into the city. A sandstone palace standing in Man Sagar lake; you cannot go in, but the causeway view is the shot.
Lunch at Anokhi Cafe
KK Square, C-Scheme. Salads, quiche and lassi from the textile house's own kitchen — the antidote to four straight days of thali.
Albert Hall Museum
Ram Niwas Garden. Jaipur's Indo-Saracenic state museum, opened 1887 — armour, carpets and one genuine Egyptian mummy. Floodlit and worth passing again after dark.
Evening
Sunset from Nahargarh Fort
Krishna Nagar, on the ridge above the city. The road up is tight and winding; leave an hour before sunset for the whole grid laid out below.
Dinner at Bar Palladio
Narain Niwas Palace Hotel, Narain Singh Road. Italian food in cobalt-painted tented rooms and a garden. Book — people come for the room as much as the pasta.
Morning
Hawa Mahal
Badi Choupad. A five-storey lattice screen of 953 windows, built so the women of the court could watch the street unseen. The entrance is round the back.
City Palace Jaipur
Tulsi Marg. Open 9:30 to 6:30 every day of the year bar Dhulandi. Two entrances — Jaleb Chowk or the Jantar Mantar counter — and tickets at both.
Jantar Mantar
Gangori Bazaar, next door to the palace. Sawai Jai Singh II raised these masonry instruments between 1724 and 1730; the giant Samrat Yantra sundial still keeps time.
Afternoon / Day
Lunch at Laxmi Misthan Bhandar
Johari Bazar. A pure-vegetarian Jaipur institution — Rajasthani thali in the dining room at the back, ghewar and pedas at the sweet counter in front.
Johari Bazar and Bapu Bazar
Johari Bazar cuts gems and lac bangles; Bapu Bazar, one street over, does block-print quilts and juttis. Bargain, and check silver for a hallmark.
Vande Bharat back to Delhi by rail
Jaipur Junction to Delhi Cantt, about four hours by rail and far less punishing than NH-48. Book the chair car well ahead; these trains sell out.
Evening
Back at The Imperial
Janpath. Collect the case you left on day three. The taxi in from Delhi Cantt takes about half an hour at that time of night.
Late supper at the hotel
Janpath. The train arrives after dark and Delhi traffic takes the rest of the evening — eat in rather than booking anywhere across town.
Crafts, a Last Thali, and Out
Morning
Gandhi Smriti
5 Tees January Marg, the old Birla House where Gandhi spent his last months. The Martyr's Column in the garden marks the spot where he was shot.
National Crafts Museum
Bhairon Marg, Pragati Maidan. Village architecture, textiles and terracotta from every state, with craftspeople working in the courtyards. Closed Mondays.
Afternoon / Day
Central Cottage Industries Emporium
Jawahar Vyapar Bhawan, Janpath. Government-run and fixed-price, from Kashmiri shawls to Channapatna toys — the low-stress way to buy on the last day.
Late lunch at Dilli Haat INA
Sri Aurobindo Marg, opposite INA market. A ticketed crafts bazaar with a food stall per state — Naga pork, Bengali fish, Rajasthani dal baati churma.
Evening
Leave for the airport early
Delhi's ring roads seize up from five o'clock onward. Allow three hours to Terminal 3 for an international departure, and more if it rains.
Fly out of Delhi (DEL)
Terminal 3. Most long-haul departures leave late in the evening, so the day stays usable right up to the drive out.
