India: where to go

Northern India

The Golden Triangle

The cities of Delhi, Agra and Jaipur are known as the Golden Triangle because of their cultural splendour. They form the basis of the classic tour of northern India, despite the fact that constant exposure to noisy crowded cities and crazy driving on traffic-choked roads can turn people off the country for ever.

That said, Delhi can be a pleasant place to start a visit if your hotel is in New Delhi, the planned British city designed by Edwin Lutyens, with tree-lined avenues and low-rise buildings. The Thirties Imperial (theimperialindia.com) is a favourite for its convenient location opposite the Cottage Industries Emporium, a treasure trove of crafts from all over India. Another good choice is The Claridges (claridges.com), a four-star hotel that is also popular with well-heeled Indians. An affordable choice is the Nath Bungalow (lutyensbungalow.co.in), a family-run b&b in a lovely garden with large pool near the Lodhi Gardens.

If you are travelling independently, sign up for a private tour with Surekha Narain (delhimetrowalks.com), the best guide I have come across in India. A keen historian, she can shepherd you through the crush of Old Delhi so that it seems like a walk in the park, and arrange private access to all sorts of places.

Agra (1) – best reached on the comfortable Shatabdi Express train – is worth an overnight stay. As well as the Taj Mahal, it has an earlier “Baby Taj”, and a magnificent sandstone fort also partly built by Emperor Shah Jahan. The best place to stay is Amarvilas (oberoihotels.com); it has a clear view across parkland to Shah Jahan’s tribute to his beloved wife, Mumtaz, who died in childbirth. Double rooms cost from £500, but it’s worth paying an extra £50 for a premier room with a private balcony overlooking the Taj. The best alternative is the low-rise Agra Trident (tridenthotels.com); double rooms from £115 a night through booking.com.

Most tours and private journey itineraries move on via Fatehpur Sikri – an extraordinarily well-preserved 16th-century sandstone city, once the capital of Mogul India, now deserted – to Jaipur.

It is hard to love Jaipur (2). Sights such as the Palace of the Winds and Tiger Fort provide a good picture, but this is another exhausting city where touts are hard to shake off and negotiating the human and motorised traffic is exhausting. There are several luxurious palace hotels in spacious grounds, but for character choose Samode Haveli (samode.com) or the cheaper Dera Mandawa (deramandawa.com).

After negotiating the hustle of Jaipur you will need a peaceful refuge if you are to keep your sense of humour. The countryside hereabout is scattered with handsome palace-hotels set in small villages but, as a first-time visitor, I would head for Chhatra Sagar (chhatrasagar.com), a dozen luxurious tents erected beside a lake in Nimaj and run by a delightful princely family.

From here it is an easy transfer to Jodhpur (3), worth visiting for the Mehrangarh fort alone. Official guides have an office at the fort entrance and offer good private tours of the old town on foot. Tour operators rate highly the new boutique hotel Raas (raasjodhpur.com), near the fort. A cheaper option is the family-run Ratan Vilas (ratanvilas.com).

There are two alternative circuits that avoid Jaipur and the main tourist circuit. They offer the chance to explore smaller towns and villages before you tackle another big city.

Head south-east from Agra to Orchha (picturesque riverside setting, medieval fort palace, evening rituals in a village temple) and on to Khajuraho (a small town famed for its erotic temple art) before tackling Varanasi on the banks of the Ganges where all life and death is laid bare.

Varanasi  (4) is India for the experienced. Its crowded narrow alleys can induce claustrophobia even in seasoned travellers: mourners carry their dead on biers to the burning terraces above the river; holy men and pilgrims from all over India come to bathe in the frankly filthy waters upstream and consult astrologers and palm readers; and cows, goats and ragged children scavenge for scraps on the ghats – the flights of steps down to the water.

Most tourists keep Varanasi at arm’s length by taking dawn and dusk boat rides past the bathing ghats where yogis practise and priests perform rituals using flaming lamps. But those who enter the fray will see India at its most profound and spiritual. Tour groups usually stay at the Taj Gateway (thegatewayhotels.com), which serves alcohol. The best riverside choice is the mid-range Palace on Ganges (palaceonganges.com), which has a roof terrace. Ask for a room on an upper floor as lower ones are basic.

The alternative is to head west from Agra into southern Rajasthan. Start with a visit to Ranthambore National Park, where there is a moderate chance of spotting a tiger – that is, if the current ban on “tiger tourism”, imposed this year by the Indian Supreme Court, is lifted – or spend a few nights at Ramathra Fort (ramathrafort.com), which offers guided walks and Jeep safaris. 

The small city of Bundi (5) is one of my favourite places in Rajasthan. Off the main tourist circuits, it sees few tour groups and the streets of its busy, blue-painted old town are free of hustlers. Popular with Western artists, it has a vast crumbling fort-palace (filled with world-class murals) mirrored in a lake. There are no sprawling suburbs, so it’s easy to hire a bicycle and explore the countryside beyond. There are no luxury hotels yet, so stay in the family-run Bundi Vilas guesthouse (bundivilas.com) or the Haveli Braj Bhushanjee (kiplingsbundi.com).

From here it’s a long day’s drive to Udaipur (6), set around a lake in the Aravalli hills. It is a tourist honeypot but easier to negotiate than Jaipur or Jodhpur. The Jag Niwas Lake Palace, now a Taj hotel, is the big draw, though I feel it’s better to view it than stay in it. There are several royal guesthouses on the opposite shore but my favourite is a small heritage property, Amet Haveli (amethaveliudaipur.com) – low-rise, intimate and just feet from the water’s edge – where you can dine on a lawn with a grandstand view of the Jag Niwas.

Kerala (7)

Kerala is a green land of rice paddies, coconut groves and hills thickly cloaked in indigenous forest as well as tea and coffee plantations. It is a softer introduction to India, with smaller, more ordered cities, a slower pace of life and a cleaner environment. It also has one of the most literate populations in the world. Many families have relations working in the Gulf, and there are direct daily flights from London via Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Qatar to three coastal airports, with return fares starting at less than £500.

The ancient trading port of Kochi (Cochin) is a good place to start a tour. Stay at Malabar House (malabarhouse.com), Brunton Boatyard (cghearth.com) or the cheaper Old Courtyard (oldcourtyard.com), all in the quiet fort area.

Behind the coast, a network of inland waterways and canals weaves through coconut plantations and riverside villages clustered around white Catholic churches.

Most tour operators offer backwater cruises on converted rice barges. This is a pleasant way to travel, but the scenery doesn’t vary much. It is more interesting – and more ecologically sound – to stay somewhere such as Philipkutty’s Farm (philipkuttysfarm.com), a collection of villas on a spice island in the backwaters, and take a sunset cruise.

Kerala’s great draw is the Western Ghats, a line of thickly forested hills rising to more than 6,000ft, stretching the length of the state and offering a welcome cool respite from the humidity of the coast. There are convivial homestays in bungalows on spice and tea plantations around Munnar and Thekkady, gateway to the Periyar National Park, where there is a good chance of seeing wild elephant.

No visit to India is complete without a Hindu temple experience, but you don’t have to go far. One of India’s holiest towns, Madurai, in Tamil Nadu, is a four-hour drive from Munnar. Its Meenakshi Temple is one of the most impressive in the country, with processions, performances of music and an endless stream of pilgrims weaving through pillared halls carved with exquisite figures. Stay at the Taj Gateway (tajhotels.com), above the city.

In Kerala, beaches, as elsewhere in India, are very much the preserve of fishermen. While hotels clean their frontages, a walk along the beach will uncover sands strewn with rubbish, fish scales and human waste. The sea is rough, the water murky, and sunbathing on the beach will attract unwanted attention in these predominantly Muslim communities. If you want a week on a clean white-sand beach by a clear safe sea, combine a tour of India with a week in the Maldives, an hour’s flight from Trivandrum.

That said, there are several delightful small resort hotels on remoter Keralan beaches, ideal for a few days’ post-tour relaxation: notably Neeleshwar Hermitage in the north of the state (neeleshwarhermitage.com), part-owned by an Englishman; the Marari Beach (cghearth.com) in Mararikulam, south of Kochi, and the Surya Samudra (suryasamudra.com) near Kovalam. All offer a range of spa treatments, visits to villages and nature walks.

Goa and Hampi (8)

Charter flights started serving Goa in the late Eighties, selling the state and its golden beaches as India-lite. A Portuguese colony until 1961, it really was a gentle introduction to India in those days. Families called da Souza and Pereira rented out rooms in pretty cottages set in flower-filled gardens to backpackers; richer tourists stayed at the Taj Holiday Village on Candolim beach, north of the capital, Panjim. Roads were the preserve of bicycles and carts, and cows roamed the largely deserted and relatively clean beaches.

Today, in north Goa many of the bungalows have been replaced by concrete guesthouses, the beaches are crowded with salesmen from out of state, and there’s a rave every night fuelled by drink and drugs.

Regular visitors to India now see Goa as a place to relax for a few days at the end of a tour rather than a destination in itself. There is a strong Russian presence in winter at five-star hotels. Money heads for the Leela Beach Resort on Kovalam; smart money for a country guesthouse such as Nilaya Hermitage (nilaya.com) or Fort Tiracol (forttiracol.com), in the north of the state, where the beaches are empty and rave-free.

Tour operators offering beach holidays – Thomson, Thomas Cook, Monarch – feature both north and south Goa, selling a fortnight in a three-star hotel for about £1,200 b&b in February. I would head for south Goa, to the quieter sands around Velsao, Majorda and Varca, where there are some new resort hotels set in palm-shaded lawns containing large pools. The Alila Diwa Goa (aliladiwagoa.com) and the Taj Exotica (tajhotels.com) get high marks.

Tour operators and local agents sell overnight excursions to visit the Taj Mahal in Agra. For a real adventure, take the train to Hampi for a few days. This small riverside village in neighbouring Karnataka sits among the ruined temples, bazaars and palaces of the 16th-century capital of the Vijayanagar kings who ruled all of south India. It is set in a sea of rice paddies shaded by coconut palms and punctuated by boulder hills, like giant tors, that glow orange in the afternoon sun.

There are plenty of thatched-hut guesthouses along the river, notably Shanthi (shanthihampi.com) and Mowgli (mowglihampi.com), but the classiest place is Hampi’s Boulders (hampisboulders.com): simple cottages in a peaceful riverside setting four miles away.