I'm going to India in two weeks for a month with one friend. We like the outdoors and architecture. Here's the proposed schedule. Somewhat ambitious, very vague/rough, I know. Looking for tips and feedback. Thanks!

Day 1
New Delhi

Day 2
New Delhi
Overnight train to Jaipur

Day 3
Jaipur--City Palace, Amber Fort
Overnight Jaipur

Day 4
Drive to Fatehpur Sikri, en route to Agra.
Or maybe we should express train Jaipur-Agra
Overnight Agra

Day 5
Taj Mahal, Agra Fort
Overnight train to Varanasi

Day 6
Deepmala ceremony, tour of Sarnath, etc.
Overnight Varanasi

Day 7
Morning boat ride
Fly to Chandigarh

Day 8
Visit Secretariat, Assembly Hall. Relish in Le Corbusier.
Overnight Chandigarh.

Day 9
Get to Kalka.
(maybe Corbett Tiger Reserve ??)

Day 10, 11
Toy Train to Shimla
Overnight Shimla

Day 12
8-9 hour bus trip to Manali, over Rohtang Pass
Overnight Manali

Day 13, 14
Travel from Manali to Leh.
Stop in Keylong; Stop in Jispa

Day 15
Arrival in Leh. Some sort of hiking journey in the Nubra Valley.
Pangong Tso, Tso Moriri, Khardung La*, Kargil, Zanskar

Day 16-19
Begin some sort of hiking journey in Nubra valley. Maybe raft? (Pangong Tso, Tso Moriri, Khardung La, Zanskar?)

Day 20
Overnight Kargil

Day 21
Road from Kargil to Srinagar
Overnight Srinagar

Day 22
Explore Srinagar
Overnight train to Amritsar?

Day 23
Overnight Amritsar

Day 24
Somehow get back to Delhi. Fly? Train?
Overnight Delhi

Day 25
Delhi: last day shopping, late night flight

on second thought, I think we may eliminate Jaipur and spend more time in Varanasi

How many other places can you eliminate? It sounds like at least 3/4 of this trip is in trains, planes and automobiles. It takes time (sometimes a whole day or a whole night) to get from one place to another so leave yourself enough time to see/do/experience in each place.

On Day 12 what kind of bus will you take? For 8 to 9 hours it should be a luxury tour bus.

Note that you are going to encounter rain in most places, and esp in Shimla. Could be heavy at times. See weatherbase.com to make sure you are OK with the rain amounts. If this were my trip, I would spend most of it along the southeast coast of India, which is dry at this time. Lots of temples and rock-cut architecture. There is lots of French colonial architecture in Pondicherry. Sorry, I know that your trip is only 2 weeks away, but for cheap and easy travel in considerably drier (if very hot) weather, that would be my choice.

With regard to the itin in particular, several items struck me if you like architecture: you might want to spend more than 1 day in Chandigarh. I would suggest that you include Fatephur Sikri. Finally, one day in Jaipur is really hard to manage to be able to see the things that need to be seen in the city in terms of architecture. Plus the city museum and then any shopping, which is good in Jaipur. I would agree that it should either be skipped, or you should spend more time there.

For someone whose other purpose of the trip is “hiking” you have allocated only about 5 days out of 25 to it. You may want to adjust this. While I don’t want to throw more into your itin, you can also hike in the Rikisesh area (a mini-Varanasi), although rain may be an issue there. You can also hike in Shimla, but you only have 1 day there, and rain may be an issue there as well. The monsoon does not reach Ladakh.

Wow, a lot of travel for ONE day in Srinagar. Seems like more trouble than it is worth. Please also make sure that you don’t need a special pass to drive into this part of J&K; I had understood that was the case given all the security concerns in J&K. I would NOT recommend going into the countryside in the Srinagar area to hike, I think you would be too great a target. Srinagar will be interesting enough (I assume your parents don’t know about this part, and I assume you have read the US State Department warnings on J&K.)

I would not go to the trouble of going to Corbett as you have only allocated Day 9 to this. You probably will get only 1 game drive in, at the most 2 (but with your schedule I don’t think that will work). This seems pointless to me.

The “night” train from Jaipur only takes about 4 hours, and most arrivals are at like 3-4 am. I would take one of the fast day trains. You will see the countryside and arrive at a better hour to search out hotels. (While Jaipur, like the rest of India, is safe, you may not find many hotel desks open at 3 am, esp in budget hotels.) There are also trains which depart at about 6 pm and arrive at midnight which may work for you as well.

The Taj Mahal is closed on Fridays. Make sure your itin does not have you in Agra on a Friday. Please make an effort to see the Taj at sunset as well as sunrise, it looks quite different at both times. Even in the bright mid day sun it looks different.

I don’t see that it is possible to fly from Varanasi to Chandigarh in one day. There are no no-stops between the two. The only possible flight is the Kingfisher flight connecting in Delhi, but you would only have a 40 minute period to make the connection. I am not sure I would chance it, esp in monsoon season. You could try, but if you miss the connection, you would need to take a train from Delhi (not sure if they would refund the air fare in that case, probably not). Perhaps you could reorder the itin to do Delhi and Chandigarh toward the end, or do them together at the beginning. For example, you can take a train from Amritsar to Chandigarh in about 3 hours, so you could do the end bit as Amritsar-Chandigarh-Delhi-home. In that case, I would also save touring Delhi for last. When you arrive into India, I would go right from Delhi to Jaipur (or Agra if you decide to skip Jaipur). You may need to overnight at a hotel in Delhi in order to get the first morning train; be sure to choose a hotel near the train station for the train you have picked. Trains go from one of three stations in Delhi: New Delhi, Old Delhi and Nizamuddin, so pick a hotel close to whatever station has your train.

If you end up flying from Amritsar at the very end of the trip, then I would try to get a flight which would allow you to connect directly to your flight home. You have to change over to the int’l terminal, but this is easy to do. This would seem easier than going back earlier in the day just to spend a day in Delhi. It takes an hour to get into the city from the Delhi airport, don’t see the point for 1 day, esp if you don’t have a hotel to hang out in until your late night int’l flight. This would give you a day more in Amritsar or elsewhere. There is a Kingfisher flight which arrives at 6:30 pm. You could then use a taxi to go have dinner near the airport and then go to the int’l terminal closer to the time for your flight time.

I don't really think there's much point in taking all this seriously. Red is a first-time traveler to India, without a single booking, completely unaware of what awaits him/her, blissfully ignorant of travel conditions, weather, airline schedules and what there is to be seen... I'd imagine that they'll make it as far as Agra and fall in a heap. Certainly all their plans will.

The best we can do is smile, wish them well and drop them in Delhi with a silent prayer they make it from the airport to their hotel in one piece. Bravo Red, what a great adventure awaits you.

Dogster, quel enfant terrible ((-; !!!
(I just penned a perhaps too-frank opinion on the Europe forum. Feeling our oats tonight? Is it the full moon?)

Ahhh, is THAT what it is. I knew the craziness had come upon me.

Maybe there are different Manali buses, but you couldn't pay me to take the ones I saw leaving from Shimla. Poorly maintained vehicles, no relief drivers+ narrow mountain roads with no guardrails? I value my life more than that!!

Thanks for the input. Here's the revised version:

Day 1-2: Delhi
Day 3: Train to Agra. Agra
Day 4: Agra. Overnight train to Varanasi (4864)
Day 5-6: Varanasi
Day 7: Get from Varanasi to Chandigarh. *this needs figuring out. either fly to delhi, take train, or take another day here.
Day 8-10: Chandigarh
Day 11: Toy train to Shimla
Day 12: Shimla
Day 13-14: Bus to Manali; Manali
Day 15-16: Travel from Manali to Leh
Day 17-24: Leh. Nubra Valley Trek.
Day 25: fly to Delhi.

I would appreciate any advice on the getting to Chandigarh issue; travel to Manali; or trekking tidbits.
Thanks again

While I am all in favour of more time in Varanais, it seems to me that the EASIEST way to do this is to take a train from Agra to Chandigarh (8 hours). That is much eaiser than taking a train from Varanais to Chandigarh (20 hours) or flying from Varansi to Delhi and then getting a train from there (which door to door will be about the same time as a train from Agra to Chandigarh, but you will have the hassle of having to get to downtown Delhi from the airport to catch a train.)

So I would do the itin this way:

-Delhi
-Fly Varansi
-Train to Agra (night train, or take morning train to Jhansi and see Orcha and then take nigt train on to Agra. See what interests you and what works with your itin)
-Train to Chandigarh (night train is option, day trains work too to see countryside)

Then the rest of the itin. ..

Glad to see you have dropped Srinagar and are spending more time in Ladakh.