Ajanta Caves, Aurangabad, Photos, Info and Map

Although it’s been quite some time to our visit to Aurangabad, I just cannot, not share the details and pictures about this place. Usually, my vacation ideas remain limited to the tried and tested locations, resorts. But this time, Mukta, my wife clearly stated that if we are going for a vacation it has to be some new place which we haven’t yet seen. After some bit of research we decided upon Aurangabad in order to visit the Ajanta Caves & Ellora caves and for quite some time, I wanted to see the Lonar crater lake. So with these three places on our main list, we set off to Aurangabad. I prefer road-trips and so do Devansh (my kiddo) and Mukta. So we drove all the way to Aurangabad. We’d booked our stay with the Vits hotel which was good. Each day we would set out for one of the destinations and return back in the evening.

First up, we visited Bibi ka Maqbara. Many know it as a Mini-Taj-Mahal. It’s the Tomb of Rabia Durani, Aurangzeb’s wife. I’ll be writing more details about this place in a separate post, along with pictures.

Ajanta Caves | Avalokiteśvara Painting
Ajanta Caves | Avalokiteśvara Painting

For now I want to focus on the Ajanta Caves. These include 30 beautiful caves carved into the face of the mountains of north-east India. The moutains being shaped in form of a horseshoe, you can really get an awesome panoramic view of the whole setup. These beautifully carved caves date back from 2nd century BC to 480 or 650 CE. The caves derive the name from one of the nearby village which is named Ajanta. The village is located approximately 12-13 kms away.

There is this interesting story about the discover of the Ajanta Caves. A British cavalry officer named John Smith, spotted the mouth of a cave above the Waghora river. Seemingly the cave appeared to be man made and lead to uncovering of the ancient architecture which had remained buried under the greenery for more than 1000 years. Smith then entered the cave with a flaming torch and saw a large hall covered in faded paintings and a dome with a statue of Buddha in a praying pose. Almost all the caves are very dimly lit in order to preserve the paintings and carvings.

The caves lined up one after the other will require one whole day to completely view and also get more knowledge about the place. It would be best to hire a guide who can explain the significance of each cave in the most elaborate manner. I guess they take 2-3 families together and would charge anything in the range of 500-800 depending upon the number of people.

Panoramic View of Ajanta Caves
Panoramic View of Ajanta Caves | Click for Larger Image

You can find more details about Ajanta caves on Wikipedia.

Entry Fee at Ajanta Caves

  • ₹ 10 per person for Indian Tourists
  • ₹ 250 per person for foreign tourists
  • ₹ 25 per camera for photo/video camera
  • ₹ 0 for kids below 15 years

Timings at Ajanta Caves

  • Tuesday to Sunday – 9:00 AM to 5:30 PM
  • Monday – Closed

Ajanta Caves, Aurangabad on Google Map

Photos from Ajanta Caves Aurangabad

19 thoughts on “Ajanta Caves, Aurangabad, Photos, Info and Map”

  1. The caves look amazing, majestic and certainly like nothing I have ever seen before. I hope that I one day get to experience this myself. The energy and atmosphere of the place must be amazing. I just imagine myself being awestruck. Thank you for sharing, there are so many wonderful places and things in this world I still need to see, and this is definitely one of them.

    Reply
  2. I have been planning to visit Ajanta and Ellora caves since so long, but sadly the plan never gets through. Hopefully 2017 is the year for these ancient caves and also the crater :). How long does it take to cover the entire place? Can we take a full tour within a day without rushing around?

    Reply
    • Ajanta has around 29/30 caves some are small and some big with more details and paintings. If you go about with a guide learning in details about each cave, it should take around 4-5 hours. I’ve already posted separately about Ellora and one of my upcoming posts is about Lonar, the crater lake. 🙂 Thank you for your comment.

      Reply
  3. Those are amazing carvings and paintings. I heard so much about the Ajanta caves when I was traveling up north but we never got down to see them. I definitely have to go back. Those are just amazing.

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  4. unfortunately, I haven’t been to Ajanta & Ellora caves yet. I have read about it a lot, and many of my friends visited it. Its quite a fascinating place with exotic statues. Btw very cool photos included.

    Reply
  5. It’s incredible, isn’t it? To see something that was done thousands of years ago, it’s almost unimaginable what kind of people did that. And what is more remarkable is how they have stood the test of time. But at the same time, I can almost imagine the brutality that came with building it in the first place. If I understand correctly, slaves were used in those times, yes?

    Reply
    • As far as my knowledge goes, there has been no mention of any slaves been used. I’m guessing that it must have purely been the work of some masterly workers.
      However, since you’ve pointed this out Robert, I’ll definitely want to find out more details about creation of Ajanta and Ellora caves for sure.

      Thanks.

      Reply
  6. Oh damn!!! I feel so miserable… Twice, twice I missed the chance to visit Ajanta and Ellora. My friends planned and visited twice and on both times, I was held up in something else. Ajanta is way too close to my heart. Infact i did a study on the clothing depicted in the paintings using Benoy Behl’s photos and presented a paper. Its an hour long talk, and its there on youtube. Still, yet to visit!!!

    Reply

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