India's Southern India

Mumbai

Formally known as Bombay, this Maharashtra capital is India’s most dynamic, cosmopolitan and crowded city. Home to the world’s biggest cinema industry, Mumbai hosts a diverse collection of people, cultures and captivating sights. Within its bounds find towering skyscrapers abreast stately Victorian homes, vibrant bazaars alongside modern malls.

Explore the historic Fort area, where Mumbai’s most well known highlights, entertainment and restaurants reside or venture to Malabar Hill on the western coastline, a posh and energetic center for some of the city’s finest, including the Mani Bhavan, the home to Mahatma Gandhi and tribute to his life and birth. Mumbai’s notorious landmark, the Gateway to India, was built to commemorate King George V’s first visit to India in 1905 and now houses an impressive collection of paintings, archeology and natural history dating to the 18th century within Indo-Saracenic architecture of the Prince of Wales Museum.

Beyond the arches and minarets of the museum lies another of Mumbai’s finest gems, Elephanta Island. Upon its shores find some of India’s finest sculptural masterpieces in these 6th century cave temples chiseled into a rocky cliff and dedicated to Shiva. At the caves’ northern entrance discover the Maheshmurti, the 8th century shrine representing the three aspects of Shiva the Creator, the Preserver and the Destroyer.