Mahabalipuram Tourism

Mahabalipuram, now officially called Mamallapuram, is a town in the Kanchipuram district of the Tamil Nadu state. It is a 7th century port city of the famous Pallava dynasty, a home to various significant monuments that were constructed between the seventh and the ninth centuries. It has been classified as a UNESCO World Heritage Site due to the presence of these aforementioned historical monuments. Mahabalipuram faces the Bay of Bengal and is situated on the Coromandel Coast. During the Golden Age of the Pallavas, the years between 650-750 AD, Mahabalipuram saw marked improvements in art, architecture, poetry, drama and nearly all other facets of cultural identity.
Mamallapuram itself was getting run down over the last decade with very patchy efforts at keeping the monuments preserved. This has changed in the last few years with the Shore Temple being included in the UNESCO heritage project. The surroundings have been made much nicer, but, there has been a lot of wind and water erosion on the temple carvings with many of them having undergone loss of detail over the years. Sort of too little, too late, but still, better than nothing. Be prepared to fight you way through clutches of gypsies, beggars, guides, snakes charmers and so on, all of which is an essential part of the experience and not to be frowned upon. The whole thing would be bland without them. A nuisance, but harmless.

Tourist Places In And Around Mahabalipuram
As was touched on earlier, it was during the rule of the Pallavas that Mahabalipuram flourished as a whole. The rock cut caves, silver sandy beach, casuarina trees and temples cut from a single rock are some of the alluring attractions this historic town has to offer to tourists and pilgrims. Mahabalipuram has a number of attractions to feast one’s eyes upon and they include the Krishna Mandapam, the Five Rathas, the Varaha Mandapam and the Shore Temple. The Cholamadal Artist’s Village lies about 30 km from the town and is home to various paintings, crafty articles and sculptures. The Mahabalipuram Beach contributes extra splendour to the construction of the Pallava Empire and many a tourists can be found relaxing here from dawn to dusk. About 5 km away from the town, there exists a shrine dedicated to Goddess Durga which has a number of beautiful figurines. The nearby Tiger Cave and Crocodile Bank serve as popular picnic spots for people of all ages throughout the year.

Mandapas : The major hill located at Mamallapuram features pillared halls structured into the rock-face. With their intricate figure carvings and graceful columns, these Mandapas stand eyewitness to the artistic quality of the Pallava rock-cutters. The 10 pavilions with 2 unfinished ones were formed as holy place, with an outer hall and a sanctum. The shallow entrances have been embellished with exquisite figures of gods, deities and many mythological sculptures. Even today, the Ganesh mandapa has been considered a beautiful place of pilgrimage, with the statue of this elephant-god being venerated by the realistic, 14 centuries after it was first sanctified. Krishna's Butterball is known as the Varaha mandapa that is beyond the circular rock. It is dedicated to Lord Vishnu’s two incarnations. The Mahishasuramardini Mandapa contains the idol of the Deity Durga in bas-relief, destroying a buffalo-headed evil spirit. The Mandapa of Vishnu Sayana depicts Lord Vishnu resting under Adishesha’s (the seven-headed serpent). The Panch Pandava-mandapa, which is incomplete, features a more sophisticated portico. All its pillars are embellished with rearing lions leaping from the center, and the place of worship is bounded by only a passageway that facilitates circumvolutions.

Shore Temple : Close to the sea shore, it was designed to catch the first rays of the rising sun and to illuminate the waters after dark; the temple ended up with an unusual lay-out. As the main shrine faces the sea on the east, the gateway, the fore count and the assembly hall of the Shore Temple all lie behind the sanctum. The temple has shrine both to Shiva and Vishnu. Interconnected cisterns around the temple meant that the sea could be let in to transform the temple into a water shrine. But, in recent times, a stone wall as been added to protect the shrine from the rising seas and further erosion.

Sthalasayana Perumal Temple : The temple is dedicated to Lord Vishnu. It position as the very first structure near to the ocean shore confirms the legend that it was built to save valuable sculptures from corrosion by blocking the sea waves. Flaunting beautiful architecture, the shrines in temples are dedicated to Lord Sthalasayana Perumal, Lord Nilamangai Thayaarand and Lord Narasimha.

Monolithic Temples : There are about 9 monolithic temples locally called as Rathas. The 5 rathas, the best of all the temples are hewn out of a huge boulder. Temples of different plan and elevation have been carved and the left over portions were intelligently used to carve animals in a natural way. These rathas are named after the Pandav brothers and Draupadi.

Arjun’s Penance : Is a massive open-air bas-relief monolith, which dates back to the 7th century. About 96 ft in length, it is also known as Descent of the Ganga. Arjun’s Penance is known by two names. As per one view, the massive rock sculpture has been named from Mahabharata when Arjun, one of the Pandavas, performed rigorous austerities to get Shiva's weapon and destroy his enemies. The second view is that Arjun’s Penance is a depiction of the incident when King Bhagiratha did penance to bring the River Ganges down, from heaven to earth, so as to purify the souls of his ancestors.