Trivandrum Feb 09

I know, I know, these are not pictures of Alex and Rory... I hope you enjoy these regardless! Tues morning I went off to see the Shri Padmanabhaswamy temple and Puttam Malika palace before going into work. The palace didn't open until 830 and I was worried about being late, so I did not get to go to the palace museum- I'll try to go there tomorrow afternoon perhaps, or maybe wait until May. Anyway, there were busloads of people at the temple, the temple was really striking- Dravidian style architecture of the neighboring Tamil Nadu. The palace is built in classic Keralan style architecture. (BTW- the info I have is mostly from The Rough Guide and Footprints)

Temple- seven tiered, high-walled, non-hindu are not permitted within

I believe this is a puttan malika or horse palace that supports the eaves

Palace in Keralan style

Weds, I was done on the early side, so I went off exploring a little more, palace, museum, zoo, market and ahhhh.... bookstore. Picked up a couple of books and am currently enjoying The Ramayana.

The Napier Art Museum was an interesting structure- built in the experimental "Indo-Sacacenic" style. Photography was not permitted inside- it was such an interestingly bizarre and oddly beautiful building. The artifacts within were interesting though there is almost no information provided.

The zoo was a restful area- though somewhat distressing because it was so poorly maintained. The walk was nice enough, there was quite a variety of animals and overall, a pleasant afternoon.

Bird enclosure area- not unlike the one at the National Zoo in theory- just poorly maintained

There were an amazing number of bats in the trees overhead by the rhino enclosure. Lots of activity and they kept flying around, making these sounds and then flying back to where they came from. No idea what they were doing, tried to get a video with sound- we'll see how that turned out.

Hippos

Rhino!

Reptile House- really really hot inside

Kannaka Kanna Palace