TLDR: Taj Travel Services is professional, timely, and reasonably priced, especially for the quality of service you receive. The driver and guides that they provide are excellent, very knowledgeable, and personable. If you are considering whether to try and plan a Golden Triangle trip yourself, trust me, don’t. I am a very detailed planner who has many trips under my belt packed with every fun activity possible with every detail explored and I felt that this was the best decision I made for our trip to India. This is a time where you really want the experts to guide you, both in the planning and execution of your trip. The guides offer so much knowledge that it makes the sites twice as interesting and memorable, your driver will give you the comfort of knowing you have a reliable local to trust, and the company will be there to meet your needs along the way. A massive thank you to the owner (I believe)/planner (Deepesh Upadhyay), our driver (Mr. Chand), and our tour guides (Indu, Samarth, and Gottam).
After receiving a recommendation to use Taj Travel Services for the personal part of my business trip to India, I sent a detailed email to Deepesh Upadhyay. From the beginning he was professional, timely, and detailed in his responses, quickly providing me with a customized itinerary with a detailed cost breakdown for my consideration including flight recommendations. Despite being unable to wire him the money ahead of time due to wire transfer restrictions, he was accommodating and allowed me to pay upon arrival, a level of trust that was greatly appreciated and helped assure me that I was dealing with a reputable company. I also greatly appreciated them being willing to pack as much content into a single day as we wanted to, basically giving us free reign to explore as much or as little as we wanted. My wife and I are die-hard for new experiences and fun, so we pulled 10+ hour days every day to fit as much into our weekend in the Golden Triangle. Thanks to Taj Travel Services, it was a success!
We took a custom 3 day tour of the Golden Triangle (Delhi, Agra, and Jaipur), flying into Delhi very early Friday morning where we spent the day there touring, Saturday in Agra, and Sunday in Jaipur where we flew out of JAI. The entirety of our trip’s transportation was performed by our private driver, Mr. Chand, who was exceptional in every sense of the word. He was always punctual, respectful, and willing to answer all of the questions we threw at him despite not being a perfect English speaker. His effort was always greatly appreciated. He always went the extra mile to ensure that we were comfortable, informed, and getting the most out of our trip. His driving skills proved valuable in India’s hectic driving conditions and we never felt nervous as a passenger of his. The fact that he is just as memorable as our tour guides and the sites should say something. Some examples of him going above and beyond include: ensuring water and snacks were always stocked in the car, being willing to answer our endless questions about India and himself, buying me tandoori tea on the roadside on the way to Jaipur and chatting with me, proposing an elephant ride for me to surprise my wife with up to the Amber Fort, patiently waiting while my wife and I shopped and experienced various cultural art locations (e.g. marble art, carpets, jeweled carpets, textiles, etc.), suggesting and bringing us to a monkey temple when we had extra time before the airport on our last day where he filmed us and helped us feed the monkeys, and the list goes on.
Each of our tour guides was exceptionally knowledgeable, accommodating, and personable. We had a different tour guide for each city and they were as follows: Indu for Delhi, Samarth for Agra, and Gottom for Jaipur.
Indu helped us to understand everything we wanted to know and more about the Qutub Minar, President’s House, and the India Gate to name a few. She knew all of the best photo locations (e.g. there is a spot where you can get multiple monuments in the park that contains the Qutub Minar, which we later saw on a billboard. We never would have known about that spot without her guidance) and angles to take pictures to capture the moment beautifully. She took her time with us, giving us time to walk around the moments and take it all in ourselves while never being absent. She told us that she had been giving tours for 7 years and her experience was clear.
Samarth was our tour guide for Agra. While it is hard to play favorites, Samarth definitely went more above and beyond than we though possible in a tour guide. Not only is his knowledge of the Baby Taj Majal, Taj Mahal, Agra Fort, etc. impressive, but he was very friendly and personal. Not every tour guide will text you on your birthday long after your trip is over. That is the kind of care that Samarth is willing to invest in his clients. It is clear that he values building lasting relationships and not just getting finished with his tour. Nothing feels rushed, and he is happy to keep feeding your interest if it is there. Because my wife and I love to experience the culture and wanted to see and do everything possible, he ended up bringing us to multiple amazing shops: a marble inlay shop where they practice the same skills with the same materials used to make the Taj Mahal, a Mughal carpet making shop, and a jeweled carpet making shop. Samarth was clear that there is no pressure to buy anything and if we felt like there was or didn’t like anything, we could and should leave immediately. Even though tour guides (including ours) often make commission from these kinds of referrals, he valued the relationship and experience of his guests more than a quick dollar which shows his integrity. The shops he brought us to were clearly quality places with personable and knowledgeable staff. He told us that he only bring people to places that he knows do the right thing, treat their customers right, and provide a good product and it was clear that this was the case. My wife and I feel like we made a friend more than that we took a tour with a guide, someone we were able to laugh with over lunch, bond with over experiences, and enjoy the expertise of. We will definitely seek to reconnect with Samarth in the future, whether for more tours or just to catch up.
Our final tour guide was Gottam, who, like the other tour guides, was also exceptional. Notice a trend? He was respectful, very knowledgeable, and personable. His experience giving tours was evident in his depth of knowledge. We didn’t go any place in any monument/area where we weren’t given a fascinating fact that we never would have known had he not been there. His commentary greatly enriched the experience and helped us to fully appreciate what we were seeing. Just like Samarth, he went above and beyond just touring us around to our scheduled sights, he saw our interest and suggested checking out a textile shop since we hadn’t seen one yet on our trip. The location we were brought to was very fair and professional in their dealings. I came away with a wonderful custom made suit thanks to the shop rushing the order (it was done in only a few hours!) and the willingness of Gottom and Mr. Chand to schedule around coming back to pick it up before we left for the airport. Gotham was a down to earth family man, and he made us feel like an important part of his day rather than just a tour to finish or a chore to do.
All in all, our trip to the Golden Triangle would never have been a success without Taj Travel Services. Every detail was planned and customized to our liking, and it allowed us to fit more into three days than we ever thought possible. When we finished the tour, we felt like we had been there for a week in the best possible sense, having seen and done so many amazing things and having met so many awesome people. It is truly the experience of a lifetime and a trip that I highly recommend, especially if you have a sense of adventure, desire to experience new cultures, and openness to try new things. You won’t be sorry! And tell them Sam sent you :)