We were in Nagercoil on 13th and 14th of May to attend our dear friend Subbu’s son’s wedding. Since Tirunelveli is just 72 kms away, we had booked the train back to Chennai from there. After a delicious “Kalyana Saapadu” at Brahma Rishi’s wedding, we headed out to Tirunelveli in the evening.
It took us and hour and a half to reach…. beautiful roads and even better scenery. There are windmills all through this route and the greenery is soothing. See some of the pictures that Krishnan clicked on the way.
We made it to Tirunelveli in good time. Once we reached the junction, I tried to trace the way to my grandmother’s place on Sannathi Street. We were about to take a wrong turn at Chandra Vilas, but Krishnan went and checked out my hunch and we turned into the right road.
Once we were on the Varadaraja Perumal road, then it was simple to find Sannathi Street and Paati’s place. We took a few pictures of the house and then headed over to Rajamani Mama’s house on the same street. Spent some time with him and Sridhar Anna’s family. Sreeja then took us to the Varadaraja Perumal Kovil.
I have walked into this temple so many times and it instantly feels like home…. every summer vacation that we spent in Tirunelveli, I would go to the temple everyday. Every stone feels familiar, and particularly, the Anjaneyar Sannathi… this Hanuman is my great grandmother Onnama Paati’s favourite and she would bring him freshly churned butter every single day.
Rajamani Mama’s outstanding alankaram work also started from this temple and this particular Anjaneyar.
From this temple, Sreeja took us to the Then Tirupati Kovil where Anirudhan, her elder brother is the Bhattar (loose translation priest). What a beautiful temple !! Again a 400+ year old temple and Tirupati Balaji gives darshan alongwith Padmavati Thayar. The Panchamukha Anjaneyar here faces south, just like Onnama Paati’s Anjaneyar and that’s very special and rare.
Our short trip to Tirunelveli concluded with the world famous Halwa from Laxmi Vilas. Can never get over the taste of this halwa… it lingers on.
Enjoy this video about this trip of ours. Please do subscribe to my You Tube channel for more such videos and travelogues.
Excellent blog Malu
Thanks Kokka 🙏