Journey Starts
4th January 2007, 5:25 PM - Egmore - Train No. 2612 Chennai Kanyakumari Express.. I ran across the long platform to get into my coach. May be I have been travelling from Chennai Central always, Egmore was a new experience for me. The train started moving, rain was intermittent.. Seems my co-passengers discovered that they were a part of a common friend's circle, a reunion sort of... I didn't want to disturb them, so gave my lower berth allocation to them and opted for a peaceful upper berth. Retired to bed with a copy of my new favourite magazine - Men's Health India. Vaithy is supposed to join me at Trichy junction, which will be around 10:40 PM. Train proceeded with a gentle vibration that was complemented by a new playlist in my phone walkman... Life is incomplete without music.
Vaithy, his brother-in-law Narasimhan along with Ramar joined in the Trichy station. Previously in the train, I have SMSed Vaithy to get Masala Dosai for me and he did it. After exchanging pleasantries, they got into their compartment and I returned to mine. We are expected to reach Thirunelveli by 4:40 AM. Surprisingly the train was at the scheduled time in all stages.
In a sharp contrast to raining Northern Tamilnadu, it was warm in Thirunelveli. Vaithy suggested taking a room near the junction and sleep for a while. Reluctantly I gave in because I wanted to stay at Kutralam tonight. But he turned to be wise in choosing Thirunelveli as a stop-over destination. There is a Hotel Vasantham nearer to it and we got two rooms for four of us. Slept well till 9:30 AM and were getting ready to start to Kutralam. The Thirunelveli Bus Station is right opposite to the Hotel Vasantham. So we carried just a set of dress for changing after bathing in the falls. We had our breakfast in the restaurant of Vasantham itself.
Kutralam
Day -1: Thirunelveli - Thenkasi - Kutralam - 5th January 2008{mosimage}
Thenkasi is at 60 Kms from Thirunelveli and it normally takes 1 1/2 hrs to reach there by Tamilnadu's driving speed standards. After much debate of hiring a taxi, we (I and Narasimhan) managed to convince Vaithy to opt for a State Transport Bus. My arguement is 'If you want to explore a region, do it mingling with local crowd. Public transportation is THE best for that where you can meet lot of new people.' We waited for Thenkasi bus patiently in Thiruunelveli Bus Station. I noticed the names of the places that were around the city. They had beautiful, complex Tamil names (Paavur Chaththiram, Vazhvilangudi, Mukkoodal, Samadhanapuram, Alangulam etc..) and it was nice to see such things after being from 'Anglised' North Tamil Nadu.
{mosimage}We boarded a Thenkasi bus finally at 10:30 A.M. It took lot of time to get out from the city. The milieu was something different from other parts of Tamil Nadu. I had a wrong preconceived notion that Thirunelveli falls in the dry belt, but today I was surprised to see the lushing greeneries right through out. We reached Thenkasi by 12:00 - 12:15 noon. While getting down from the bus, the view of green paddy lands, 'fenced' by the coconut fields located under the foot of a hill, clouds passing close over the hill top made me excited. During the bus travel one man suggested that we should have chosen 'Papanasam' instead of 'Kutralam'. From there our 'destination' - Kutralam is just 5 Km away. We hired an auto rickshaw for Rs. 50/-
Kutralam is a small village whose major revenue is from tourism. The auto driver dropped us near the entrance arch of 'Peraruvi - Main Falls' and offered to wait for an hour or so... We were not sure how long will it take to return, so we cut his service off. It takes a km from the entrance to reach the Peraruvi. There is a Kutralanadhar temple at the foot of the falls. There are many people making their life out of 'Oil Maalish' nearer to the falls. We changed to simple towels and deposited our things in a locker shop.
{mosimage}The much hyped Kutralam falls had less of water due to our off-season trip. Also there were a huge rush of Lord Ayyappa's devotees as Kutralam falls in the way to Sabarimala. That put me off. I have no grudges against Lord Ayyappa but during the Sabarimala season the devotees move like an exodus to temples, they litter the place with faeces, pollute the surrondings by washing and throw off the garbages like food packets everywhere. In fact I stop going out to Thirmurthy hills and Pollachi during the Nov - Feb months because of these people. Kutralam's state was no exception. That day while we bathed there were more body-body contacts than body-water contacts.
We had a bath in the falls for 25-30 minutes and I along with Ram went to the Kutralanathar Temple at 2:15 PM. It was closed for the afternoons and scheduled to reopen by 4:30 PM. Since I had a feeling that I'll return to this place again, I had no upsets. We prayed in front of the closed door and started returning. We just wanted to explore how the village is. Wherever we stand in that Panchayat, we can see the waterfalls and coconut trees. We decided to give 'Aintharuvi' a skip because of the influx of Ayyappa devotees as well as less water. Thanks that we didn't chose to stay at Kutralam. Else it wold have been boring.
We had our lunch in a place called 'Hotel Meenakshi' near the bus stop in Kutralam. Fuck... the food was so bad that it started upsetting our stomachs even before reaching Thirnelveli. While going there next time, please stay out of it.
Nellaiyappar Koil
What to do next? Our train tickets were for the next day. Vaithy out of sudden impulse suggested travelling to Kanyakumari. But it was dropped for various reasons. I suggested that we go back to Thirunelveli, visit the 'Nellaiyappar Temple' from which the city derived its name 'Nellai' and explore the city. We returned to Thirunelveli by 6:15 PM. During the return the same person who was with us during to journey also joined at Kallidaikurichi. He emphasised that we go to Papanasam sometime. So our plan for the rest of time spent in Thirunelveli was set - visit Nellaiyappar Temple in the evening and Papanasam the next day.
We lazed around for 30 - 40 minutes, had dosages and dosages of Vaithy's staple diet - Coffee and started at 7:00 PM to Nellaiyappar temple. It took 20 minutes & Rs. 40 for an autorickshaw travel. The very famous 'Iruttu Kadai Halwa' shop was just opposite to the temple. This very famous shop opens at 5:00 PM and closes by 7:30 PM. We all secured our shares of 'Halwa' before going inside the temple.
{mosimage}To be really frank I don't know even an iota of details about the Nellaiyappar temple. The wood carved entrance itself was enough to entrall us. We went inside the temple. The presence of 'musical pillars' was a surprise to me. I had seen such structures in Madurai only. The beauty is that out of a single rock, one pillar is made with so many 'individual' small pillars yet all jointed in a common base. The 'individual small structures differ in geometry (cylindrical/hexagonal/octagonal/sqare base) and in thickness. These structures give different sounds in knocked in our knuckles.
Due to large movement of tourist population, the temple is sort of commercialised. We were approached by a 'priest' to offer 'archanai' on behalf of us. We just followed him, he took us to the main shrine, showed the 'deeparadhanai' and in turn we offered some 'datchanai' to him. The main shrine was beautiful and an example for Shiva-Vishnu unity. Both the Nellaiyappar (Shiva) and Nellai Govindar (Vishnu) were together. Vishnu lying down in Adhiseshan's bed was life like. Something we went again and again to see before getting into the temple.
{mosimage}The temple had a long history dating back to many centuries. Since I had an intrest in carving, the sculptures & statues appealed me a lot. They were so detailing about the dressing style of those centuries. When going to a old temple next time, instead of passing through a statue in the temple pillars, watch for a minute, you'll fall in love with ancient Tamil Nadu. We also visited the 'Gandhimathi Amman' shrine. Infact we had to rush through because the temple was about to shut down at 9:30. We regretted very much for not coming here early.
We took an auto and went to Hotel Saravana Bhavaa (Incidentally this is the hotel we had our lunch during our college Port visit to Tutucorin in year 2000). The dinner was again pathetic. Our orders - Chola Batoora and Onion Dosa were soooooo oily and poor in taste. We returned to our hotel room and had to check out at 5:00 AM next day.
Papanasam
Day 2 - Thirunelveli - Papanasam - 6th January 2008.
{mosimage}We checked out our rooms, started early by 5:45 AM and waited for the Papanasam bus. Papanasam lies at 45 kms from Thirunelveli. Picturesque locales of Ambasamudhiram and other areas lie in this route only. That day was bit clowdy and chill. We were expecting some rain then. (un)Fortunately nothing of that sort happened. The weather was sizzling and so chilling that Vaithy wore my Jerkins. We atlast boarded a bus by 6:15 AM to Papanasam directly. While others had a nap, I enjoyed watching the lush greens as if I am not going to return there anymore. By the time bus entered the Papanasam village panchayat, we were not sure where to get down. The to journey was so tortuous that it took 2 hours to cover 45 kms. One old lady told that she will let us know where to get down.
The bus passes through the Papanasam Sivan temple and then climbs the hill having a breath taking stunning view. The forest falls under the 'Mundanthurai Tiger Sanctuary' forest area. So the commercialisation and deforestation were avoided to certain extent. The bus shedded us in a point where there was no sign of being a bus stop. From there the hill station looked like a closed circle. There was a Power station ahead of us. We could see the Thamirabharani river gushing in a full swing. The old lady who accompanied us in the bus vanished suddenly.
{mosimage}We walked in a narrow single lane path down the hill for more than a kilometre. It took us to a small hamlet sort of place where there were 2-3 shops, a Lord Murugan temple. From there we walked towards the Agasthiyar falls. It is a small yet beautiful waterfalls. We had a blast there. See the video clip to realise how much we enjoyed. The old lady who came with is in the bus was selling peanuts and mangoes there. She said that we came for pleasure whereas she came for her livelihood. Thats why she moved quickly leaving us. I was touched by her forthrightness, so bought something for sake of her.
The video shot by my me in Sony Ericsson mobile phone just gives a glimpse about the lush vegetation of the area. {moismage}After enjoying the tryst with the waterfalls for an hour, we started to Papanasam Sivan Temple by 10:30 AM. While we were returning a horde of Ayyappa devotees crossed us opposite. Thank God... we were in the right time avoiding a 'mass body bashing bath' and I believe sadly that the place would have turned a public lavatory. We came to the Papanasam temple, had our heartfelt prayers... I noticed a style in down south temples. The main shrine is so wide and is almost like a miniature temple when compared to the temples of other parts. They also had a lesser height ceiling in the main shrine premise.
We came out, offered 'pori (puffed rice) to the fishes in rememberence of our forefathers and had to settle down a worst hotel for our breakfast. Please carry your food or snacks while travelling to Thirunelveli. For both the days we had a tough time in having our food.
Return
We reached Thirunelveli by 12:30 noon, had curd rice and Sprite for lunch. Our train (Nagercoil - Chennai Sunday Special) was scheduled for 3:00 PM at Thirunelveli junction. Since the tickets were booked at different times we had different coach allotments. Mine was at S7, Narasimhan and Ramar got S8 and Vaithy in S10. Since sleeper class coaches are interconnected, we had a good time in juggling between our allotted seats. Also the train stopped in many stations for long leaving the rails clear for regular trains, so we had more time to catchup and chat.
Vaithy, Narasimhan and Ramar got down at Trichy by 9:30 PM and I reached Mambalam station by 5:00 AM next day. On the whole the trip was enjoyable as the trip had so many surprise elements. Thanks that I didn't have the time to 'research' about the tourist destinations, else that suspense element would have been missing. We seriously thought that the trip was a disaster when we were disappointed at Kutralam. We never expected the Nellaiyappar temple to be so compelling, Agasthiyar falls and Papanasam temple be so enthralling... 'A beautiful journey well started and ended'
