Time for takeoff India 2025, Maharashtra Tour. First stop The World Heritage site, Ajanta caves. But how to get there? Well a few firsts first. First time I’d been to Munich (admittedly just the airport), then first time on the huge Airbus double decker, A380 and first time Premium Economy (even though I’d flown Business class a few times!).

So I arrived in New Delhi at 1am, a few hours kip before the last legs, a 4am flight to Aurangabad followed by a two hour taxi ride deep into the Indian countryside to the middle of no where and my first destination. The Ajanta Caves really are in the middle of nowhere and is a good reason why they were only rediscovered in 1819. There is, however a government rest house nearby, which I had managed to book, so my plan was to stay there in order to get an early start the following morning. So on the first day, I just wanted to relax and recuperate after my long journey and maybe see a bit of the nearby wildlife, of which there was plenty:

Tues 11th Feb 2025

Slept great, despite the rock hard coir mattress, roused the staff to rustle up my favourite aloo paratha brekko and I was soon off. I thought rather cunningly, I had decided not to take the official government bus to the caves. Tourists could only get to the Rest House which was about 3kms from the actual caves, from here everyone had to take an official bus. However, the bloke at the guest house arranged for me to get a motorbike to take me to another entrance, which no one went to but provided an amazing view of the caves. I could then make a short trek which would enable me to get there earlier than everyone else. This worked a treat as I got the fantastic view and I managed to see most of the caves in splendid isolation.

NB First minute or so of the vid below is copied from first vid above – just scroll past this bit!

I leave the factual information to other sites but all I will say is that I was totally blown away by the caves. The site itself is spectacular on the bend of the river, with wonderful views all around. Nature was one thing but I kept thinking of the enormous human endeavour of cutting these caves out of the solid rock face two thousand years ago. The architecture of these caves was amazing but if not more famous are the paintings. Most of them are over fifteen hundred years old (the site is thought to have been active for over six hundred years) and they are still vibrant and quite clear despite some poor attempts at restoration in times past. I particularly liked the scenes of people of the time, how they dressed and what they looked like.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

More Ajanta photos here

Map of 2025 trip: