Mahabalipuram

Tamil Nadu here we come!

After our house boat trip we drove back to Kochi and then flew into Chennai (Madras). The next day we drove down to Mahabalipuram (Mamallapuram) which is the city where the main character of one of my books is from. There are a ton of old sculptures and shrines there (which would have also been there 1000 years ago when my book takes place!)

This is Krishna’s butterball, a cool rock formation that might make an appearance in my story (notice all the goats resting in the shade! it was really really hot that day):

Here is an incredible rock cut mural called Arjuna’s penance:

And the Shore Temple which was incredible to see in person after having read and written about it:

After seeing all of this, we went to a museum called Dakshina Chitra where they had replicas of different types of homes from all over India. Here is a merchant’s home from Chettinad:

In this house they had an exhibit of some of traditional games, including Mancala (called Pallankuri (sp?) in Tamil). My mom says she used to play this a lot when she was a kid.

Here is a hut made out of cow dung!:

And here is a really cool lizard we saw that day. Look at that tail!:

#indiatrip #photos