Thiruchendur

It is one of the six sacred abodes of Lord Murugan.                                       

The other five being  Thiruthani, Swamimalai, Palani, Pazhamudircholai, Thirupparankunram. 

While five of them are on hill tops, 

Thiruchendur is the only one that is located on a sea shore.

It is 60 km south-east of Tirunelveli, 40 km from Tuticorin and 75 km north-east of Kanyakumari. The temple complex is on the shores of Bay of Bengal.  

Tiruchendur Murugan Temple is an ancient Hindu temple, built more that 2000years ago, and is dedicated to Lord Murugan (Karthik, the second son of Lord Shiva)

We woke up early morning to watch the sunrise on the sea shore behind this temple.

But the sun played truant and hid behind the clouds.

So, no glorious sunrise photo ops. 

But we got to watch the early morning activity around the temple and got to capture some very interesting sights that we would have otherwise missed if we had concentrated only on the beach and the sunrise!

At 6.30AM and the entire area outside the south entrance of the temple was abuzz with activity- Devotees, Vendors and some tourists as well.

The Two ‘Vahanas’ – the Peacock for Murugan and the Crow for Shaneeshwaran! And they both keep their vigil atop the tall gopuram early morning

Shaktivel wakes up at 4.30 each morning and milks his 2 cows – Vani and Lakshmi.  Boils milk, has bath, loads up his cycle and pedals 5 kms from his village to sell hot piping coffee here. He also has Bournvita, Horlick, Tea and Badam milk!

Arumugan specialises only in ‘Shukku Malli Kapi'

A hot dark liquid that is freshly brewed by boiling Dry ginger, Coriander seeds and jaggery and kept scalding hot with a coal fired stove tied to the bottom of the tea kettle.

And your nose lifts up to some wonderful aroma of masala vadai, samosas and Bajjis.

The beach is teaming with devotees who go for the mandatory bath before entering the temple and the youngsters who are happy skipping the waves.

When the Tsunami hit the eastern shores in 2004, the sea here actually receded by a kilometre!! 

So, there was zero casualty and no material loss either!

Every temple in India has a footwear safekeeping place and Selvam has been holding on to this job for a year now.

A resident elephant is a MUST in all famous temples in south. Blessings by elephant, having young kids sit on top and photo ops are an integral 

part of the temple darshan.

Devotees.

These guys are IT techies!

They believe in machine language and miracles!!

Going on a pilgrimage and going Green!!

And the usual prasadam stall – Vibhooti and Panchamritam!!

Panchamrit = bananas+dates+crystal(mishri)sugar + jaggery+ curd+ghee+milk.  One of the oldest jam recipe ever known to mankind!

The holy (brown) cow of-course – fattened by devotees feeding it with ripe bananas.

Kashi Kayaru or Kalava –black, red, maroon, yellow –to ward off evil and neutralised those evil eyes!

And combined with holy Kumkum - you are well insulated from all the negative vibes in this world, my friend!

Such a wonderful place with pristine beauty.

Simple hardworking folks with so much devotion.

A huge temple where you can sit and meditate peacefully (off seasons only)

Overall a great outing for a couple of days away from Bangalore!

Krish..