After the name change, Aurangabad is now formally known as Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar, and it has 2 UNESCO World Heritage sites, a Mughal mausoleum, and a very popular Jyotirlinga temple in its neighbourhood.
The tour will begin at Aurangabad and the first visit will be in the Grishneshwar Temple. It is directly adjacent to the Ellora Caves and thus the two co-operate naturally on day one. Whence the itinerary diffuses.
Ajanta is around 105 kilometres from the main city, so it is just a two-and-a-half- to three-hour drive through. Here you’ll be amazed while watching Thirty Buddhist cave monuments carved into a horseshoe-shaped basalt gorge above the Waghora river, some of them going back to the second century BCE. The murals inside are what most people come for, scenes from the Jataka tales painted in colour that have survived over fifteen centuries. Give it four to five hours, not less. Ellora is thirty kilometres from Aurangabad and works on a different scale altogether.
From the sixth to the tenth century CE, thirty-four monuments created for Buddhist, Hindu, and Jain religious use are also there. At Ellora, the Kailasa Temple was not constructed upward but instead carved down into a single solid piece of rock. Since it was excavated from stone, people often stop on their journey when they see all the stone removed to create this amazing structure.
You also get a chance to visit Bibi Ka Maqbara, and it was constructed in 1668 by Prince Azam Shah in honour of his mother Dilras Banu Begum. You can also sometimes refer to it as the Taj of the Deccan, or the analogy is no injustice.
If you want to explore Aurangabad in person, book your trip with us now!