Elders Babu and Brokaw accompanied us to the Taj. They had both completed their missions and this was their treat to get to take a trip to Agra. They were great traveling companions.

In the next picture, I'm helping to mow the lawn at the Taj with a push me pull you lawn mower. It's so cool the way they do things here. We just would never think of such a lawn mower. It really makes it a lot more fun and not nearly so lonely when you use two people to run the mower.

Fred always get so excited when he sees these beautiful Brahma oxen pulling big loads. Blow this up big and notice the reins fastened in their noses.

We don't have the little working donkeys in Delhi. We saw quite a few in Agra carrying loads of just about everything imaginable.

Fred described these men making a Persian rug in his e-mail. The pictures just don't do them justice. It was the most marvelous thing we saw on the whole trip. Each thread was wrapped, knotted, pulled down tight and cut so swiftly and in such a swift motion that our eyes couldn't follow it. They then did it in slow motion and it was truly poetry in motion. We couldn't believe the precision and the perfect unison that these two men worked together in. They only complete two inches of this size rug in a day.

More scenes of the Agra Fort and from the fort looking over to the Taj.

Make this picture big to get the full effect.

The fort built near the Taj Mahal by the same King was very beautiful. It's so amazing to see such beautiful and ancient architecture.

Fred spotted these women and figured out that they were Rajustani women. He had read that they are the toughest and meanest women in the world. I just thought they looked pretty.

As we crossed the river we could see children swimming in one part of the river and water buffalo cooling themselves in another part.

After seeing the Taj we crossed the river and were driven to the tomb of the Queen of the Taj Mahal's parents tomb. It is called the Baby Taj Mahal.

Agra is full of artists who display the ancient old arts. These men were inlaying tiny little chips and pieces of stone, and jewels into meticulously carved marble. The process was incredibly tedious. This was how the whole Taj Mahal had been decorated. It was amazing.

This was our driver and tour guide at the Taj. He was quite the entertainer but after he bragged that he had a wife and a girlfriend we didn't like him that much anymore. This has happened to us several times. Men think it's really a feather in their caps to have several wives and girlfriends all at the same time and they think we foreigners are going to be so impressed.

As we walked on the fly over we were able to get a few more good shots from above the station. Look closely at the two monkey friends sitting on the hot tin roof.