Carnage at the Taj Mahal..

First stage on our Indian wander was south and east to Agra, site of the Taj Mahal which we supposed had to be seen; Rach was focussing more on her bowels last time she was here and didn't enter the site so it was as if we were both new to it.
As usual, it was all about the journey rather than the destination and Indian railway travel is testament to that. Leaving our back alley guest house, we fought through the beggars, salesmen, rickshaws, cows and dogs to New Delhi station (new in name only) and joined the pantomime of the railways. Our 6-person carriage was quickly overrun by a family of 10 Indians with around 15 bags between them who, when they eventually settled, were supplanted by 4 other western travellers; more comfy but less of a spectacle. As the kilometers passed and the sun grew hotter, we saw yet more wandering cows, water buffalo, monkeys and all manner of human life from the window. Each station was a consumer's paradise; magazine stalls were rolled past on the platform for our reading pleasure, tea sellers passed us clay pots of chay to drink and then throw out the window, and purveyors of all manner of local food and cold drinks offered while the ever-present beggar children swept the carriage floor or performed sad dances in hope of a rupee.
Agra is a fort town on the banks of the Yamuna river (assessed as too polluted to support any life form we understand) where Shah Jahan, the Moghul ruler who built the red fort in Delhi, built this majestic mausoleum for his missus Mahal. He was later imprisoned by his son and lived the rest of his tragic life in a cell looking across the river at the Taj.
Unbeknown to your travellers, and our out of date guide book, the Mahal is closed on a Friday and our plan to visit at dawn was scuppered; having learnt this at 5pm, this left us little time to view the site at sunset before it closed at 730pm! And so the carnage began, as we queued with a great mass of Indian and international tourists frantic to get the same photos and see the tomb. The security procedures for entering were ludicrous and we lost more time as I was forced to check in the weapon of mass destruction I had disguised as a USB camera cable. It seemed we were incapable of finding anyone with skills enough to take a straight photo of us in front of the building, and the light was fading as we queued to enter the mausoleum. A very Indian affair then ensued as a thousand tourists attempted to enter and leave from the same narrow doorway in the failing light, with one hysterical guard blowing a whistle to demonstrate the famous echo in the tomb and actually throwing 2 punches at a particular errant tourist; we feared for our lives as we exploded into the darkness of the tomb to see...not much, actually. Lit up only occasionally by the odd camera flash (photography forbidden by the way), somewhere in there Shah Jahan lies with his sweetheart and only later were we told of the spectacular pietra dura inlaid marble decoration therein. Oh well...
In order to make the most of the site, we dragged ourselves up at dawn and finally got to appreciate the serenity of the site at sunrise, although we still cant find anyone to take a decent photo!
Next step is Jhansi and the erotic temples of Khajuraho...by train!