Checked out of our little palace at the Mayfair Lagoon and loaded up the bus. Drove to see the famous Sun Temple at Konark, 75km from Bhubaneswar. The route took us through interesting scenery. There are still rice fields and occasional ponds with water hyacinth and lotus. But as we approach the coast both the flora and houses became more tropical. We started to see many palm, coconut and banana trees. Houses have thatched roofs and are wicker sided.
Konark temple was built around 1250 AD and is a dedicated to the Sun King. When it was originally built it lay near the shore of the Bay of Bengal but today the coast is quite a distance away. The temple is designed to look like a giant chariot carrying the Sun King. At the bottom are 12 gigantic wheels each intricately carved. The entire temple is decorated with carvings of beautiful women, amorous couples and panoply of gods and goddesses. Our guide told us that during the heyday of the temple unmarried young women were chosen to dance each night for the gods. What a sight that must have been.
The sun king must quite happy with his temple because during our visit between 12-2pm we were absolutely roasted. After this visit we continued on to our new destination, Puri, a coastal town where we will spend the next few nights.
