Chandni Chowk
- Address:Chandni Chowk, Old Delhi
- Admission:Free
Cultural Experience, Good Place to Shop, Popular with Locals, Market, Street / Avenue
Chandni Chowk Reviews
We've found 37 Chandni Chowk reviews from Viator.com travelers and members: what they loved, what they liked and what they think could be improved. It's all here to help you make the most of your next trip.
It is sorry to note that quality of the "guide" is not up to the any standard. He was not able to explain properly. The vehile used for the all journey is bad.
We did the Old Delhi Half Day Small Group Tour on 6 February 2012.
We booked the tour through Viator and paid online. My husband and I are in our 50's and 60's. We like to see the old parts of cities and prefer to do so on foot.
The walking was not strenuous at all and there were plenty of stops along the way. It was cool pleasant weather in February but I would say bring water if you go in the hot months.
We were delighted to see that our local guide Hirdesh Shrivas arrived on foot at our hotel to collect us. She told us that we were going to experience local modes of travel. Outside the hotel we hailed an auto, which is a small 3 wheeled vehicle ideal for travel in heavy traffic areas.
From there it was on to the Metro where we went a few stops and then we were in Old Delhi.
Hirdesh was excellent at showing us around. She explained what the process was for making chai while we were standing beside a chai stall. We were shown all types of food and other stalls and had many processes explained very well to us by Hirdesh.
We were taken by rickshaw down one of the the narrow streets which sells wedding accessories, which was a feast for the eyes and ears.
A highlight was having lunch in a little place in the heart of Old Delhi that has been serving food there since 1875. The food was delicious. Lunch and all transport was included in the price.
Another highlight for us was visiting a Sikh temple. After visiting the worshipping area, we were able to watch lunch preparation in the kitchens and see the hundreds of folk patiently waiting for their free meal. Hirdesh gave us a lot of good information about the religion and how the temple is run.
We also visited Jama Masjid which is the largest mosque in India. We paid a very small fee there to have our shoes looked after and for the hire of a robe for me to put over my clothes.
At the end of our tour which took about 3 hours, Hirdesh took us back to the metro station and went with us to the stop where we needed to get off to return to our hotel. From there it was simple to get another auto back to the hotel.
I can highly recommend this tour if you really want to experience the real sights and sounds and smells of Delhi. We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves and would rate this tour as a highlight of our stay in India.
Thank you for making it special Hirdesh.
Highly recommended. Guide was excellent. Had a great day with him..
Without having this trip I would never have experienced a most wonderous and real side of Delhi. It was a really amazing and intimate experience I went to places I would never have had the courage or the contacts to do so. Wondering around the streets of Delhi on your own is nothing compared to this marvellous opportunity to meet real residents, eat with locals and experience real Delhi Life. Thank you so much. My guide was very professional and yet warm, informative and I felt totally safe. Unforgettable!
This tour was a fantastic introduction to Delhi and was the highlight of my time in Delhi. Our guide was so friendly and made the tour feel like it was a friend showing you around their home town as opposed to an organised tour. Old Delhi and it's markets could definately be a bit intimidating on your own but with our guide I felt totally comfortable and would have definitely discovered a lot more about the area and streets than I would have on my own. It was great to use poublic transport to get around too. Lunch and a cup of chai along the way made you feel like one of the locals and it was interesting to learn about the history of this part of Delhi and also seek out the worship places of some of the different religions in the area. I couldn't recommend this tour more highly.
The historical sights were great but our guide was not very good, she was young and did not have much knowledge about the historical sights, you need better guides.
Tour started 1,5 hours late and lasted 3 hours (instead of promised approx. 5 hours) and consisted of 3 places of visit: Gandhi museum, Gandhi funeral place, and Gandhi house all of which can be entered free of charge in any case. It was cold on an open tuck-tuck in January morning in Delhi, and very uncomfortable with three people sitting in the back. Vianor promised an "airconditioned" vehicle, it sure was. I tried to cover my ears for not getting cold. The guide took us to these places and we did ourselves all the readings on the posters. Definately, not worth the money. Do it independently .
If our group could give this a zero we would. The guide, though pleasant, knew nothing more than the briefest amount in a guidebook--really the worst guiding information I have every experienced! Also, the guide's Indian accent was so strong it made understanding very difficult (and my family is Indian, so I am used to hearing accents . . .) Raj Ghat was closed, as the Japanese PM was visiting the next day, but the guide could not offer an alternative site to visit. When we asked to return to a garden we had passed on our way to Raj Ghat, he and the driver got lost, which was hard to believe, and we landed up driving to India Gate for a brief visit. This tour operation does not have their own cars and drivers and hires those. The cars were not clean and drivers were poor (and I say this with knowledge as we had a car and driver for most of our stay in Delhi, who drove the same kind of vehicle, but clean and knew how to get to places. The guide and cars also arrived 30 min late and the first car had problems and they had to bring another for part of our group while we waited along the side of the road.
AVOID this tour group and AVOID this tour!! It is a total disaster. There were 8 in our group and we wasted our money.
Good to have a guide if you have never been. Have a list of places your interested in seeing and your guide will take you there and show you the ropes.
The trip was okay once I took it. The company didn't understand where my hotel was, and instead of picking me up as agreed, told me to take the metro. If I could do that, I wouldn't need a guided tour! Finally they agreed to pick me up, but the driver came at the wrong time and couldn't speak English. But, I finally got there and had a nice tour. I had to pay for a taxi to get back to the hotel.
I loved this small group tour of Old Delhi and our guide was very good. We did not do much walking as got caught in a traffic jam while in a rickshaw down a little alley but that was fun too
This is a great tour. I recommend it if you either have little time or are planning to see Delhi for a few days or more. The tour gave my Wife and I a great outline and overall understanding of the city and it's culture.
The Guide was excellent. Very knowledgeable and approachable. We asked a few curly questions and he was honest in his responses.
The tour allowed us to make note of places where we could tour on our own later on, and equipped us with a better understanding of how to 'survive in Delhi'.
Note on dress: My wife advises other women to dress not worrying about what you look like but about covering yourself up. No exposed chests or anything below the knees. The men/boys can't stop staring.
Note on Tips: Most hospitality est' will charge a service charge, if they don't, tipping is about 5-10% depending on service provided. Like some other countries, many workers rely on tips as the source of income. We were told that many of the budget hotel/restaurants have workers who work only for tips and don't get paid a base wage.
Note on trading days: Many of the monuments/sites have days where they are closed. Check first before going to those places.
Don't expect much from the transport car. It is only a simple old bomb, but part of the experience. Traffic in Delhi is chaos, so recommend you have a bottle of water with you.
Overall, great trip and worth doing.
The tour was a bit disjointed and a little confusing. The tour guide was not able to provide a cogent historical background at the start of the tour and from there was not able to place into context the sites we were visiting. In particular the visit inside the Red Mosque was completed without the tour guide. I did however find the tour a good introduction and was able to cover a fair bit of ground afterwards by myself. Given the price i think the value was reasonable.
I saw all the major highlights, and the guide was friendly and knowledgable. However, I was told (due to traffic in Delhi) that we would not be able to see everything on the itinerary and that we should choose what to miss out (we chose the markets). The tour should not be sold 'as is' if all the items cannot be covered. Delhi traffic is always a problem.
We had an excellent guide and driver for this one-day tour of Delhi. We knew in advance how we wanted to spend the day, and the guide accommodated our wishes. He was knowledgeable about the history of the sites we visited and very interesting and pleasant to talk to. Also, having a vehicle at our disposal allowed us to do and see more than I anticipated.
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