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Published: October 13th 2007
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I traveled to the end of the earth or at least the end of the Indian subcontinent to stand on the southernmost point of India where the Indian Ocean, the Arabian Sea, and the Bay of Bengal meet! I flew from Mumbai to Thiruvananthapuram (formerly Trivandrum) and from there it was a three hour drive. My flight was late from Mumbai so I barely made it in time for sunset. We watched from Chaitra Purnima and, although it was fairly cloudy and the sunset wasn't the best, but it was still nice to see. My driver and I walked around a bit and saw the Kumari Amman Temple built in the 8th century by Pandya kings, the Vivekananda Memorial where the great Indian philosopher Swami Vivekananda meditated before attending the World Religious Conference in Chicago in 1893, and the 40 meter statue of Tiruvalluvar, the 1st century BCE Tamil poet who wrote the epic "Tirukural". It's a popular area and there were lots of people and the usual hawkers and stalls selling all sorts of food and "beach stuff". There is a nice memorial to the 2004 tsunami victims down by temple.
After dark, I headed to my hotel which
wasn't far from the main area of town. It looked fairly desserted and it was - I was the only guest! There were several staff members around so I was able to get something to eat before turning in early. I planned to get up at 5:15am to watch the sunrise. My driver thought that leaving at 5:30am was too early and that we could leave at 6:00am, but I came too far to take a chance at missing it. He finally agreed to meet me at 5:30am, although he wasn't happy about it.
I got up at 5:15 and was ready to go at 5:25am. My driver was nowhere to be seen, although the car was in the parking lot. I waited for 10 minutes and then decided just to walk. I could already see some pink in the sky and it seemed a relatively short distance. It took me about 20 minutes and there was quite a crowd when I arrived. There was lots of color, but the sun wasn't quite up. I walked around and then sat to watch the show. It was still a bit cloudy, but impressive nonetheless.
After sunrise, I walked around
a bit more and then went back to the hotel to shower. I wanted to leave for the airport in plenty of time so that I could stop along the way and take some photos. We were in a hurry to get to sunset and there were places I wanted to get a better look at. My driver was waiting when I got back and he apologized for oversleeping. He said he was in the car - the windows were heavily tinted so I didn't see him. The weather was beuatiful so it seemed strange to me that he slept with all the windows up.
We hit the road at 8:00am and it took just over three hours to get back. I stopped several times to take pictures and we went a slightly different route to see more of the villages along the way. I made it to the airport in good time.
I flew back to Delhi and am in Gugaon for one night as flights didn't work out to get to Khajuraho today. I have a 10:40am flight tomorrow and will be there for a day and a half.
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