The end of India!
There’s something so evocative about standing at the end of a huge land mass. I have to say that this was the main motivation for including Kanyakamuri in our itinerary and, arriving there, we did feel a sense of accomplishment even though the place itself was rather desolate.
In a ‘flashpacking’ move, we had blown our budget and booked a room with a sea view so that we could watch the sunrise without actually getting up before dawn! On account of the high price, we had limited our stay to just the one night, so we had to make the most of our time.
We didn’t arrive in Kanyakamuri until mid-afternoon, so had to rush to catch the ferry to the off-shore islands before it stopped running at 4pm. We bought ‘to and fro’ tickets for the bargain price of 34 rupees each and joined the queue for the boat. Before boarding the ferry, we all had to grab a life jacket from a huge wire basket, the idea being that once all 180 of them had gone, the ferry was full. We were the only passengers who didn’t immediately put the jackets on – it was rather cosy with everyone suddenly being double their normal size!
Our destination was Vivekananda Rock and our journey time was less than five minutes. The rock is where the famous Hindu apostle, Swami Vivekananda, meditated from 25 to 27 December 1892 and where he received instructions to take his moral message overseas. A memorial to him was built on the rock in 1970. It was interesting, not least because of the large tableau showing the times and direction of the sunrise and sunset at different times of the year. It’s probably rather mean of me to admit that I was very entertained by people getting their bare feet burned when they strayed off the white painted paths. There were lots of signs imploring visitors to remain on the white areas, but, inevitably, many ignored the instructions. The resulting hopping about and screaming amused me somewhat!
After visiting Vivekananda, our ticket allowed us a stop at another rock to see the Thiruvalluvar Statue, but, foolishly, we had made the trip without taking any water with us and were parched, so we decided to go straight back to the mainland. We contented ourselves with photographing the statue of the ancient Tamil poet, Thiruvalluvar, from the boat. The 133-foot high monument was erected in 2000. It was created by 5000 sculptors and honours the poet’s 133-chapter work, Thirukural.
Back on land, we walked around to the southernmost tip of Kanyakamuri and so of the entire sub-continent. We stayed a while to watch those who chose to swim off the rocks. For some, it appeared to be a religious or spiritual ritual involving total immersion in the water.
The area around the tip was less than edifying. There were lots of stalls selling cheap plastic toys and huge piles of foul-smelling rubbish everywhere.
We continued our walk, intending to visit the Gandhi Memorial where the Mahatma’s ashes were stored before they were thrown in the sea. We were expecting to see a statue of the great man and walked past the actual memorial, a non-descript cream building, without realising what it was! We walked on for a while, wondering whether we wanted to go as far as the advertised ‘sunset point’. In the end, we decided against it because:
- we were too early and there was no bar or restaurant to sit in and wait,
- it was a bit cloudy and probably wouldn’t be a good sunset anyway,
- we were hungry,
- we’d seen some lovely sunsets already,
- we’d see more sunsets as we moved up the coast.
So, we left the sorry-looking stretch of prom and returned to our hotel for a beer! After darkness fell, we were treated to the sight of a full moon and an amazing lightning show behind some cloud on the horizon.
The next morning, we were woken at 5am by Kanyakamuri’s version of the dawn chorus – a two-hour cacophony of singing and instrumental music coming from the church just in front of the hotel. Wide awake, we were able to watch the crowds gathering to see the sunrise. It turned out not to be that good as there were clouds on the horizon. At least we didn’t have to leave our hotel room to see it!
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