Qutb Minar

Delhi

Delhi is not one city, it is seven of them stacked on the same ground, and the reason first visits go wrong is trying to see it as one place. Old Delhi and Lutyens' Delhi are ten minutes apart on the Metro and belong to different centuries. Give each a separate morning rather than stitching them together — the whiplash is what exhausts people. Start in Shahjahanabad early, before the Chandni Chowk lanes fill and the rickshaws stop being able to move at all. Jama Masjid's southern minaret is worth the climb for the one view that makes the layout of the old city legible from above. The Metro is genuinely excellent and will save you hours; use it and ignore anyone who tells you Delhi traffic is unavoidable. On Thursday evenings there is qawwali at Nizamuddin Dargah, which is the single most affecting hour in the city and costs nothing. Be honest with yourself about when you come. From late October into January the air is often severely polluted, and no amount of planning fixes a week you spend indoors with a headache. February and March are the reward months.