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| What to do ji ? |
At this point of time I see the glum face of my daughter and then came the query from her which actually I was dreading would come 😜😜 “Dad yeh temple chase ka kuch zyaada nahi ho gaya”. I smiled and said betaji yeh toh suruvat hai, aage aage dekh hota hai Kya.
As a traveler we have to balance the likes and dislikes of our co traveler too, hence I told my daughter today we will check out Danushkodi, Kalam house and Pambam bridge. But it seems that luck was not on our side.
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| Oh Danushkodi !I much I shall be missing you |
You will ask, Why Luck! Yes sadly we were informed by the local auto driver that the Danushkodi is closed for the visit due to red alert for cyclone. Believe me I was so disappointed I cannot tell you.
Actually of all the things to visit, Danushkodi was on the top most priority. I remember speaking to one of my friend few years back(2013) when he posted those lovely pictures of the beach with beautiful skyline and some amazing clouds.
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| Danushkodi Beach |
Then this abandoned church, the destroyed railway station.All had a mythical aura attached to it that I was zapped by the crude beauty of the place.My heart was set on visiting it and today this disappointment,Seriously I wanted to cry, but then as a traveler I have learned to take things in my strides.(The pictures of Danushkodi that I have posted are the ones which my friend Prathamesh had posted on fb in 2013 and was gracious enough to allow me to share them with you on my blog when he came to know that I couldn’t go to Danushkodi)
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| Abandoned Church at Danushkodi Beach. |
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| Abandoned Railway Station at Danushkodi |
We reworked our plan and decided to go on the local sight seeing of places which are near the Rameshwaram Temple.( The auto guys here have a standard local sightseeing package for RS 300(year 2018.)
10.00 am
We started our trip from Ramar Padham monument atop Gandamadana Parvattham. Ramar Padham is as the name suggest means Rama’s feet. One of the local told me that during the war on Ravana, Lord Rama stood atop this mountain to have first look of Lanka.
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| Ramar Padham Temple |
Mere ko koi Lanka Nazar nahi aayi, bus door khada TV tower zaroor nazar agaya.(its a big lie so ignore) Instead of Lanka you do get good view of Rameshwaram. The premise is not well maintained.
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| One of the view from the Temple |
We spent few minutes soaking the scenes and the lovely blue sky around us and moved on but not before enjoying the coconut water.
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| Rameshwaram me aake Nariyal Pani zaroor hona ji |
Then our Auto driver took us to a small temple. Where Hanuman told Lord Rama that he has seen Sita. The temple is so simple that you would easily miss out.
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| Hanuman Temple |
Next we visited Panchamukha Anjaneyar Temple or the 5 headed Hanuman idol. ( For a moment I thought to myself, Kya Hanumanji Ravan see inspired ho gaye the kya .( One is ten headed and one 5 headed)
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| Panchamukhi Hanuman |
Jokes apart, there is a legend behind this Five Headed Hanuman. According to the legend, when Ahiravana a great demon and brother of Ravan, took unconscious Lord Rama and his brother Laxman to Patallok and hid them. Hanuman went in search of them and came to know that demon Ahiravana can only be killed if lamps which were put in five different directions are extinguished simultaneously.
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| Five face Hanuman |
So Hanuman became the 5 gods in different directions, named 1-Hanuman 2- Hayagreeva 3-Narsimha 4-Garuda 5-Varahswami and extinguished all the five lamps simultaneously and thus Ahiravan was killed and Lord Rama and Laxman were saved from his clutches. This five faced statue signifies the face of those five Gods in one God Hanuman.
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| Floating Stones |
Next to this idol, in the same temple complex there was this temple where the floating stones are displayed. Floating stones are believed to be those stones which were used for the construction of Ram Setu or Adam Bridge to reach Lanka.
Next we visited Laxman Theertham. What I like was the bright colours of this temple.
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| Colourful Laxman Theertham |
Its basically a small temple with the usual pond attached to it and then there is a small temple within the pond. Most of the Theertham here are exact replica of this style of construction.
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| Pond with the temple perched inside the pond. |
Last but the least we visited Rama Theerthaam.
There too just like the above picture one pond was there with the temple inside, however Laxman Theertham was better maintained I felt. Next to the Pond separated by wall there was a hall built by the Gujarati trust.
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| Prayer hall by Gujarathi Trust |
Next to this temple there was another old temple.
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| Ancient Temple next to Rama Theertham |
Interestingly this temple have hundreds of idols of snakes, something which I have never seen anywhere before.
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| Hundreds of snake Idols . |
It was getting hot and we were done at least for first half of the day and were now looking forward for some delicious sambhar rice for lunch.
I therefore instructed the auto driver to drop us at over hotel and later to pick us at 3 pm so that we can visit Kalam house and pambam bridge in the evening. I wanted to see sunset at Pambam bridge because I was told that the sight is absolutely amazing.
Please wait for the next part where we shall be visiting Dr Abdul Kalam Memorial till then happy reading.
To read about our journey from the beginning click here.
