The typical vacationing tourist who visits India for a week or two usually does a lap around the “Golden Triangle” that consists of New Delhi (map), Agra (map), and Jaipur (map) before heading home. When I began my trip in India, I was told great things about the Golden Triangle, but now that I’ve seen all of the cities in this famed tourist circuit, I must seriously disagree with my fellow travelers. Not only are the three cities not an accurate representation of India, but two of them - Agra and Jaipur – are actually my two least of favorite cities in all of India.
Without a doubt, the most iconic building in all of India (and poster child for anything tourist related) is the one and only Taj Mahal. Unless you have been living out in the African Serengeti disconnected from society, odds are you’ve come across this building either in a textbook, online search, or any travel related commercial on TV. This enormous monument is right up there with the Eiffel Tower in Paris, the clock tower housing Big Ben in London, or even the Empire State Building in Manhattan and I was not going to pass up the chance to see it in person. Just like the Hagia Sophia in Istanbul, Turkey, I never thought I’d ever get to visit in my lifetime, but my dream finally came true!
When the news of my trip across the world became public, I received a torrent of emails and messages with links to articles listing the most beautiful places on Earth that I had to visit. Funnily enough many of the links were to the exact same Buzzfeed article (very similar to this one) that I read countless times before whenever I felt depressed at work. To date, the only location I've marked off the list is Ponte de Piedade in Lagos, Portugal, but I vowed to visit as many of these unbelievable places as possible during my trip. Today I can happily say I've visited yet another one of these locations - Plitvice Lakes National Park!
