During my last India trip, I got a chance to visit the Elephanta caves. Elephanta caves are located on Elephanta island off the coast of Mumbai.
We started out from home around 9:30 and got to Gateway of India around 10:15. The drive down towards Colaba was quite nice and with practically no traffic. I got to see so many interesting buildings, many skyscrapers, business offices, the Haji Ali sandwich place (this place makes some fantastic sandwiches) and of course the dargah itself.
The thing I really enjoy about India is the statues we have in several places in our cities throughout the country. I don't get to see those here in the US. The first one I got to see was Shri Lal Bahadur Shastri statue with the famous 'Jai Jawan Jai Kisan' slogan.
We got a nice parking spot right away, and everyone took their belongings and hats/glasses for the rest of the sunny day. There's a little walk from the parking area to the Gateway of India where the ferryboats depart from. On the way, got to see this restaurant owned by none other than Sachin Tendulkar. 
Near the Gateway of India, got to see two more statues. One of Swami Vivekanand and the other one of Chhatrapati Shivaji.
After getting the tickets for the ferry boat ride at the stall near Gateway of India, we boarded the boat right away around 10:30ish. It wasn't as much crowded for a Sunday morning. 
The ferry boat ride from dock to dock is about 45 mins. The weather was quite wonderful and breezy on that warm day with clear skies so I had fun taking some great photos. 
On the way, got to see some naval stations or something similar in the bay and countless boats and a few cargo ships.
We arrived on the Elephanta island around 11:30. There's a nice little walkway from the docks to the park entrance. 
They also have a cute little train that brings people up to the park entrance, in case the visitors don't want to walk. We decided to walk as there was so much to see around and stop and take photos, of course!
We got to see some beautiful birds, trees growing in the sea water, quite a few fruit stalls, a lot of boats and many other things along with excited visitors.
From the park entrance, there's wide stone stairs that lead up to the caves. The climb isn't very bad but it's easier if you don't have too many things to carry. The stall owners have the stairs covered with plastic canopy so it's cooler during hot weather. As you climb up, you see lots of souvenir stalls and food/drink stalls along with monkeys and other life that go around the island for survival.
Once we finish climbing the stairs, we come to an open area where they have a small museum with quite a lot of good information about the history of the caves and some sculptures.
A little further from the museum, there's a nice gazebo like place where people sit and relax or have a picnic at. 
From here on, the extra-wide stone/concrete walkway begins that leads to the caves. It is beautiful as on one side of the walkway there are the caves and on the other side, there's either hills covered with green trees/plants or just an open view of the island down below or the sea.
The first couple of caves are large and the others are little smaller in size. 
All of them are carved from rocks/stone and have stone-carved sculptures and Shiv-linga in them.
The concrete walkway ends when the caves end; from there on it is a dirt trail that leads up to the tallest hill called the Cannon Hill. 
At some point this used to be home to a real cannon (which is still there) and the other remains of the buildings that probably were used by military back in the days. There's a nice shaded food stall on the way to the top that also sells cold drinks and fruits and other food. It was quite crowded. 
The climbing down was quite easy and fast. At around 4:45 PM we decided to head back to the little train station that takes us to docks. The first train we saw was too crowded so we ended up taking the next one and boarded the 5:30 PM boat back to Mumbai.
Got to see beautiful setting sun while riding back to the mainland.
This is a must visit place if you already haven't been there before. I'd love to go back there again.
For more photos in the series, click here.
Some photos of Mumbai at night.
Urv's Elephanta photos are here.
Good tourist info on this site: http://wikitravel.org/en/Elephanta_Caves
Thursday, July 24, 2008
Elephanta Caves, Mumbai
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7 comments:
Do you and Urv know each other? As I was going through your post, his post kept coming back to me!
Some photos are so similar nai? :D Will check out the photos on Flickr now :)
~solitaire
Yes I know the author of this blog! Her name is Kanan. And she also knows my name. And we both know you too. Your name is Sneha :P
I know the resemblance between the pics is uncanny :)
Sneha, hi! yes :) we do know eachother via blogs. And his post was the one that inspired this one so I can see why you saw the resemblance. Thanks for stopping by.
Urv, ekdam j. :) sure, there's a lot of them on there and I didn't want to bore people with so much on the post so just left them on there. THANKS! :D
I had been to Mumbai just last month. My sister and I had plan to visit Elephanta Caves, but guess what. It was raining too heavily at that time. So, we had to sit at home only. We both were disappointed as we had lost an opportunity to visit Elephanta. And the rain was there till I was in Mumbai. So, we couldn't plan it. But, I am sure we'll visit it when I will be there next time. Thanks for posting details of Elephanta.
Happy Rakshabandhan to you too...
:)
Hi Snehal, hope you get to visit the caves soon with your sister. Thanks for the wishes, same to you! :) Take care.
It reminded me my visit to the place. :)
And I'll check in my photos whether the lady selling those eatables is the same !
And I too know Sneha thru her blog !!
Aah, they say world is small.
Cuckoo
Cuckoo, thank you! :) Yup, I am sure you'll find similarities in the photos and in the people too. Sometimes I wish I can make copies of these and send them over the those folks their photos. Nice to know you also know Sneha. It is a small world indeed. :)
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