Spirit of India Day 5 Khajuraho to Agra

Wednesday April 13^th

After an early breakfast this morning we loaded onto the bus and took a short ride to the western Khajuraho group of temple monuments. These are similar to the Jaina ones, but are newer, 14^th century, and are Hindu temples. These are referred to as the Kama Sutra Temples or erotic temples. The carvings are again made from red sandstone and are very elaborate. There are gods, elephants and quite a few devotees in sexual positions as demonstrated in the book of the kama sutra. This religion believes that sex is a way of reaching enlightenment and should be practised first for pleasure and second for procreation.

After our tour there, we headed back to the hotel to get our stuff and head off towards Agra. We had a two and a half hour bus ride to a small village where we stopped for lunch at a heritage hotel that was once a maharaja's palace. The maharajas went into decline a number of years ago and the families struggled to maintain and hold onto their homes. The Indian government provided support to any home older than a hundred years and declared that heritage homes could be turned into hotels or bed and breakfasts. We had a good lunch there, and a tour of the building which has a number of nice hotel rooms in a palace that needs some upkeep. Then we boarded the bus again for the second half of our bus ride to the train station. We drove through some small villages and saw lots of interesting things there including a man riding an elephant and some shops that you would expect to be inside, but doing business outside. For example motorcycle repair on the sidewalk or a man sitting on a pile of bricks, facing a mirror taped to a tree in front of him and having his hair cut. No overhead that way.

The train station was another chaotic experience. Lots of people, filthy children begging, hawkers, rats and lots of garbage. We had to wait for about a half hour for our train to arrive, so we just watched the goings on. The compartment of the train we took was old and tired but comfortable and air conditioned. The train left on time and then stopped about five minutes out of the station, for a half hour. They served food but it was crap and I didn't eat any.

It was raining when we arrived at Agra. Apparently very unusual for this time of year. Sameer said it's a disaster for the farmers we saw today who have their wheat crops drying in the fields. Sad.

Got our rooms, did the blog and headed straight to bed.

Tomorrow Taj Mahal at sunrise!