Exploring Mahabalipuram or Mamallapuram.

 

My travel coffee set up

I am still having trouble with holding the phone steady while I zoom in on the moon, but it is fun to try.

Sunrise

Breakfast.  It was a buffet.  It was nice that people remembered that it was my birthday today.  I also got emails.  That felt good.

George and Paul H - we were starting to gather to go for the tour of the Mahabalipuram Monument.

Carla & Don

Janet and Paul Z

The monument is one of the 32 UNESCO sites in India 

Our guide, Santosh,  was telling us about the monument.  He was very informative. There were seven of these monuments but this is the only one which has survived.

The sunken areas were not even known to exist until after the tsunami in 2004. 

There used to be 108 bulls but now there are only 63.  But both are auspicious numbers (9)

wildlife

flowers

Then we went to a different site to see the 5 Rathas.  It is a monolith, in that all of the carvings are actually from one stone hill.  It took over 39 years to carve. It is to honor the 5 brothers who were all married to the same woman, as told in the Mahabharata.

We made a short stop in an air-conditioned gift shop.

The evil eye facing outside helps to protect what is inside.

Ganesha falls in love with computers

Then we went to see Krishna's butter ball. Our guide told us that Krishna loved to eat butter. One drop of his butter fell down creating this stone.  People have tried to move it unsuccessfully, even the British with 7 elephants.

Then we went to see Arjuna's Penance.

Bas-relief.  It depicts the story of Kiratarjna of the Mahabharata.

Pretty amazing stuff.  I really felt awed by the history, skill, and time it took to create each of the monuments we saw. 

We headed back to IBR.  Some of us were hot and tired.  We had a chance to put our feet up and relax.  Rebecca and gang got here around 1:45 pm for lunch.  It was a buffet.

After lunch George, Rebecca, Marry, Ashish, and Guru headed to the beach. Sultan did not come.  Some of the class headed out to another tour.  George and I did not go.  I hear that it was a fabulous tour.  They went to the Dakshina Chitra Heritage Museum.

Guru, Rebecca, Ashish, Marry

Lounging under a coconut palm tree.

One of the many sculptures around.

As Rebecca was leaving with her gang, we were informed that we should have been paying for their use of the beach.  We had not known about this rule.  Luckily, they will not be coming over again.  I feel like a bad girl, but there were no signs, nothing posted.  So I hope that we won't see that on our bill when we check out tomorrow. 

Around 5:30 pm we headed up to the entrance to the Ideal Beach Resort to call an Uber.  

Clay tennis court

Argh.  Lots of problems.  Finally Don came up on an auto (we used to call them tuk-tuks).  So we snagged his auto and headed off to see Rebecca's room and to say good-bye. 

 It was nice that she came for my birthday.  Rebecca was at the InterContinental Hotel.  It looked like a prison with lots of guards around and cement block construction.  But once we got inside it seemed very nice.  Marry, Ashish and Guru were at the pool.  We watched them play, then we went to Rebecca & Marry's rooms.  As it was getting dark we walked

out to the beach.

Sultan gave me flowers for my birthday.

Flowers outside each room

I was trying to hurry things along as the class was going to go to dinner at 7:30 pm  I had told them that we would be there.  Rebecca was dragging her feet.  Finally George said that Rebecca had a surprise planned for 7 pm.  

WOW!!! What a nice surprise.  Rebecca had done a lot of work to do this.  The hotel restaurant cooks made the cake and 7 pm was the earliest that it could be ready.  It was like a modified a layered Boston cream cake.  It was beautiful and delicious.  They kept some of the cake and we took the rest back to share with the class.  

Marry called an Ola (like an Uber in India).  We got to the IBR only a little late.  Jewell and her nephew, Tim, had arrived.  They sang happy birthday and gave me a card and the restaurant gave a box of treats.  My birthday was a very special day. Thank you one and all. I am very blessed to have such great friends.  You made me feel special. 

From the IBR (full of candies and chocolates 

My dinner of pumpkin soup.  Delcious

Tasted like mango lassi

All in all - it was a wonderful day.

Chennai to IBR

 

Pulling out from Mumbai airport.  We were flying Vistara Airlines. I had never heard of it before. It wa a nearly empty plane.

The Vistara magazine had an article about Kodaikanal and Mahabaleshwar (a different Mahab)

Once we got above the clouds, we got to enjoy the sunrise. 

Masala omlet with a potato cake.

Remember this butter?

The flight was uneventful and we even got to Chennai a little early.  Add another 1 hour and 20 minutes to our actual flight time. Making it 19 hours and 35 minutes flight time.

Chennai airport, women's restroom

We were met by the driver of the Radisson shuttle. Note his sign.

The Radisson was very close. It was also very fancy.

We picked up a few things from the complimentary breakfast buffet to have for our lunch.  They wanted us to load up our plate and then let them carry the plate up for us. They were not happy when we refused.  

The room is also way too complicated for me.  It was a challenge just to figure out how to turn out the lights and close the drapes so we could take a little nap. 

The shower was amazing.  Water comes from everywhere.   But it was a challenge to get the temperature right.  The toilet seat starts warming up when you sit on it and there were about 5 settings.  I did not study the settings.  

Our complimentary lunch.

George managed to take a little nap.  I will just try to go to bed early tonight. We ate our lunch.  Our driver arrived at noon to take us to the Ideal Beach Resort (IBR) in Mahabalipuram.  What a wild ride.  Riding on the "wrong" side of the road, lanes are just a suggestion, and horns are a required form of communication, It was about an 1 1/2 hour drive south of Chennai.  Ros had arranged with Mr Thayalan's company to give us all rides from our various locations to the IBR.  

When we arrived we were right behind Shanta, Vivian, Paul H and Rebecca (all classmates).  Paul Z and Janet (his wife) and Don and Carla (his wife) were already here.  George has met all of them before except for Rebecca.  Rebecca has done most of the planning for our get together.  She has done an amazing job.  We will meet others of the class later.  We checked in but the rooms were not quite ready so we went to lunch. George and  I just had pop. By the time lunch was done, our rooms were ready.  We are in #34.  

We are on the second floor and we have a little balcony.

Lots of crows.

Rebecca (our Rebecca) flew in on the 1st with her daughter, Marry and 3 of Marry's friends (Ashish, Guru & Sultan).  They are staying in a different hotel.  They got here around 5:30 pm.  

Paul Z and Paul H

Rebecca, Don & Vivian

Ashish, Guru, Sultan, Mary and Rebecca

We wandered around mostly on the beach.

Line of fishing boats

The Indian Ocean water is warm like the Atlantic.

Practicing the zoom on my camera.  I need to work on holding the camera steady. 

Nice pool

Sultan, George, Guru, Ashish, Marry, and Rebecca

Irani Tikka Panneer is what I ordered.  But we had a lot of other dishes that we shared.

Fun decoratively cut up onion on top of the Sultan's biryani.  There was a lot of food.

My class ended out sitting at a table close.  I would go over periodically to visit. 

Shanta, Vivian, me, Rebecca, Paul H, Janet, Paul Z, Don, and Carla

Rebecca and her gang got an uber back to their hotel

Now I am ready for bed. A little wine and blogging first

It is an Indian Sangiovese from the Nashek Valley in Maharashtra near Mahabaleshwar.  It is ok.  Smoky and a little on the sweet side but drinkable.