Our recent trip through Southern India took us to Gingee Fort, an impressive complex distributed over three hills in the Villapuram district of Tamil Nadu. The photo below shows one part of it. The lush rice paddies are a defining feature of the area.
There are steps leading all the way up the hill.
As we climbed them, we could see an interesting-looking temple compound not far away and decided to put that on our agenda for later in the day.
It was not altogether obvious how we could get to the temple, but Renju, our fabulous driver, eventually found the track that led there. Once we reached the temple's 7-storied outer 'gopuram' - the entrance gate - he recognised it as the location of a dance scene in one of his favourite movies.
The temple dates from the middle of the 16th century. A lot of it is now in ruins, but there is enough left to give the visitor an impression of its erstwhile splendour.
Several of the temple's (monolithic) pillars were apparently moved to Puducherry in the 18th century, after the area had become a French colony.
Around a century later a number of large stone sculptures were removed to a Jain temple.
The light made shots from some directions very difficult. Below are the results of three of my efforts to capture the gopuram.
Unfortunately, the best one is probably from the side where the scaffolding was.
The fort itself also has a number of former places of worship within its walls. The photo below shows the ruins of one of them - I believe it is the Venugopalaswami shrine - which can be found in the lower grounds.
There is an entrance fee for the fort, but no charge for visiting the Venkataramana temple.
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