Sri Venkateswara Swamy Temple, Tirumala

This is what Tirumala is for. Inside the sanctum called Ananda Nilayam stands the image of Venkateswara (Balaji to most of India), which tradition holds nobody ever installed: it revealed itself. Sixty to eighty thousand people come to stand in front of it every day, more than a hundred thousand at peak, and the moment itself lasts seconds; the queue that gets you there is the pilgrimage, not the obstacle to it. Free Sarva Darshan is open to everyone and runs eight to twenty hours; the ₹300 Special Entry slot is booked two to three months ahead and cuts the wait to one to three; holders of foreign passports can ask about the separate NRI window. Phones and cameras go into lockers at the entrance, the dress code is checked at the gate, and black is best left in the suitcase, since in Dravidian tradition it is the colour of mourning. Whichever queue you stood in, you walk out with a laddu.

The most-visited temple on earth, and the one place where the queue is the pilgrimage rather than the price of it