Mamallapuram (or Mahabalipuram)

Mamallapuram possesses some wonderful monuments, including some of the earliest remaining stone structures in India, plus (or but, depending on your point of view) it is a beach town. We had a dark room in a nice hotel with a fair restaurant and a great pool, a one-minute walk from the beach. The town is quite touristy, but pleasant anyway. Restaurants serve fresh fish, caught that morning by fishermen living a couple kilometers north of town, but they drown it in hot spices so that it might as well be anything. We note here that the cuisine in Tamil Nadu lives up to its reputation of being even spicier (hotter) than that in the north.


Fisher villlage just north of Mamallapuram	Path from our hotel to the beach

The beach and the Shore Temple	Mamallapuram Beach looking north

South of town are the ancient monuments known as the Panch Pandava Rathas, the five chariots of the Pandavas, the heroes of the Indian epic, the Mahabharata. They were not masoned, i.e., made of stones set into place, but were all carved out of the rock around 650CE.


The Panch Rathas	Bhima and Dharmaraja Rathas

Ardhanishvara, or androgynous Shiva	Left to right, Nakul Sahadeva, Draupadi, Arjuna and Bhima Rathas (plus elephant)

The famous Shore Temple is probably the oldest stone-built temple in India, dating from the eighth century. It used to be on the beach, before protection was built all around it, and the wind and the waves have weathered it and rounded off its angles. It is still beautiful anyway and is in a striking locale, right on the sea.


Approaching the Shore Temple from the land side	Western tourists at the Shore Temple

Weathered sculpture	The Shore Temple

We then took a look at the Krishna Mandapa, a room carved out of the rock, with sculptures of -- who else? -- Krishna, and a curious rock sculpture known as Arjuna's Penance. In fact, it depicts the fall of the Ganga from heaven to earth after the long period of sanyasa by a rishi, or seer. It is notable for the many sculptures of animals, naga (serpents) in the river and an entire family of elephants.


Krishna Mandapa	Arjuna's Penance

Just north of Mamallapuram is Tiger Cave, park with a shrine to Durga, the goddess in one of her less pleasant moods.


Durga Shrine at Tiger Cave	Durga with her bow attacking the bull monster

The last evening, we took a walk on the beach and came across a stage with enormous speakers which had been set up by an orphanage as some sort of show for the kids. The kids were dancing on the stage and running all over -- and they were anything except shy!


Doggies digging in the sand	Fishing boat setting out

Enjoying sunset on the beach	Kids being photographed on their own insistence

What kids!

The next day, we visited Siv's foster child at Sharma Sheva School, southwest from Mamallapuram. And the day after that, we hit the road.

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