We wake in the morning to the news that the Indian prime minister withdrew 500 and 1000 rupee notes from circulation last night, with no prior notice. It is apparently an attempt to counter the black economy and money laundering, and is probably a good idea. In the meantime it has caused total and utter confusion.
We depart for the Taj Mahal as scheduled, but with no idea if we will be able to visit or not. At the tickets counters there is a long queue, and the local Kuoni rep is #1 in the queue, but after over half an hour it is apparent no one is going to be able to buy tickets today. Not only can no one accept the most common notes, but all banks and ATMs are closed for two days.
Eventually Dilip suddenly beckons to us, and leads us to the entrance gate. We wait for a few minutes, then Dilip is handed 14 tickets and we are in. We later discover they are from a friend who had 30 tickets from last week, which were never used. Our group and one other Kuoni group get in, the five groups fail!
The Taj Mahal is all everyone says it is. Beautiful, amazing and fantastic. We take numerous pictures, then enter the inner area where no photos are a.lowed. A local man shows us how the colours of the inlaid semi-precious stones light up when illuminated with a torch. We watch the sun come up, then head back to the hotel for breakfast.
More confusion when we go to check out. The hotel won't take cash, and we all have to pay with credit cards. They won't even take the cash they gave us last night!
Dilip explains the situation at the ruined city of Fatehpur Sikriwith will be the same, and this time he has no local contacts. We all agree to bypass this, which turns out to be a wise decision. Along our long route to Ranthambore National Park there are about five toll stations. At each there is more confusion as no one has the money to pay. It's not helped by the Indian driving which dictates that if your road is blocked then you drive the wrong way down the opposite carriageway as long as possible before trying to cut back into the correct lane. The first toll takes about 90 minutes, the second over an hour. Our expected driving time of six hours goes up to nine hours! We do stop for a late lunch, and I'm delighted to find a genuine can of diet coke and a packet of Pringles, while mick has freshly cooked vegetable samosas.
More disasterous news as we travel, Trump has won the election!! 2016 is proving to be the year the stupids won.
We get to our hotel at 19.30, and discover we are in an old hunting lodge built in the 1920s. All our rooms are in a bungalow built round lawns with shaded verandas outside. We eat quickly and retire to bed - it's an early start in the morning!
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