Rameswaram, chidambaram, vaitheeswaran koil trip Nov 2017

Three amazing places, I got an opportunity to see two of them by chance  and by god's grace.

Firstly, Rameswaram:
We booked the car who is next to our in-law's house in Gundur, Trichy, it was Mahindra Xylo, nice car with spacious 3rd row.
We started early, 4:30 am so reached very early there, i think around 9:30 am or so, had breakfast there, the food was not great, we saw Pamban bridge, it was overcast conditions for the past few weeks in tamil nadu, though so a bit cloudy.
When we reached the temple, there were so many people, mostly North Indians.
There were agents running around saying they would help with the bathing; ok, there is something to explain here, there are 22 wells, each of these are named after either a famous indian river or a dosham.
eg: ganga theertham, yamuna theertham, chandra, surya, guru hatya dosha nivaran theertham ( name is not exactly the same but similar),  its a belief that you would get rid of the sins after you bath with the water from these wells, the actual fee is 25/- per person and you have to go in a queue passing by each well and the agents there would pull water with a small bucket and pour in your head.
For 1000/- commission(for one group), they will guide you to each well and pour water on each person, for 25/- they will just throw one bucket of water on who ever is there.
Any how we finished, ryan was shivering but he was still ok, we changed our clothes and went for darshan, 50/- shreeghra darsanam wasnot bad, took 25 mins or so; there were agents here as well asking for 1000/- but we declined.
People said you should first bath in sea and then in these wells but the sea water was very dirty so we just sprinkled sea water( kadal neer) on our heads.
We did see APJ abdul kalam memorial from our car.
And we went to Dhanush kodi, its the tip of the ocean, people say we can see ceylon from there, we bought so many gems there, its a nice place, we also vent to a SriRama temple, legends say that the King Vibheeshana from Lanka was coronated here by Lord Rama.

Chidambaram was a great temple, so many giant entrances to the temple, lord natarajan's shrine looks like that of a mosque, this is a unique one, we went in the night but i was mesmerized and awe struck by the temple, i was asking a priest about the secret of the temple and my father-in-law gave a clue that I was from Aus, so the priest said they would send prasadam every month to Aus, I agreed and filled up the form and then he said 3000/- per annum, luckily I had that much in my purse, anyhow I asked him to send prasadam from march to the new house, let's see what happens.
Vaitheeswaran kovil is special, all the statues are made with black stone, there is a shrine for angaraka and we did puja there, this temple is very old and I had a feeling that this one was special, I loved it.

Best hotels in Kancheepuram - trip 2017

Food in kancheepuram is great, its a big town so have a lots of hotels.
Vegetarian
My favourites are:
1)Chakra- breakfast is great here, sambar vada, ravva dosa and filter coffee, great place for south indian breakfast
2) shakty ganapathy- another great place for breakfast, I really liked onion dosa here, 55/- though, looks like the price has gone up due to onion prices. Rava dosa ia not bad.
3) coffee house, we were late to this place on that day, 10 pm, they were almost closing so they had only dosas, i remember the plain dosa was very good here.
Non vegetarian:
1) taahira- biryani used to be the best here but lately I heard that the quality dropped considerably, so haven't gone this time.
2) Balaji military hotel- biryani is nice, my wife gets brain fry whenever we go there, I dont eat so I dont know.
Last time I ordered prawns fry, 280/- per plate, it was good but felt sand inside the fry while chewing, i didnt bother as it was tasty.

That incident in the train secunderabad

Some incidents are so strong that you would remember for ever especially when you regret of inaction:
1) i boarded a train to warangal at secunderabad station, general compartment, a man with bandage on his foot, he was sleeping, people asked him to get up but he didnt, a lady was shouting, i'd asked him but he didnt and the lady asked me to complain to railway police, i told them that I would gey down at kazipet and its ok, i had to stand for 3 hours in that train, i still regret that i didnt protest and I didnt take any action, i regret every time I remember it and I am a changed man now.