Caves
Trip Start
Mar 10, 2007
1
108
153
Trip End
??? ??, 2007
Mamallapuram,
India
Monday, December 17, 2007
Mamallapuram is famous for its complex of cave temples and sculpted rock panels, and as a result sees flocks of tourists. It consists mainly of a few streets lined with emporiums/shops aimed at the tourist dollar, plus hotels and restaurants catering to the same people. Having said that, i stayed in the village and found it a pleasant place to stay, except when the rained kicked in on my second day and i was confined to my tiny little room for the best part of two days. The cave complex for me was very interesting and some of them are still remarkably well preserved, such as the bas relief Arjunas Penance, the most famous of the sculptures. At 29m long and 7m high it is remarkably detailed, featuring animals, gods and saints. For me the only thing that spoiled the whole complex was again how little care the Indian people seemed to take of it, there is rubbish all over the place and upon walking over the rocks to a further part of the park, i found it was obviously an area being used by locals as a toilet. Lovely.
The Five rathas, a group of 'mid 7th century monolithic temples' are interesting to see, though you do not need to bother with the 250 rupee entrance fee, as this merely gets you about 10m closer to them and isn't worth it (in my opinion anyway).
So my opinion of Mamallapuram:- a nice place to pend a few days, but stay in the village to get away form all the usual hassle of any touristy place.
