India Made Easy

But what about the rest of us who are limited to one or two weeks of vacation a year? Is India completely beyond our grasp?

In a word, no. Even sampling the tiniest geographical crumb of India over a period of 7 to 10 days can be a satisfying travel experience.

Quite rightly, no one wants to miss the Taj Mahal, especially on a first visit, so our suggested route pivots around that Platonic ideal of tourist attractions. Spending a couple of days first in the nearby capital of New Delhi — a strange patchwork of imperial Mughal monuments, bustling urban villages, leafy British Raj-era avenues and expanding middle-class housing colonies — is bound to give you a good taste of urban India. Still, some two-thirds of Indians live outside the nation's cities. With that in mind, this route, after passing through Agra, site of the Taj, and the ruins and palaces of Gwalior, culminates in Orchha, a riverside village well-stocked with palaces, tombs, Hindu temples and ordinary village life.

Rajasthan? That fascinating, tourist-infested merry-go-round has been deliberately omitted, though it is a place worth coming back to when you have time to explore its less overdeveloped pockets. The hiking trails of the Himalayas and the beaches of Goa? Next time.

Start your trip in New Delhi. Like a steaming bath, the city is best eased into slowly, and there are few sights more soothing than catching an advanced yoga practitioner holding a pose in the city's lush Lodi Gardens with the spooky, 15th-century domed tombs of the Lodi sultans looming in the background. Residents from the well-to-do neighborhoods nearby go there to picnic or jog it all off, while young couples still head there to coo discreetly, keeping alive the park's historic function as a romantic hideaway safe from conservative parents' horrified eyes.

The gardens are convenient to sites like Humayun's Tomb, a serene, enormous red sandstone monument dedicated to the second of India's Mughal emperors, who lost an empire, recaptured it, and died in 1556 in an unlucky tumble down a staircase. As you gaze at the pearly-white onion dome, you might wonder to yourself: how much nicer can the Taj Mahal possibly be?