Kanyakumari, the southernmost tip of India, is a small town with a big personality. Three seas meet here: the west-facing Arabian Sea, the Bay of Bengal, which touches Thailand to the east. And, due south, with nothing between land and Antarctica, the Indian Ocean.
It is the place in India to watch sunrise and sunset. Both occur on the same stretch of water: if you sit on the very tip of India itself - marked by a small scrubby beach packed with shrieking bathers - and incline your head slightly to the left, the sun rises. A tilt to the right, and the sun sets. And, on full moon days, you can see the sun setting and moon rising at exactly the same time.
A few steps behind the beach is a 3,000 year-old temple, dedicated to the virgin Goddess Devi Kanyakumari. The town and its surroundings are believed to be part of the land created by the God Vishnu, hugely important to Hindus.
Unsurprisingly, the town has received several important visitors. One Swami Vivekananda sat on a rock 200 yards out to sea to meditate for three days in 1892, before embarking on an evangelical crusade to America. Today, the rock has a couple of temples dedicated to him, beseiged by exciteable Indian tourists. A rusty ferry took me and around 200 of them the six minute journey across, after a jolly one-hour queue. Although the sky was clear, the sea was choppy and the boat heaved up and down violently, to cheers, wolf-whistles and people falling about. Notices saying no standing and imploring life-jackets to be worn were ignored. The latter lay strewn across the floor. It was high spirits all round.
Gandhi visited Kanyakumari three times: in 1925, 1937 and then in an urn, his ashes carried by train from Delhi and scattered out to sea in February 1949. He wrote: 'I am writing this at the Cape, in front of the sea, where three waters meet and furnish a sight unequalled in the world. For this is no port of call for vessels. Like the Goddess, the waters around are virgin.'
Standing on the rocky island, looking out to sea as the sun danced on the waves, I thought of the expanse of ocean before me, and the immense country behind me. And despite the heat, I shivered.
It is the place in India to watch sunrise and sunset. Both occur on the same stretch of water: if you sit on the very tip of India itself - marked by a small scrubby beach packed with shrieking bathers - and incline your head slightly to the left, the sun rises. A tilt to the right, and the sun sets. And, on full moon days, you can see the sun setting and moon rising at exactly the same time.
A few steps behind the beach is a 3,000 year-old temple, dedicated to the virgin Goddess Devi Kanyakumari. The town and its surroundings are believed to be part of the land created by the God Vishnu, hugely important to Hindus.
Unsurprisingly, the town has received several important visitors. One Swami Vivekananda sat on a rock 200 yards out to sea to meditate for three days in 1892, before embarking on an evangelical crusade to America. Today, the rock has a couple of temples dedicated to him, beseiged by exciteable Indian tourists. A rusty ferry took me and around 200 of them the six minute journey across, after a jolly one-hour queue. Although the sky was clear, the sea was choppy and the boat heaved up and down violently, to cheers, wolf-whistles and people falling about. Notices saying no standing and imploring life-jackets to be worn were ignored. The latter lay strewn across the floor. It was high spirits all round.
Gandhi visited Kanyakumari three times: in 1925, 1937 and then in an urn, his ashes carried by train from Delhi and scattered out to sea in February 1949. He wrote: 'I am writing this at the Cape, in front of the sea, where three waters meet and furnish a sight unequalled in the world. For this is no port of call for vessels. Like the Goddess, the waters around are virgin.'
Standing on the rocky island, looking out to sea as the sun danced on the waves, I thought of the expanse of ocean before me, and the immense country behind me. And despite the heat, I shivered.
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