Highlights of Kanyakumari (Cape Comorin)

Kanyakumari (Cape Comorin), also known as Cap Com, is at the very southern tip of mainland India, where the Gulf of Bengal, Indian Ocean and Arabian Sea all come together (the southernmost of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands are slightly further south, latitude-wise).
There are 4 main sights to see (not counting sunrise and sunset, which unfortunately were unspectacular due to clouds in the way):

The Vivekananda Memorial (Rs10/$0.25) and Thiruvalluvar Statue (free), reached by a small passenger ferry (Rs20/$0.50) that does a circular route to these 2 small rocky islands a few hundred metres off-shore. The memorial was built in 1970 for in memory of a swami who meditated here in 1892. Visiting this memorial had a Disneyland-ride feel to it (follow the arrows and lines around the island). Update: I forgot to mention that at the memorial there is a darkened meditation room with a glowing Om symbol and a recorded Om sound that plays every 30 seconds or soo. Very relaxing.
The statue, also referred to as the “Statue of Liberty” of India, is of the Tamil namesake poet and stands 133 feet tall (inc. the base) due to his master 133 chapter work Thirukural.

Kumari Amman Temple and Vivekananda Memorial

The Kumari Amman Temple (free) which I didn’t find that interesting, though it has the unusual feature of requiring all men to take off their shirts when entering the temple. It has a stunning location near the tip, but you can’t see the shore or oceans from within the temple’s high outer walls.

The Gandhi Memorial (free) – yes, another one! he’s very popular, you see – which is a multi-architectural-style building near the shore, with a good 360° view from the little tower.

The bathing ghats just south of the temple. There’s a little sandy beach too, but beware – the water is full of rocks and shallower than one would expect (I scraped my ankle). Always an interesting slice of Indian life at a ghat or beach.
Here is an emaciated old man meditating near the ghats:

Old emaciated man meditating

Also, there is an interesting looking tsunami memorial to the lives lost in the tsunami of Xmas 2004 near the ghats.

Tsunami memorial

There were far more Indian tourists/pilgrims here than foreigners, not to mention school groups…

Overall it’s a relaxing little town on a stunning location, definitely worth a visit!

My hotel was right next to the temple entrance, and I had a view of the water and rocky islands (the memorial and statue).

Highlights of Madurai

Madurai, about 3 hours by train south of Trichy, has 2 main sights: the big Sri Meenakshi Temple, and the Gandhi Memorial Museum. And lots of tailor shops.

The Sri Meenakshi Temple (Rs50/$1.25, + Rs50/$1.25 for camera) was built in 1506 in Dravidian architecture. The outer wall surrounds a 6ha/15acre compound. There are 12 gopurams ranging in height from 45-50m. The large pillared temple contains many gold-topped sanctums (off-limits to non-Hindus). There is also an art museum in the 1000 Pillared Hall (which probably really does have a thousand pillars!) which I rushed through.
I was getting a little templed out so overall I wasn’t wowed by this one, despite the rave reviews in my guidebook.

the closeup isn’t from the same gopuram pictured on the left…

The Gandhi Memorial Museum (free, + Rs50/$1.25 for camera) had 2 distinct sections: the first one describes the 2-century fight for independence against the British, which I had just read in my guidebook the day before, so it was a little repetitive (albeit with photos and maps) but still interesting. The second one describes the life of Gandhi, in way too much detail (well, too much detail for me). The exhibit includes the blood-stained loincloth that Gandhi wore when he was assassinated by a Hindu zealot on 1948/01/30 (I recall they had a remembrance on that anniversary when I was in Pondy, which has a huge Gandhi statue by the shore). Anyways, the reason the loincloth is in Madurai is that Gandhi had decided in Madurai years earlier to only wear a loincloth (of the style common in Madurai).

Another noteworthy item is the large number of tailor shops in Madurai. I had 2 cotton short-sleeved shirts made for me (one orange, one blue) for Rs600/$15 for the pair of them (probably “overpaid” but they work, though they won’t last forever :-)

Arrived in Varkala last night (cliff-top beach town)

Internet is very slow here, but will try to post some updates over the next 2 days as I chill here for 3 nights.
I’m now in the state of Kerala, in the southwest corner o India.
It’s a beautiful setting, albeit very touristy (though apparently not as commercial as beaches in Goa).
Fresh fish is on display in the many restaurants every night.

There is a cliff-top walkway with no buildings on the ocean side (no railings either, for the most part!) and a long row of restaurants, shops and hotels on the inland side. My hotel is further back (a 2 min walk from the “action”). There is a nice breeze from the ocean, and I’ve gotten some nice body surfing rides down at the wide beach, which you reach via steps on the cliff. There are even lifeguards on the beach (the rips are strong).

Beach and cliff

The main stairs down to the beach from the cliff top are visible on the right

Leaving Madurai late tonight for Kanyakumari

At 2:10 in the morning, that is, on a night train that puts me in at 6:30 in the morning. I have a sleeper berth in AC3 class – that’s open compartments of 6 berths (3 per side) with A/C. Since I have a cheap hotel room (Rs160/$4 per 24 hours, I took it an extra “night” and so I can snooze tonight before going to the train station.
I did notice on my previous train, also in AC3 class, that there is no extra luggage room for my backpack – it will have to go on the berth with me!
Kanyakumari (Cape Comorin), informally known as Cap Com, is at the southern tip of India, where the Gulf of Bengal, Indian Ocean and Arabian Sea all come together.
After one day and night there I start heading up the west coast to the state of Kerala; first stop will be Varkala, a cliff-top beach town (there is a beach below).

Today I tried to go to a bank to change a large bill (Rs1000/$25 is extremely hard to use, but that’s what the ATM mainly spits out), only to discover that it was in fact Sunday and the bank wasn’t open. Oops!

Did I mention I’m very much looking forward to seeing the ocean again after 5 landlocked days? Getting tired of temples and cities…

Here is a photo from the vegetable market in Madurai:

Vegetable market

Highlights of Trichy and Thanjavur

Trichy, as Tiruchirappalli is known, (pop 847,000) has 2 main temples to visit.

The first one, Rock Fort Temple, is built on top of an 83m rock outcropping – it takes 437 rock-carved steps to get to the top!
There are actually two temples at this site – one big one half way up, and one little one dedicated to Ganesh at the very summit (non-Hindus can’t go into the first one, nor into the sanctum of the second one). However, you do get a great 360° view of the city from up top!
My heart rate was 168 when I made it to the top, almost non-stop. Oh, and you have to do it barefoot, since the whole thing is a temple site.
The entrance is through another temple at street level on the main bazaar street in the area.

Rock Fort Temple

The second one, Sri Ranganathaswamy Temple, is actually a ridiculously large temple complex consisting of 7 concentric circular walls, with a total of 21 gopurams (pyramid-like tower on an entrance archway) – the tallest one, which you hit first at the south end, is a whopping 72m high! Granted, the area within the outermost walls are city (dwellings, stalls, etc.), and only the innermost parts are temple per se, and a huge pillared temple at that.

Thanjavur is a smaller town (pop 215,000) 50km east of Trichy; I visited it as a day trip (1¼ – 1¾ hours by train, Rs10/$0.25 in unreserved second class).
It has one World Heritage listed temple and a palace to visit.
I rented a single-speed bicycle for Rs3/$0.08 per hour.

Jan on rented bicycle

The first one, Brihadishwara Temple, is a large sand-coloured complex in Chola architecture, built in 1010 by Raja Raja. It is different than most temples here in that the vimana (the pyramid tower over the inner sanctum) is taller than the gopuram (over the entry way). In fact this vimana is 66m tall! There is a huge Nandi (bull) statue carved from one 25 tonne rock (it’s 6m long and 3m high). Just inside the outer wall is a covered arched walkway containing hundreds of linga (phallic statues representing Shiva). And in the centre, a huge carved pillared temple; the air is cool inside. The inner sanctum contains a huge lingam.
See http://jantrabandt.blip.tv for a video.

The second one, Thanjavur Royal Palace & Museum, is an old palace seemingly surrounded by schools. There are a number of buildings to visit, including:

  • Durbar Hall, where the king once held audiences, with a large dais

    Durbar Hall
  • the Saraswati Mahal library containing interesting artefacts, inc. palm leaf manuscripts with tiny script, and a 1785 World Atlas (with the latest discoveries of Capt Cook!) in which Australia is called New Holland, and Hawaii is the Sandwich Islands
  • an art gallery with detailed Chola bronze statues from the 9th-18th Century.
  • a slog up the narrow circular stone staircase of the ~8 story bell tower for a great view (though on the way down I saw a sign that said tourists shouldn’t go past the 3rd floor for their safety)
  • the Royal Palace Museum, which was small and the only case that grabbed me contained royal embroidered shoes & hats
  • and the uninteresting Raja Serfoji Memorial Hall

A lesser highlight of Thanjavur was that school kids kept wanting to talk to me and, gasp, I talked to them!
At one point I was surrounded by school boys (age 10?) in uniform on their break, near the palace, and they wanted their picture taken (and see it on my LCD) and they didn’t even pickpocket me (if you’ve been to Rome, you know what I’m talking about :-)

Currently in Trichy (Tiruchirappalli)

I’m currently in Tiruchirappalli, known as Trichy, pretty much in the centre of the state of Tamil Nadu.
Trichy has 2 major temples, one of them called Rock Fort and is built on top of a 83m rock outcropping – it takes 437 rock-carved steps to get to the top!
Today (day 10 in Tamil Nadu) I realized I have some Tamil (language) in my big LP guidebook (but not in my LP phrasebook, which has Hindi, Urdu and Bengali), so I learned hello and no and thank you on the train today (a day trip to another town, Thanjavur, for 2 temples, one of which is a World Heritage site). Hello went over well, returned with a (Tamil) hello and sometimes even with a namaste gesture.

Tomorrow I leave for Madurai (3 hours by train), which has another famous temple.

Another breakfast sample:

Mini-tiffin breakfast

the mini-tiffin (Rs32/$0.80) including the tea (tiffin means snack); in the lower left are 6 mini sambar idly (spongy rice dumpling), in the lower right is a small dosa (lentil flour pancake), in the upper left is a small scoop of pongal (sticky rice w/ spices; Pongal is also the name of the big harvest in January)

Tips/thoughts/feelings: Drinks

After 10 days in (South) India, here is what I’ve discovered/experienced regarding drinks:
note that bottled drinks are almost always opened in front of you at your table, sometimes even after confirming with you that it’s ok (which also gives you a chance to feel it to make sure it is cold)

  • Tea: if you ask for “tea” it is hot milk (not water) with infused tea. Not to be confused with chai or masala tea (spiced, with milk).
    You can ask for black tea (water, not milk).
    Oddly enough, tea isn’t always available, for no apparent reason (it’s boiled water/milk, tea, and a cup, no?).
    Several times I’ve been told there is no tea (or no coffee) and once I was told not until after 15:00 (it was 14:45).
    One time on the long distance train, the tea was hot milk out of a big container, and a tea bag to steep in it myself. On the local train, it was pre-steeped milk tea served from the over-sized stainless steel thermos.
    Cost: Rs3-12/$0.08-0.30 for a cup (sometimes in a resto you can buy a glass or pot)
  • Coffee: can be black or pre-mixed with milk. Not always available. And it’s usually instant (Nescafe) unless it explicitly says “filter coffee” on the menu.
    Cost: Rs5-15/$0.13-0.38 for a cup (sometimes in a resto you can buy a glass or pot)
  • Espresso/cappuccino/etc.: available in upscale coffee shops
    Cost: Rs40/$1 or more
  • Fresh fruit juice: One of my favourites, I ask for no ice and no sugar (they seem to like sugar in their fruit juice here). This is fresh fruit cut up and either run through a blender or, less commonly a juicer. I only have this in restos, as street stalls will add (tap) water to it – I tried that once, took a little sip and discreetly dumped it (not worth the risk!). So far I have had orange, pineapple, madulai/pomegranate, papaya and mixed juice.
    Cost: Rs17-38/$0.43-0.95 (“no ice” can cost Rs0-5 extra, but that is already added into the price range shown here)
  • “Fresh lime soda“: another favourite as it’s cold and refreshing and no plastic waste:
    it’s fresh-squeezed lime juice (they have really small limes here) in the bottom of a glass and a 300mL glass bottle of Soda water (i.e. club soda).
    Cost: Rs10-20/$0.23-0.50
  • Lassi: with or without fruit
    Cost: Rs20-30/$0.50-0.75 I think. Have only had one.
  • Soft drinks: of course they are available, but I only had one once and it was too sweet to be refreshing (300mL glass bottles)
    Cost: Rs15/$0.38; note that soda water (club soda) is usually a little less, Rs10/$0.23
  • Water (plastic bottle): usually purified water, not spring water
    I haven’t bought many in restos; in stores they vary from Rs20-40/$0.50-$1.00 for a 1L or 2L bottle (the best I’ve seen is Rs20/$0.50 for a cold 2L bottle!)
    See also below on reducing plastic waste.
  • Water (tap): In non-touristy restos, they have tap water on the table in a stainless steel jug (and stainless steel cups).
    I presume this is not safe to drink, but I purify it (see note below).
  • Beer: not available very often, since liquor licences are expensive. The tourist restos will have Indian beer, and sometimes you have to keep the bottle on the floor so that it isn’t visible to a policeman on the street; in some areas, it’s called “secret tea” and is served in a teapot.
    Cost: Rs110-120/$2.88-3.00 for a large 650mL bottle of Indian beer (Kingfisher is a popular brand, quite drinkable)
    Update: in state of Kerala, beer was as low as Rs80/$2 for a large bottle.
  • Wine shops: the official liquor outlets sell beer and alcohol, but not wine :-)
    I saw a large beer bottle for Rs40/$1

Note about reducing plastic waste:
One new gizmo I have that helps in this regard is my SteriPEN which is a portable UV light sterilizer (it runs on 4 AA batteries, the same (rechargeable) kind I use for my camera and my travel shaver, so I only have one recharger with me). It cost me about US$75 at REI, a travel gear store in Seattle (a store similar to MEC in Toronto).
One downside is that it doesn’t improve the flavour of the water (but at least it doesn’t make it worse, like iodine tablets do). Another downside is that the water isn’t quite as cold as a fresh refridgerated bottle.
So far I’ve used it in 2 ways:

  1. To purify tap water that I then use for brushing my teeth (this alone could avoid 1-2 1L plastic water bottles per week of travel).
  2. In non-touristy restos, they have tap water on the table in a stainless steel jug (and stainless steel cups); I purify a cup of this to drink along with my meal.

So combined with choosing glass bottled soda instead of plastic bottled water at a resto or drink cart, I am only buying one 2L plastic water bottle every 2-3 days (as opposed to one or more a day!)
Actually the very first day, before I started using my SteriPEN, I probably went through 4 plastic bottles (300mL and 1L sizes). Oops!

So far I have not gotten sick (and these last few days I have been drinking a total of 2-3 glasses of purified water in the restos per day.

Tips/thoughts/feelings: Accomodation

Having been in 4 hotels now…
Note this applies to budget and moderate hotels (all under $20/night), since I haven’t stayed in any fancier ones…

  • Often 24-hour checkout is possible, i.e. you can check out 24 hours after you check in, instead of by 11am like we are used to
  • A/C can be nice (duh!), but mostly because it gets rid of the mosquitoes. Hotels just don’t get that a screen-less slatted-glass window in the bathroom makes having a screen (usually with holes or a poor seam) on the window ineffective. (This isn’t a problem only in India)
  • You can reserve a room just by calling and giving your name. No credit card or deposit. Worked so far…
  • Book ahead (a few days) if possible, esp. around holidays or weekends in popular areas. For one town, I had to call 6 hotels; today, I called 5 and ended up with a more-expensive-than-I-wanted moderate A/C room for this Sat night.
  • You can pay one night at a time, which is handy if you aren’t entirely sure how long you will stay, or might want to bail after one night (I haven’t yet). Also handy if you don’t have all the cash on you when you first check in.
  • Expect thin, ratty sheets and small, thin, ratty towels. I’ve been using my silk dreamsack (like a thin sleeping bag liner) as a barrier and to keep the breeze from the ceiling fan from chilling me.
  • You have to ask for a towel. Yes, I do have a travel towel, but if I can get a reasonable towel I’ll use that first…
  • Bring (or buy) toilet paper. There won’t be any, and not always a wastebin in which to discard them (like in Mexico, they don’t go in the toilet or the pipes will clog).
  • Bring a good big padlock (or buy one here cheaply); sometimes the rooms don’t have regular keyholes in the door, rather they use a padlock to lock the door (by locking a metal bar to a loop behind the lock). One thing I like about the local-style locks is that you can’t lock it without using the key, so you don’t have to worry about accidentally locking your key inside the room. Note that your typical luggage lock isn’t big enough. It’s comforting to know you can keep the staff out, and it’s not like you’re getting daily maid service at these places :-)
  • Buy mosquito coils here and burn one in the room (or bathroom) while you are out for the day to clear out the mosquitoes.
  • I’ve only had hot water in 1 of 4 hotels. Supposedly you can sometimes get it by the bucket (sometimes at extra cost) but I haven’t figured that one out yet. Of course, the “cold” water tap isn’t anywhere near as cold as back home, in fact it’s actually refreshing!

 

Highlights of Pondy (Pondicherry, now Puducherry)

Pondy has a split personality: the one side (closest to the ocean) has a French heritage, with wide tree-lined streets (nice shade!), with little traffic, French street names (even using “rue” instead of road

French street names

), a central park with big trees for shade, and quite clean; the other side of the canal (away from the ocean) is typical Indian.
There is no beach in Pondy itself; however, there is a nice promenade which is lit up at night thanks to the double-street-lights on top of each lamp post along that one road next to the promenade. Moving inland from the water’s edge, you have a big rock wall, then a flat sandy area (about 5m above sea level), then the cement promenade, then the road. And a nice breeze on the promenade (though still brutally hot in the sun).
I did hear quite a bit of French spoken here, including an Indian waiter at a French tourist resto.

Promenade at 'beach

Highlights include:
– meandering through the main market (fish, fruit & veg, flowers) – which my middle-class barista said she didn’t go to as it was too dirty and time-consumng, and she would rather pay a few more rupees at the supermarket (I was asking about prices to see how I had been doing on my fruit haggling)

Flower market

– watching the locals on the promenade and the food vendors on the beach near the huge Gandhi statue
– watching an Indian music video being filmed in the park (though it wasn’t one of the outrageous big dance numbers, just one guy who I actually think I recognized from the videos I had seen in my room in Chennai)
– the elephant outside a temple dedicated to Ganesh
– the beautiful flower-festooned samadhi (tomb venerated as shrine)at the Sri Aurobindo Ashram
– eating breakfast “beachside” on a shaded marbled patio at the government tourist development corp’s Le Cafe (and seeing dolphins one morning) along with a good cappuccino as a treat
– good cheap local food (actually, it was North Indian food) at a resto facing the “beach” and sea
– the quasi-French restos were “overpriced” and not really that interesting (and full of tourists of course)
– actually, most of the sites in my guidebook were disappointing, including the Heritage Walk (I couldn’t find a guide for it as it was being reprinted, so I was left to walk the streets and see some buildings)

All in all, a peaceful stop on my way down south. But not a must-see town, except for the French nature of it making it different.
The only reason I had heard of it was that it is the starting point in the book “The Life of Pi” about a boy and a tiger escaping on a lifeboat.