Mandu

Visited this ghost city during a trip in December 1989. Nobody seemed to take care of the place back then. The area was open, and no fees needed to be paid. Our group spent the night in the open air under a full moon (if I remember correctly) on top of the pavillion and we woke up with a beautiful sunrise. Arriving in the evening and leaving early morning means that it was dark most of the time we were there. It served as our campsite and we had not much time to explore the grounds, but still, it was a wonderful experience.

Mandu is one of the few sites lingering on the tentative list since 1998. I couldn't tell you if there is an internal problem or if this was attempted and got early bad feedback for any reason, but since it “survived” for so long I figured I should add it to my trip sandwiched between Bhopal's WHS and Western India, i.e. Ahmedabad.

Visiting all three parts actually costs more than any WHS in India which seem on a standard price (currently 600), so I find it a bit ridiculous that they can't offer a group ticket for this price but instead 300 x 3. Saying this, if one is not interested to spend 900 they should just focus on the group of monuments. This is the best and biggest part.

To get here you need transportation from Indore, 90 minutes away. More than half is a good highway, the last part can be frustrating and inside the Mandu fort area the road is often single lane. Many of the sites in the fort are off limit mainly due to lack of infrastructure to support visiting them although I saw locals climbing around on them.

First stop was the Jami Masjid and marbel Hoshang Shah’s Tomb. The mosque is not very special, the tomb is pretty neat. You can actually see the tomb from the side of the road so you could also skip this but I think it was okay for an introduction. There were no other …