4 weeks in India; from the Arabian Sea to the Golden Triangle

Our trip took us from tropical Goa to dusty, bustling Delhi. Here we share the details of where we went, how we travelled, and also our thoughts on travelling to India with young kids.

Contents

Where we stayed

We stayed in small hotels and guest houses, usually booked through booking.com and we didn’t have a problem with any of our accommodation doing it directly- we just went with places with average prices and good reviews – we stayed in some lovey and unique places.

In Agra, we chose an expensive hotel as a treat but found it really wasn’t our style – we just love the more relaxed feel of family run, smaller places.

I must give a special mention to a beautiful waterfront hotel in Udaipur, the Lake Pichola Hotel. The location, service and beautiful heritage decor was wonderful and really added to our trip to Udaipur. Its a 3 star hotel, but it’s so charming it feels like more!

How we travelled about

Trains

We travelled between cities by train. India has a vast rail network which allows people to travel all over the vast country in an affordable way. We took several long rail journeys by sleeper train which felt like a really authentic and special experience.

We had heard train travel in India was a real pain to book, however, we managed to do it all online with out much issue.
We followed the comprehensive guide written by the excellent man in seat 61; we used 12go.asia (which he advises is the easiest option), booked and printed our tickets before we travelled and then just needed to find our train, carriage and berth when boarding.

It is possible to book tickets at the station, we only once arrived at a station without a pre-booked and pre-printed ticket and to be honest I wouldn’t recommend it. Not only do you run the risk of your preferred time and carriage class being booked out, it was also a super stressful experience. India’s culture is a world away from ours in the UK and things like queuing for tickets in train stations simply didn’t seem to exist!

Also, by booking online you know that the price you are paying is the standard price and no unscrupulous individuals have added some rupees on to skim off the top – I’m sorry to say we had to have our wits about us in India and came across this type og thing quite a lot.

Back to buying tickets at the station; as soon as the ticket booth opened it was a massive crush with every body surging forward and pushing us out of the way to get to the booth first – it felt like being in a rugby scrum! This type of pushing and shoving did not come naturally to us but once we realised all the tickets for our train were getting sold out, despite us being the first waiting for the ticket office to open, we had no choice but to go for it and start elbowing people out of the way. We managed to get on our train, but it wasn’t a pleasant experience so we made sure to have pre booked every journey after that.

Once on the train we had mixed experiences – I would do it again but if I’m honest, I did not feel safe without James right next to me on the train. We booked sleeper berths which were 4 or 6 ‘beds’ to a compartment which had a curtain to be drawn at night. There was one journey where seats/berths next to each other had been sold out and James was in the next compartment to me and I was unable to relax and sleep that night – nothing happened but there were men in the carriage staring at me and it made me feel very on edge. They knew I was travelling with my husband but as he wasn’t right next to me I felt very uneasy.

However, we also had some amazing and really memorable experiences travelling by train – we talked to Indian families who were so interested in speaking with us about the UK, and keen to share there food and culture with us also. We were definitely very interesting to the other people travelling on the train and generally experience a lot of warm hearted curiosity from the local people.

There are 11 different classes of train ticket/carriages to book on Indian trains and we always made it a rule to book no lower than AC2 – it is the class used by middle class Indian families and will give a bed, more space and air conditioning (the man in seat 61 site is great for more info on this).

We generally booked AC1 (higher class and double the price) or AC2 and didn’t find it expensive at all – definitely when compared to UK train travel prices! Beware – the lowest Sleeper Class, or for daytime travel, general seating, is the way the masses travel, and it is crowded, grubby and hot. It is definitely colourful and authentic- but might be a shock to the system if you are not ultra adventurous! We never travelled in this way during our time in India as I know it would be too much for me, especially at night. However I may be tempted to try it next time for a short daytime journey, for the experience if nothing else!

A lot of people has brought there own food on to the train (which many people we met insisted on sharing with us!) And we also had a thali – a kind of plate with different dishes in sections – this was provided in the price of our ticket (I assume not included with the cheaper tickets). I ate some of this, but often not – it was hard to communicate and as I had no idea what I was eating I often left a lot of it. I was very careful about food poisoning and adopted a vegetarian only policy while we were travelling in India. To be honest, this did mean that I went hungry a lot of the time during train travel, but I did successfully manage to avoid the infamous Delhi belly on the trip (which unfortunately James did not!)

We also really enjoyed the ‘Chai- sweet Indian milky tea, which every few hours would be sold up and down the carriage in little paper cups. It was delicious. I still remember with a smile the calls of ‘Walla Chai’ up and down the train.

Rickshaw

When visiting sights and getting about the cities and towns we nearly always just took a rickshaw off the street of which there are many and I’m sure you will have a que of people vying for your business. These were noisy, loud and I’m sure very dangerous, but we never had a problem and it a fast, convenient and cheap way to get about.

Just a few words of caution – everyone gave us an inflated price and we had to haggle them down relentlessly. I don’t mind paying over the odds when travelling in a country such as India – I know I wont be paying the local price and as it is usually so cheap I don’t mind paying the extra. However, we are budget travellers and we don’t want to pay ridiculously over the odds, which is likely to happen if you don’t haggle a bit. We would normally ask at our hotel or guest house what a decent price for a tourist was to our destination and use that as a guide. We also always made sure any luggage we had stayed with us in the back of the rickshaw, not matter how insistent the driver was to have it upfront, on the back on on the top to ‘balance’ the rickshaw. We fell for this one the first time and saw the driver rummaging in our bag whilst driving, and also a friend of the driver doing it for him once we had stopped in traffic.

What we ate

We love Indian food so we weren’t worried about finding something we enjoyed to eat – although I did wonder what we would eat for lunches and breakfasts as we tend to eat a lot of curies for dinner at home and thought I would get quickly tired of curry everyday.

Well, we DID have curry every single day without fail for a month and I could have eaten it for 6 months more – we didn’t get sick of it once, which is crazy as I couldn’t eat Indian food for more than two days in a row back home!

We always had vegetable samosas or dosa for breakfast. A vegetable samosa as I am sure you know is a pastry with a vegetable filling folded up in to a triangle and then fried in oil. A dosa is something I had never tried before coming to India, and is savoury crepe served with a chutney, and was delicious. Both samosa and dosa were available on the menu pretty much everywhere we went.

For lunch and dinner we ate curries with rice, nans, tandoori paneer or vegetable biriyanis’, or a vegetarian thalidomide ( a selection of dishes and update with chapati, naan or rice). We had lots of fruit lassies and chai too.

We ate vegetarian meals only while in India as a preventative measure to avoid any food poisoning or upset tummies. We made sure any vegetables we ate were cooked and we avoid fruit and salad. This worked for me, and I had the whole trip illness free, but my husband was very ill for three days with food poisoning- we think he ate a little bit of a side salad garnish accidentally. As previously mentioned, we did not get sick of curries, the food was delicious and a real highlight of the trip! I did miss eating fresh fruits, though.

We tried to stick to the rule of only eating at busy restaurants, and we did eat occasionally at street food places, but again, only if busy with locals – they know!

Our Itinerary

Goa
Mumbai
Jodhpur
Udaipur
Jaisalmer
Jaipur
Agra
Delhi

Goa (5 days)

We spent 5 days in the beautiful tropical Goa, taking some time to relax and unwind before we took on the frenzy of Indian cities! The beaches were gorgeous and we loved spending a few hours with a book in a beach side restaurant – renting a day bed, and just settling in! they all served gorgeous food and drinks and watching the view wit ha mango lassi was honestly paradise!

Goa definitely felt like a relaxed and hippy vibe, must less intense than we found the rest of India and a good introduction to the country. apart from the beaches we were there to see, we loved the food, we went to lovely restaurants and markets. We took a rickshaw to Panaji, a delightful town with colourful houses in the Portuguese baroque style and churches to wander around and explore. For us, 5 days felt like plenty to chill out and explore before we were ready to move on.

Mumbai (3 days)

We flew from Goa to Mumbai (this was our only internal flight). It was a 12 hour journey by train, and we wanted to save some time as we knew we would be doing a lot of train travel later in the trip. when we arrived in Mumbai, the first thing we were hit by was the smell! It wasn’t bad as such, just distinctively different, and strong; a mixture of fumes, spices, and salty humid air (it’s by the sea). I actually loved it as I felt I was in another world. It felt like a shock to all our senses – there were animals and people everywhere, bustling markets, people playing cricket in any open space, traffic beeping, and quiet frankly – it was chaos! We spent the days hitting up the main sights and then eating in a restaurant near our hotel, taking a long leisurely dinner. We had afternoon tea at the famous Taj Mahal Palace Hotel, which is historic and beautiful and located right next to the gateway of India (another top sight). Next we time we come to Mumbai I would love to stay in this hotel! We then went to walk around and take pictures of the gate way of India, a huge stone monument located by the waterfront which had what looked like hundreds and hundreds of crows around it, which made for a great picture. We took a walk to Marine Drive (a 3k promenade that is beautifully lit up at night), found a place for dinner, and then had a walk. We went for lunch in the famous Leopold Cafe (which we knew from the book Shantaram). We also had a lovely walk in the area around the high court where it seemed a little bit more chilled out, there were beautiful gothic -revival style buildings and ruins with vines growing out them which was very atmospheric, and there were also so many cricket matches in the large meadow and park here which was brilliant for people watching!

After the relative calmness of goa, Mumbai felt like a shock and while I really enjoyed it and was glad to have seen it, I was ready to leave the crazy city after 3 days- it was plenty enough for me! Mumbai was also the start of local people approaching me and James for photographs, which was something we hadn’t experienced in Goa. Everybody was lovely and polite who asked for a picture, but it did start to get a little annoying, which added to the feeling of me becoming a little overwhelmed and ready to move on.

Udaipur (5 days)

We took an 18 hour train from Mumbai to Udaipur. This was our first stop in the Rajasthan region. When we arrived, we were worn out from the travelling and broken sleep (I didn’t sleep well although it was actually quiet comfortable). We were definitely ready to relax a bit!

Udaipur is a beautiful town located on the bank of Lake Pichola. It’s a beautiful town, lovely streets to wander, historic buildings and lovely shops full of handcrafted items to browse – these were all tourist shops but wonderful to explore and great if you want some Indian made goods. One of our favorite things about Udaipur was people watching, the way of life of the people down by the water and how they use the lake was so lovely to witness – such a different way of life to that in the UK. We enjoyed watching families come together, play, do laundry, cook, and tend to animals on the shores of the lake. It felt peaceful and serene feel, especially in comparison to Mumbai, and it was a perfect place to relax. We spent a lot of time walking and taking it all in, also a lot of time in our lovely hotel which was right on the lake with amazing views.

Jodhpur (3 days)

The next stop was Jodhpur, which I had seen in pictures from our friends trip on social media. It was a 5 hour train trip. To be honest, I had no idea of what was there when I booked it – I just knew it was called the blue city, and it looked magical to me. Pulling up in the train to Jodhpur was a shock – we saw some disabled and disfigured people begging, and also someone who looked liked they had a learning disability being beaten up at the station. It was shocking and upsetting and is something that i still think about now – this is the reality of travelling in India and something you need to be prepared for.

When we got to our guesthouse, we were pleased to find an adorable and comfortable room and a wonderful rooftop restaurant with fantastic views over the city, which indeed looked totally blue, with the towering Mehrangarh fort in the distance. This was one of the great places we stayed that I am sorry I can’t remember the name of – but it was utterly charming, and a small family run place with good reviews all booked online at booking.com.

While we were here we wondered the streets taking lots of photographs – as all the buildings are painted blue it really is a unique view! We visited the Mehrangarh fort which was fascinating, and did the self guided audio tour in English. We also went to the Jaswant Thada, a white palace and gardens with lovely views. It was a nice place to take photos and to walk around. apart from that, we spent most of our time eating, walking the streets and looking at the markets, or having a drink in the rooftop bar and taking it all in. We did have an unsuccessful visit to Umaid Bahvan Palace Museum – We researched online, it was meant to be open, but when we arrived after taking a 30 minute taxi to get there we found it was shut. Although there were staff there they would not sell us a ticket so we got a taxi right back to our hotel.

Jaisalmer (3 days)

The next stop was the city of Jaisalmer in the desert, on the very western edge of the Rajasthan region.

We read online that Jaisalmer is known as the sandcastle and it’s easy to see why! The amazing fort which dominates the landscape, is mad of golden coloured sandstone and really does look like a giant sandcastle. It is a magnificent and unique living fort, where inside the fort there are restaurants, shops, animals and people going about their business. The carving and detail of the fort really is beautiful, and we loved getting lost in the little lanes and alleys, walking through a beautiful archway and wondering where it would take us. It felt like a really adventure. We spent our days exploring the fort, eating and then going back to our hotel and enjoying the rooftop restaurant, where we relaxed on day beds and comfy sofas, reading writing and watching the sun go down. It was great

Jaisalmer is also famous for its beautiful sand dunes – there are lots of campinging/ camel trek tours that offer a camping in the dessert experience and the chance to go star gazing.

This all sounds so amazing, especially the star gazing, and if you are interested in doing this, there are lots of tours available for you to research – in the end, we decided against it. This was mainly because we were becoming tired at this point in the trip and really, didn’t have the energy to put it researching a well reviewed, ethical and safe trip. We had also been put off any tourist experiences involving animals after a really sad encounter at a elephant “sanctuary” in Thailand. Although I’m sure there are ethical animal experiences out there I find them very hard to find, and even harder to known if they are truly ethical, or just saying the right thing to get you to part with you tourist pounds. We just didn’t have the energy to do all of that this time, but we enjoyed our time in Jaislamer very much all the same.

Jaipur (3 days)

Jaipur is one of the three cities that makes up the famous golden triangle – a torist circuit linking Jaipur, Agra and Delhi. These three cities have an abundance of history, culture and beautiful architecture.

We found Jaipur to be totally crazy, busy, with bustling traffic everywhere. We found it totally overwhelming, but in a great way – we felt safe walking about and loved the culture shock of being in a bustling Indian city. Jaipur is know as the pink city, Jaipur is called the Pink City because its buildings are painted pink—a tradition started in 1876 to welcome Prince Albert, apparently! Pink was chosen to symbolize hospitality, and the city has kept this charming look ever since. It’s a very striking look, and we loved the feel it gave to our walks around the city. I wasn’t expecting to love Jaipur as much as I did – it was my favourite place in India, along with the Taj Mahal in Agra.

We visited some truly stunning places on our trip to Jaipur, including the Amer fort, Jal Mahal palace on the lake, and Hawa Mahal Palace. We also went to the Panna Meena Ka Kund: an impressive stepwell that was really interesting to see. Amer Fort was my favourite fort of all the historical forts we visited on this trip. It truly is amazing to see in real life. The only thing that I didn’t like was the elephant rides on offer tourists – seeing the beautiful elephants carrying people up and down the steep road to the fort being whipped, was really sad and I hope they stop doing this here soon. We chose to walk rather than travel by elephant for ethical reasons.

Agra (3 days)

We went to Agra for one reason only – the Taj Mahal! If I’m honest, this beautiful and iconic landmark, famous the world over was the driving force behind planning an Indian adventure in the first place- I have wanted to see the Taj Mahal with my own eyes ever since I was a child – it’s mystical beauty captivated me even from photographs. We got a rickshaw to the East Gate (we took our passports as we were told that foreigners needed to show them to buy a ticket but we weren’t asked in the end). We got there early to avoid massive ques – there was still a que but not a humongous one. I had read on several blogs that the Taj tends to get busier throughout the day, so we set our alarm for 430am to get there for opening (6am).

It was an unbelievable and magical experience seeing this impressive, beautiful and iconic building in the soft morning light – it literally took my breath away seeing it in real life and was definitely worth the trip to Agra. Agra gets a bad rap, I had heard from various sources to avoid the dirty chaotic city, and in the end, we only travelled through it to see the Taj Mahal. We spent time exploring the building and grounds and, of course, taking a million photos.

For an indepth guide on everything about planning a visit to the Taj Mahal, check out this detailed post from Never-ending Footsteps.

Delhi (3 days)

We were in two minds about visting Delhi. On one hand, the guide books said there were some amazing sights to be seen. And it is part of the golden triangle. And the capital of India, we had to visit it right?! Our friends who were regular visitors to India warned us off it, saying it was horrible and we would get scammed. Our schedule meant we had a few days before our flight to Nepal, so we thought we’d just go for it and see for ourselves.

We kicked off our trip at India Gate, a majestic arch that doubles as a great picnic spot, especially in the evenings when the lights make it magical.

Next, we visited the Red Fort, an awe-inspiring Mughal fortress that felt like stepping back in time. Climbing the towering Qutub Minar was a highlight too—it’s incredible how something so old still stands so tall and beautiful!

One of our favourite stops was Humayun’s Tomb, a peaceful place with stunning Mughal architecture (and a great spot for photos!). The Lotus Temple was another family hit—its unique flower-like design is fascinating, and the serene vibe inside made it a nice break from the city’s chaos.

The city’s energy is electrifying, but it can feel overwhelming at first. The sheer volume of people, traffic, and the sound of honking cars is a sensory overload. Navigating the bustling streets, especially in areas like Old Delhi, can be chaotic— I guess it’s part of the charm, but I did find it was too much for me. This might be because it also came at the end of the trip, that while awesome fun was also exhausting. Now I have seen it, I’m not sure I feel the need to visit again.

Thoughts on travelling to India with our children

This has recently been in the forefront of my mind – my youngest is learning about India in school and keeps asking if we can go there on holiday!

India is an incredibly exciting and diverse country, and I would love to take the boys to experience such a vastly different culture and environment to the one they have been brought up with in the UK. Also, Barr the flights, it’s a great economical option for some winter sun for us as family too- all of which sound appealing!

Friends and other parents I have spoken with about this idea seem aghast that I would take my children to India and I do see why, and also share some of there concerns which I shall go in to in more detail shortly, however, I do think there is some fear of the unknown at the heart of those types of reactions and also the assumption that India is inherently dangerous for westerners, which I don’t think is necessarily the case, although I do think travellers, especially those with young children, need to go in with there eyes open and be aware of potential hazards and pitfalls- some of which could be significant. Really, what every parent wants to know is – is travelling to India with children safe?

I dont claim to be an expert on this subject and really, it is up to every parent to way up what level of risk they find acceptable for their family. All travel to any country comes with inherent risk, but these are the things that would be my top concerns when taking the kids to India.

Food poisoning. My husband got a bout of food poisoning (we think from a salad), and it floored him- he was in bed for days, and he lost a lot of weight. He was a strong and healthy young man – this could potentially be a lot more serious for children who don’t have the resilience and ability to recover as quickly as an adult. Hand washing, sanitising and being careful of what you eat are key here, but managing this can be easier said than done with kids – especially really little ones. Not having access to the same range of fresh foods might be an issue as well, as we avoided meats, fruits, vegetables and salads to avoid food poisoning.
Rabies This was a concern of ours and we did see animals with rabies in Indian cities, and there are also a lot of stray animals – lots of dogs,and we also saw monkeys and camels regularly. We made sure we had our vaccinations for rabies up to date – this ensures that treatment is.quick and effective should you get bitten by an infected animal. The though if one of the children getting bitten by a rabied dog is horrifying, but at least if you are vaccinated you can recover I’d the worst should happen. Apart from that, and remaining vigilant about your surroundings- I’m not sure what else you can do about this one. We also made sure we were up to date with all our other vaccines for travelling to India, following the advice from our doctor.
Poverty There is alot of poverty in India and we have seen disfigured people begging, including children, people in “begging gangs” and people with mental health problems and learning disabilities being treated publicly in a way would we class as abuse. I read that attitudes to disability are slowly changing, but you will see some upsetting things which will have to be explained carefully and sensitively to your kids.
Attention. You are likely to be the centre of attention in a lot of places you go – people will want to stop and talk to you, take pictures with you, and will stare at you. This was nearly always bevause the people were so interested to talk to us and was meant positively, however. We found this quite overwhelming and would probably be even more so for kids. Sometimes, we were interrupted while eating to take photos and had our personal space invaded by hugging and touching without our permission. It was not aggressive in any way but was too close and uncomfortable. This is something you would have to prepare kids for, maybe practising speaking up, saying no loudly, and of course, making sure you advocate for them and protect them from unwanted attention as much as possible.
Healthcare the health care system from what I can research is often vastly different to what we in the UK are used to, and public hospitals, and although I have never visited an Indian hospital, from internet research I don’t trust the standard will be the same as a western hospital. I would make sure you research private hospitals (there are good options with excellent reputations in popular tourist hubs) that are used to dealing with international tourists and speak English. Have a list you can refer to, should you need medical care when travelling in India. Also, make sure you have top notch Insurance and all the details accessible, such as phone numbers and policy numbers.

So, bearing all that in mind, would we take our kids to India? The answer is, a cautious yes, and we would adapt our trip. i think India could be an amazing family holiday for us, but I would change the following things:

Go for a shorter amount of time. As a couple, we went for four weeks and I found it exhausting be on alert for safety ( things like avoiding traffic, animals and food relate safety/hygiene) and the constant attention. So with kids and the much higher level of vigilance needed I would go for a much shorter trip so we wouldn’t get mentally exhausted from it. It would also help with kids eating – we wouldn’t be able to cope with such a restrictive diet for them for too long. I would think we would initially go for one – two weeks and then see how we went.
Prep the kids – spend time educating the kids and discussing with them the reality of life in India, showing them videos and documentaries that were age appropriate so that they are not totally shocked with issues such as poverty and disability.
Consider itinerary changes – we spent a lot of time in Northern India which is generally thought of to be more hectic, heavily populated and busy. We have heard from friends that in regions such as Kerala the pace and culture is more relaxed than in the north so that might be a good place to start when travelling with the kids to India. we definitely find that the beachy vibes in Go were a lot more chill and a nice introduction to the country.
Skip the biggest cities – I personally could not be doing with the headache of taking the kids to Delhi or to Agra (apart from a direct trip to the Taj) and would probably stick to smaller towns and cities.
Wait till they are older -even though a lot of adventurous families do, I wouldn’t have enjoyed taking my kids to a place like India while they were crazy toddlers with no reasoning ability and total lack of regard of there personal safety! Now the boys are both primary aged I would definitely be up for a trip like this as they are mostly great at listening and following instructions especially when they know it is important to keep us all safe.

Final Thoughts

So that was our adventure to India – we found it exhilarating, exhausting, beautiful and fascinating. Would we return with kids – yes I think so.