No Madras in Madras!

---

So we're back in India. Chennai/Madras is quite a shock to the system after Sri Lanka...it is the dirtest city we have visited so far...the dust, heat, smells and poverty are all ten fold. It's great to be eating Indian food again though...we found a great veg restaurant for our first lunch. There are hardly any tourists in the city, so you the food is very authentic (but no Madras. Steve was gutted!)

We paid a rickshaw guy to take us round the sights for a couple of hours. We visted the amazing Kapaleeswarar temple, an ancient Shiva temple, the biggest in Chennai, the Santhome Cathedral Church built in 1504, said to house the remains of St. Thomas the Apostle (only two places can boast that they have remains of an apostle, and the other is St Peter's Basilicia) and Fort St George, which was a very odd place to walk round. It houses government offices and a very lax army presence.

So that was Madras...not the best but great to be back in India. We decided to take a short break to Pondicherry before moving off to Bangalore...so that's the next blog....See ya

Lou & Steve xx

---

Photos

The shitehole we stayed in in Madras
...moved on to another shitehole the next night !!

Chennai by sunset II
...makes it look less dirty

Chennai beach...
...imagine the Rolling Stones here ??

Made it on the train..
..note they have mine and Lou's age mixed up

Chennai slums
...from moving tuk tuk

Our transport to Ponicherry..
4 hours in a bone shaker