Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh

Varanasi is one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world and the holiest city in Hinduism. It sits on the west bank of the Ganges in eastern Uttar Pradesh, at a point where the river takes a broad northward curve — a geographic feature that gives the city its distinctive crescent of ghats.

Also known as Kashi and Banaras, it is sacred to Hindus, Buddhists and Jains. The Kashi Vishwanath Temple is one of the twelve Jyotirlingas, the most sacred shrines to Shiva. Sarnath, ten kilometres away, is where the Buddha delivered his first sermon after attaining enlightenment. Jains revere it as the birthplace of two Tirthankaras.

For Hindus, dying in Varanasi is believed to bring moksha — release from the cycle of rebirth — and the cremation ghats at Manikarnika and Harishchandra burn continuously, as they have for centuries.

Beyond the religious significance, Varanasi is a centre of Sanskrit learning, Hindustani classical music, and the Banarasi silk weaving tradition. Banaras Hindu University is one of Asia's largest residential universities.

Varanasi offers something no other city in India does: an unbroken, entirely unselfconscious continuity of ritual life stretching back thousands of years.

The ghats at sunrise are the defining experience. Take a boat out on the Ganges as the light comes up and you see the whole crescent of the city waking — pilgrims bathing, priests performing rituals, wrestlers training, laundry being beaten on stone, smoke rising from the cremation grounds. None of it is staged. It has simply always happened this way.

The evening Ganga Aarti at Dashashwamedh Ghat is the other set piece — seven priests performing a synchronised ritual with brass lamps, incense and conch shells, watched from the steps and from boats on the water.

Beyond the ghats, Sarnath is one of the four most important Buddhist pilgrimage sites in the world, with the Dhamek Stupa marking where the Buddha first taught. The old city's lanes are a maze of shrines, silk shops and food stalls. And the city's musical tradition — the Banaras gharana — produced Ravi Shankar and Bismillah Khan.

Varanasi is intense, crowded and can be confronting, particularly around the cremation grounds. It is also, for many travellers, the most memorable place they visit in India.