Night 7, ITC Mughal, Agra: Prudence. By saving some monies on our stays at Ahmedabad (ITC Guesthouse) and Indore (IIM Indore Campus), we decided to splurge on our visit to Agra. Barely 10mins away from the beautiful Taj, we chose the ITC Mughal, one of THE most luxurious hotels in India for our night-stop. With its exquisite interiors, sprawling architecture and impeccable service, the Mughal scores high on our list of holiday accommodation. The food was excellent, since we were in Mughal land, we tried the chicked biryani and raita for dinner and sampled the extensive breakfast buffet spread in the morning. The variety on offer was mind-boggling and we stuffed ourselves with some delicious bread, cakes and continental fare. Didn’t have the time to check out Kaya Kalp,their spa, that is the biggest in India and meets world standards, might be worth a visit.
Place - 10/10 , Food - 10/10 , Ambience - 10/10

Night 8, Tourist Village, Shivpuri: As we ended up going to the Taj once again in the morning, we decided that since we wouldn’t have much time to explore Gwalior and that the Gwalior-Indore stretch is too long to be covered at one go, we would park ourselves at the Madhavrao National Park at Shivpuri (210km from Agra) for the night. This MTDC guest house is right in the middle of the national park and is a great place to stay for serious wildlife enthusiasts who would like to hit the trails early in the morning. The service is unhurried and forces you to unwind after a long, tiring day.
Place - 8/10 (not very hygenic), Food - 8/10, Ambience - 10/10

Night 9, IIM Indore Campus: From Shivpuri, we headed straight to Indore, to our campus and alma mater IIM Indore. The familiar roads, bad traffic, crazy road-sense of drivers and pedestrians alike filled us with nostalgia rather than irritation this time. Going back to campus was a great feeling and meeting some familiar faces from the junior batch as well as greeting some of our avid followers filled us with nostalgia and a longing to turn back the clock to 2007. The canteen contractor had been changed recently and somehow the maggi and parathas in the night canteen were not quite upto the mark. Was it just that or the absence of the familiar kitchen staff, I wonder?
Place - 9/10 (some of the hostel rooms could use some repair after the monsoon seepage dries up) , Food - 9/10, Ambience - 20/10

Night 10, Hotel Krishnai Food Court, Dhule: We spent the day attending the flag-hoisting on campus and meeting some of our favorite professors. This obviously meant that we left Indore quite late and hence had to make an unscheduled night stop at Dhule. We stayed at Hotel Krishna that is along the Nasik-Dhule highway (267km from Indore). The place was neat and tidy, rooms were spacious, the food is not highly recommended but might be the best that Dhule can offer. (Do not try the Chicken Strognoff and the Kantucky Fried Chicken (sic) even if you feel adventurous!) And yes, though the hotel is called Krishna, non-vegetarian food is available.
Place - 8/10, Food - 8/10 , Ambience - 8/10

Night 11, The Gateway Hotel, Nashik: From Dhule we ventured into wine-country and consequently are staying at The Gateway Hotel (Taj Group) in Nashik. The hotel has been built in accordance to traditional Maharashtrian architectural style and is very spacious and quite pleasing to the eye. As expected from any Taj property, the staff is helpful and courteous, the place neat and comfortable. For dinner, we sampled the buffet and found that sorely lacking. Joseph Radhik, our in-house expert on non-vegetarein cuisine found the fish .. quite… err.. shady (?!?!), the chicken dishes though passed his muster. In my opinion the vegeterian biryani could be tastier and fresher than tonight’s preparation, the desserts (especially the chocolate gateaux) were excellent and so were the soups.
Place - 10/10 , Food - 9/10 , Ambience - 10/10

Next stop, home sweet home!