These are the best places to travel this summer

Before my first trip to India, I’d never truly traveled with a camera. That might sound strange coming from someone who leads creative teams in photography and video at Lonely Planet. And, sure, I’ve spent years surrounded by professionals behind the lens – either collaborating closely or managing production. But when Goway invited me on a journey through India that I knew would be mind-expanding, I felt something shift. This time, I didn’t just want to document the experience. I wanted to see it – really see it. And since I knew my phone would tempt me out of this, I decided to pursue a new-to-me medium.

Drumroll, please: I borrowed a real camera. Not my phone. Something intentional. And though it was a small shift for me, it changed everything. (Cue, all photographers everywhere screaming “duh!”)
Left: Two women wearing saris walk along a pathway towards a vast white marble structure with domes and minarets. Right: People walk through ornate arches on the edge of a city square.
Left: The gates open at the Taj Mahal. Right: People walk through arches in Delhi.
A river packed with small boats that are loaded with people on the edge of a city where the twilight sky is glowing pink.
Onlookers gather for ganga aarti (river worship ceremony), Varanasi.
Left: A man with a large colorful turban stands in front of an intricately patterned orange wall. Right: A woman in a pink sari walks by intricate carved pillars within an ancient complex.
Left: Colorful turban in Jaipur. Right: Intricate carved pillars within the Qutab Minar complex in Delhi.

A call to participate

Carrying a camera – not just snapping from my phone – brought me fully into the present. It asked more of me, both as a traveler and an image-maker. I found myself slowing down, noticing more, connecting more deeply. Taking someone’s portrait required more than just aim and click, it required presence, both hands, and full contact with the subject and the tool. Permission. An exchange of glances, a conversation or a shared joke. With a phone, I could remain a voyeur. With a camera, I became a participant.

And that participation meant giving in to the pace of my trip. India is not a place that whispers. It arrives with full force – chaotic, colorful, spiritual and unlike anywhere I’d ever been. I traveled through Delhi, Varanasi, Jaipur, Ranthambore, Agra and Rishikesh, and from the moment I landed, I was overwhelmed – in the best possible way. By the noise, yes. But also by the generosity. By the vibrancy of daily life. By the constant, beautiful thrum of energy around every corner. And with each frame, I felt more a part of that tempo.

A series of vegetable stalls in a market with each of the vendors' stalls covered by yellow tarpaulins supported by large bamboo canes.
The vegetable market, Jaipur.
Left: A small three-wheeled vehicle with a driver and passengers drives along a city street. Right: A man dressed all in white uses a machete to cut the top off a coconut.
Left: A tuk tuk in Delhi. Right: A seller cuts coconut in the Jaipur vegetable market.
A cow wanders among people in front of buildings in a city.
A cow crosses the road in Rishikesh.

A rhythm of contrasts

What struck me most was India’s rhythm of contrasts. There’s urgency and chaos, to be sure: motorbikes threading through traffic, horns blaring in symphony, people in motion everywhere. But, layered beneath that is a surprising stillness: a prayer at the edge of the Ganges, a stolen hour for an afternoon nap in doorways, in tuk-tuks, on sidewalks, the second cup of chai (tea) served too hot to hold in its clay cup. In these quieter moments, and through the images they helped me produce, emerged a story of cultural ease with simply being, a comfort with public space, and, too, with the public, that felt radically different from the guarded posture of my native New York.
A group of women wearing colorful saris cross a city street.
Women walking across the street in Varanasi in colorful saris.
Left: A woman, dressed in bright shades of purple, red and orange, smokes a cigarette. Right: People dressed in orange gowns on a walkway in front of a large mural.
Left: A woman sells herbs at Jaipur vegetable market. Right: Sadhus walk across the Ganges via a footbridge in Rishikesh.

One image from the trip particularly stays with me: a woman sells herbs at the Jaipur flower market while casually smoking a cigarette. Nothing out-of-this-world unusual, but the posture, the relaxation, and the way she made eye contact with each possible buyer will stay with me. It told a story of her internal world, that she was preoccupied with her own day-to-day, and yet still she stayed engaged and engaging. 

The poolside terrace of a luxury hotel with brightly colored umbrellas providing shade to the guests. A large white marble dome peeks over the gardens in the distance.
The Taj Mahal peeks over the Oberoi Amarvilas, Agra.
Left: People walk through golden arches on a pathway through a garden. Right: A woman wearing orange and purpler hands out samples of produce at a vegetable market.
Left: Decorative gates in Rishikesh. Right: A woman hands out samples of produce at the Jaipur vegetable market.
A person dressed in white and sat cross-legged on a mat runs a chime around a golden bowl.
A yoga teacher chimes a sound bowl near the Ganges, Rishikesh.

A portal to memories

Traveling with a camera made me more curious, more observant, more present, and not just in the physical sense, but emotionally, too. I wasn’t posting in real time or chasing validation from a feed. I wasn’t texting friends photos before I’d fully looked at them myself. The camera became a kind of portal – singular in purpose, limited in function, but lasting in effect. Later, when I reviewed the images, it wasn’t to pick the best one for social media. It was to tell a story. It was about memory, not content.

That shift transformed not only how I saw the trip, but how I saw myself within it. I didn’t need to hand the camera over for a “candid” of me in front of a landmark. I wasn’t the subject here. India was. And that decentering of self felt liberating.
Left: A hand covered in intricate ink patterns and a large sparkling ring, with beaded bangles on the wrist. Right: flowers and pink petals spill out of bags on the floor at a flower market.
Left: Henna and jewelry in Agra. Right: Bundles of flowers for sale at Jaipur flower market.
Three women dressed in saris with head covereds sit surrounded by bags of colorful flowers on petals at a market.
Women sell flowers at Jaipur flower market.

One of the most meaningful relationships I made was with our Goway guide, Malaynil. We shared an unremarkable but unforgettable afternoon on a walk around the block near our Varanasi hotel, nothing planned or scenic, just a stroll during some free time. I had my camera, and as I snapped a few quiet scenes – hennaed hands, bare feet, shadows of trees on worn brick – he began noticing them too. After that, he started pointing things out with a smile and a nod that said, “You’ll want to get this,” hinting towards the vibrant hue of a woman’s sari or a crooked doorway. Photography became a shared language between us, a new way of experiencing the trip together.

A tiger crosses a dirt path between crumbling walls made of stacked stones in a national park.
Shakti, one of ~80 tigers in Ranthambore National Park.
Left: An orange and yellow hot-air balloon begins to inflate as flames fill it from below. Right: a man wafts incense near a series of lit candles.
Left: A hot air balloon begins to fill for a sunrise trip. Right: A Ganga Aarti ceremony honoring the Ganges.
A man in his small wooden boat on a river at sunrise.
A man in his boat on the Ganges at sunrise.

A trip in full resolution

Of course, there were the headline moments: spotting six tigers in Ranthambore National Park, floating over Jaipur in a hot-air balloon, staying in the luminous Oberoi properties. But the details are what stayed with me. The textures. The glow of temple walls at dawn. The sounds of street vendors and sacred chants at the ganga aarti (river worship ceremony). The idea that strangers are meant to be greeted with reverence, for all unknown people could be gods in disguise.

I’m grateful to have those images in full resolution. But more than that, I’m grateful for how they make me feel and how they conjure a strong connection with the emotions of the trip. Expansive. Curious. Present. What the best kinds of travel always unlocks for me – and now, what photography does, too.

I ended up buying the Fujifilm X100VI I borrowed for the trip. And while I’d return to India in a heartbeat, I know I don’t have to fly across the world to feel that sense of attention and wonder. All I need to do is reach for the camera.

Annie traveled to India with the assistance of Goway. Lonely Planet does not accept freebies in exchange for positive coverage. 

Plan with a local

Experience the real India

Let a local expert craft your dream trip.
Get started