Our last day to visit Old Delhi and the return home

In the morning, we had our last breakfast and checked out of the hotel. With all of our bags in tow, we loaded up the tour bus for a last day of sightseeing in Old Delhi, then heading to the airport.

We had a full day in store, and in hindsight, I do not know how we accomplished everything we did before 5 PM. We visited two Hindu temples, which were pretty amazing. I’ve never been so this was a first for me. First we visited the Lakshmi Narayan Temple, and that was interesting to walk around and understand the important elements on the Hindu faith. The 2nd temple was the Akshardham Temple, which had high security. We had to park far away, go through stringent security screening, and cameras were not allowed. Once we were in, we saw intricate stonework and huge grounds. Really impressive.

Next, we visited Raj Ghat, a memorial to Mahatma Gandhi. After, we waited a long time to get a table for lunch, then finally took the kids on a auto rickshaw ride (first time!).

In the late afternoon, we visited the Lodhi Gardens, a city park featuring 15th century architecture by the Lodis who once ruled parts of northern India. I was fascinated that these structures were from the 1400s and still standing today. Really cool.

Lastly, we hit up a street market, then it was time to get to Indira Gandhi international airport.

After we reached the airport, we hit a snafu. At Indira Gandhi, there is a Holiday Inn Express hotel inside the airport. The benefit is that if you have a layover, you don’t need to leave the airport or lose security clearance. We had reserved a room with a plan to stay overnight for a few hours — enough to shower, change, and get freshened up before our return trip.

The problem was finding the hotel, and contacting anyone at the hotel to come get us. Eventually, we reached someone, they came, we went through an intense screening process, and were eventually brought inside into the secure area. The hotel is indeed inside the airport, with rooms overlooking the airport departure terminal. Crazy. It was a small room with one bed, but enough for us to take turns showering and getting ready, and to take a quick power nap.

We caught our Lufthansa flight, and it was an uneventful flight to Frankfurt. Once we got to Frankfurt, we had to go through another intense and time-consuming security check process. Once past that, we hung around and wandered, then took the flight to Newark.

Once in Newark, no issues. We called a Lyft, Drove the 50 mins, and and we were home.

This entry was posted in Family, Trips and tagged , , , . Bookmark the permalink.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *