Travel Day 904 – Mamallapuram (Mahabalipuram), INDIA
After seeing the two UNESCO Sites of the Shore Temple and the Five Rathas yesterday, today we definitely had to see the rest of the many temples in and round this little beach town of Mamallapuram…
Structural Temple and a Cave Temple
Considering the hot temperatures during the middle of the day, we opted for an early start and rather considered the implementation of a siesta and an extended lunch before we would then set out again later. In theory this was a great idea, but in reality we ended up walking around until well into the afternoon since the area to be covered was much more extensive than expected…
For me it was simply amazing to see how many temples there were around in the protected area behind the local bus station, but whenever we reached an elevated area and got an overview, we could see that there were even more scattered temples in the distance. Those temples could probably be reached by bicycle, but for us the numerous sights in walking distance were truly more than enough and after the long morning of walking around we felt well templed-out…
Rock Cave Temple in Mamallapuram
But overall it was simply amazing the see everything that Mamallapuram (Mahabalipuram) had to offer. In general the temples could be categorized in three different types, depending on their construction. First there were the Rock-Cut Cave Temples, which were known for their simplicity as they were basically hollowed out rocks. Then there were the Monolithic Temples, with the Five Rathas being the best example of them and lastly there were the Structural Temples, put together out of individual pieces of stone…
Sometimes the Structural Temples were even situated on top of the Cave Temples, which made for quite an interesting sight. What was also interesting was that especially the cave temples, which seemed to have required the most work to carve out, could be seen in all sorts of stages of completion. Some were done really rudimentary and it could actually be seen how they intended to continue with the work, while other were beautifully done and finished…
Bas-Relief in Mamallapuram, India
Besides the actual temples, another important part of Mamallapuram’s history were the sculpted Bas-Reliefs. These were to be found inscribed into a huge boulder and were beautifully depicting all sorts of scenes of Hindu mythology. Most notably were the snake beings, the huge elephants and even a cat preaching to a crowd of mice…
While seeing all the sighs was great, it obviously took a lot longer than expected and so we ended up having a rather late siesta while enjoying lunch in one of the many beach-side restaurants. Yeah Mamallapuram (Mahabalipuram) was really a great place to visit…
Find all Mamallapuram photos here.
Leave a Reply