Northern India is the lion's share of the country, a massive stretch from the snow-fed headwaters of the Indus; which gave India its present name, down to the Indo-Gangetic plain.

The adventurous may consider the breathtaking drive through the Beas gorge to Manali, and the really adventures the two-day jeep safari across the 13,400 foot Rohtang Pass and on to Leh in moonscaped Ladakh.

The Downward Journey takes one to the astonishingly fertile valley of Kashmir, the welcome comfort of its legendary of its Moghul gardens; Shalimar and Nishatr Bagh.

Frequent flights can which you quickly back to Delhi but those with a few days to spare may head south by road through the Punjab to Amritsar.

At the very heart of Amritsar is the golden Temple, the Sikh's holiest of holies. Unlike some Hindu shrines you are allowed into its center, but you'll have to remove your footwear.

Delhi is a statement of British imperial splendor, the last gap of the Raj. Delhi is the natural springboard for all the north. A half-day's drive or a short flight directly north brings you to Chandigarh, designed by Le Corbusier. Or make directly for Kalka and take the little sky-blue and cream narrow-gauge railcar up to Shimla, set amidst deliciously cool pine forests.

The spokes that radiate from Delhi's hub are many and varied but the most popular is undoubtedly the tour of the so-called 'golden triangle'. This usually includes Agra for the matchless Taj Mahal and the exquisite Agra Fort. Near by is Emperor Akbar's abandoned city of Fatehpur Sikri, in its heyday larger than London.

From here most tours head westwards to Rajasthan. Unlike other areas of northern India the proud Rajput princes of these desert regions never entirely capitulated before the Moghuls but fought long campaigns of legendary valor. Their fortified cities and citadels now enthrall the traveler. Jaipur delights with its City Palace complex, its Jantar Mantar Observatory, the Hawa Mahal or Palace of winds from which the ladies of the court could see out without being seen themselves, and the massive Amber Palace, a fortress bastion, best reached upon gaily-caparisoned elephants. 

Head south from Agra to Madhya Pradesh for the formidable bastions and fretted domes of Gwalior Fort standing high and mighty upon a rocky outcrop which rears abruptly from the surrounding flatlands. This is India's heartland far removed from the hubbub of Delhi. And so, by minor country roads, to Khajuraho, known for the verdant setting and sculptured sensuality of India's most famous temples

In Uttar Pradesh is the sacred Ganges and the world-weary, dizzying city of Varanasi; "older than history, older than tradition, older even than legend, and looks twice as old as all of them put together" as Mark Twain remarked.

Here spirituality is all, devout Hindus believing that immersion in the Ganges washes away all accumulated sins. One of the world's oldest continuously inhabited cities, its contemporaries - Thebes, Nineveh, Babylon - have long since turned into dust, but Varanasi buzzes and bustles from dawn when thousands of pilgrims throng the ghats, to dusk when the Ganges twinkles with the candles of a thousand tiny prayer-leaf vessels.