Rameshwaram - Our first spiritual trip

We all have heard stories about Rameswaram. It is a holy place for Hindus that has mythological connections with Lord Rama. The history tells that the name "Rameswaram"  itself came after Lord Rama installed Sivalingam(Eswaran). Puranas tells that from here only Lord Rama built a bridge Ram Setu across the sea to go SriLanka to rescue his wife Sita who was aducted by Ravana, the king of Lanka. Also Puranas states, since Rama had Brahmaharthi thosam after killing Ravana who was a brahmin, Sages advised Rama to worship Siva to expiate the sin.

Hindus believes that pilgrimage to Kasi is incomplete without pilgrimage to Rameswaram. They bring the holy water(Ganga) from Kasi and do abhisekam for the Lingam at Ramanathaswamy temple and finish their pilgrimage tour.
                                                                                                                                                      

This temple is situated near the sea side. It is widely known for its beautiful praharas with nicely sculptured pillars. It was built by different rulers in different periods from 12th century. There are 22 wells(theerthams) inside temple. Bathing in these wells is considered to be of great significance as it posses medical value. Our trip story:  Before we head towards Rameshwaram we were told that we should see the early morning "Mani Dharshan" in the Ramanathaswamy temple. First they do pooja for a shivalingam, made out of Crystal. It's a very small lingam. This pooja happens every day in the early morning @ 5:30 AM.  The procedure is like first we should see the Mani Dharsan(spadigalinga poojai) and then we have to take bath in the Agni theertham (which is about 150mtrs from the east entrance) and then should take bath in the 22 theerthams around the temple. After wards we have to go for the main sivalingam dharsan.

Agni Theetham

After the Manidharsan we went to Agni theertham, the sea is very calm without waves and it is ideal to have bath. People also do the spiritual rights for their ancestors in the seashore. Then we went inside the temple and had bath in all the 22 theertham. (To take bath in the well you should buy a entrance ticket, costs not more than 25/-  but you have to wait in the queue or else if you around 4 or 5 people going give 50/- per head to a person who stand in the east entrance with bucket they will take you seperately and you coudl finish the bath quickly.) The last one is the 'koodi' theertham (holy Ganga water).

 

You cannot get inside the temple with the wet clothes so once we had bath we came back to our room as we stayed at a hotel which is very close to west entrance. And then we went to the temple to see main linga dharsan. We had our breakfast in a roadside shop near the west entrance. Initially we were scared to eat but the taste was good so we had full stomach. And then we started our journey(hired a jeep) to Dhanusukodi which is about 18kms away from Rameshwaram.

Bay of Bengal no waves

Indian Ocean with waves

vehicles that takes tourist to land's end
Dhanuskodi 

 

     There is no bus service or train service to Dhansukodi because the roads and the railways tracks were swept away after 1964 cyclone. Only option is to go by truck or 4W drive vehicles(like jeep,..) can get inside Dhanuskodi as the beach side roads are mud & also slippery. On our way we were able to see the damaged railway station, post office, church & railway track. After 30mins drive we reached the lands end point Dhanuskodi. It is the point where Indian Ocean and Bay of Bengal joins. You can see that. It's really amazing. Bay of Bengal is very calm without waves in the other side Indian ocean with waves. That's the real beauty we really enjoyed our time.we were advised not to take bath in that area as it was rough sea. We spent about 30mins and then we started our way back to Rameshwaram.