A two-day plan

Morning: Kumartuli and the northern riverside. The workshops, the ghat, and the lanes around Sovabazar and Ahiritola. Two or three hours, on foot, finished by ten.

Afternoon: sleep. This is not a joke — the evenings run to midnight and doing two of them without an afternoon off is how people end up watching Navami from a hotel room.

Evening: north Kolkata on foot. Shyambazar down through Hatibagan to Hedua, five hours, Metro home. See the north Kolkata itinerary for the detail.

Morning: a bonedi bari courtyard, or two. These are late-morning events in private houses, quiet, seated and completely unlike anything you saw the night before. Ask at the door.

Midday, if it is Ashtami or Navami: bhog. Take a coupon in the morning at whichever community puja you are nearest.

Evening: south Kolkata. Bhowanipore into Kalighat, or Gariahat and Ballygunge — two clusters, one Metro hop, and a great deal of food.

Salt Lake in the evening. It is the opposite experience — spacious, domestic, unhurried — and it will change what you think Pujo is.

Or Howrah, across the river, which almost nobody from Kolkata bothers to do.

Panchami and Shashthi if you want to see the pandals. Ashtami and Navami if you want the festival at full pressure. Saptami and Ashtami is the usual compromise and the busiest of the three.

Whichever you pick, build the routes in advance. On the night, with the crowd and the network both against you, a saved list is worth more than any amount of local knowledge.