Ranthambore and Agra

From Jaipur we headed to the dry jungles of Rajasthan to search for tigers in Ranthambore national park. About 20 tourists piled in to a giant canter jeep which bumped and trundled and tossed us along dirt tracks. the car sounded like the rumble of an earthquake and I was a a little sceptical that we'd see anything at all thundering through the wilderness like that. After about an hour of spotting birds, deer, crocodiles, lizards, mongeese and monkeys, our sore butts were rewarded with the sight of Shere Khan himself, taking a very public rest from the searing heat next to a lake. Apparently we were very lucky to spot a tiger on our first and only excursion - some people take up to 5 trips and don't see any of the 32 resident striped cats. The park is over 1000 years old and was originally the hunting ground the maharajas and wasn't opened to the public until 1970. As well as wild life you can also spot clues as to its former life with the odd palace, fort, temple or hunting pavilion scattered around.
The grand finale of our road trip was a visit to the city of Agra and a 5am wake up to see the Taj Mahal just after sun rise... My goodness do you see and read a lot about that darn building before you get there but I don't believe it diminishes the experience of stepping through those gates and seeing that glittering (literally -it is inlaid with semi-precious stones) white marble facade with your own eyes. The Taj Mahal was built by the emperor Shah Jahan for his 3rd wife, Mumtaz, who died giving birth to their 14th (!) child. It was originally intended to be a live-in palace which came to him in a dream. He told Mumtaz about the dream and described the palace that he would build for them but sadly she never survived to see work on the structure even begin and so it became her mausoleum instead - he is now also buried there with her.
I think of all that we have seen so far, what has actually left the most lasting impression on me has been the roads themselves. There is nothing quite like the circus that is India's road system with cars jostling for position amongst goofy camels, uninterested cows, proud horses, rabid dogs, scampering monkeys, wide-eyed goats, and brave, brave rickshaws, mopeds and cyclists. As well as all that there are scores of lorries heaving at the seams with all sorts of goods and urging you to 'blow horn' in ever more elaborate and colourful designs - turning highways into death defying high speed art galleries with their paintwork and their baubles. With horns as the only weapon on these crazy battlegrounds you can bet that they are used liberally and vigorously - I think the highway code here is about one sentence long and reads something like 'He with the loudest horn shall pass first.'.
We are now on a night train going south to Aurangabad and although I can't say I'm as entertained or as comfortable, I definitely do feel a lot safer!