Ma - mall - la - puram

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Woke up normal time, ate then threw up breakfast...not sure why I bothered. I took at bus to Mamallpuram from the central bus station it was 2 hours journey... The road down the west coast was very odd. The whole area was still recovering from the Tsunami, so there were only new buildings everywhere and lots of open fields with no trees just grass.

I checked into the first hotel/Guest house I saw ( Tina's ) which wan run by a man called Xavier, he looked/dressed like a huge fat Buddha. He really didn't care about me staying, having no customer service, except saying “show me the money”. It was 150 rs per night which was ok but I had to ask for clean sheets as the one on my bed had not been cleaned in a long long while.

After I had dumped my bags in the room I went exploring round the city. The beach was lovely with a temple on a small peninsular. I walked into the village which has about 20 different temples/carvings/ruins. The whole time i was hassled by people trying to sell me things or people trying to take my picture. I got really annoyed by it after the 20th person I put my scarf over my head and kept my head down and totally ignored anyone who talked to me.

In the evening, I had dinner at the restaurant on the beach, it was very expensive, but I did have a beer and dinner and a chocolate pancake. I met a really nice swiss girl called Kyra, who persuaded me to stay another night.

Slept ok despite illness and being bitten on the bum a few times.


Spent the next day doing more sightseeing and shopping (for lovely anklets they wear here)

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