We left the hotel by about 5:15 a.m. to visit Sun Temple at Konark and return to Bhubhaneshwar. Konark is about 60 kms. from Bhubhaneshwar and the route is via Peepli. The road, although, partly NH and partly SH is good. We reached Konark temple around 6:45 a.m. and took a guide.
Konark temple (also known as Black Pagoda) was built in 13th century by King Narasimhadev. It was built on the sea shore. However, now the sea is about 3 kms. away. The Sun temple is built in the shape of a chariot. There are seven horses and 24 wheels to move the chariot. This denotes 7 days in a week and 24 hours in a day. The 12 pairs of wheels represent 12 months. The wheels have 8 spokes and subdivisions. The alignment of Sun temple is on East – West direction. The sun rays fall on the wheel and the time can be calculated by the angle at which the rays fall. Each division represents 15 minutes. The entrance is guarded by two lions who are crushing elephants. Each elephant in turns lies on top of human body. Lion denotes power, elephant denotes money. When the power and money comes, the good qualities of the man suffer.
The main sanctum which housed the diety has fallen off. There was a big magnet at the top of the tower. It was disturbing the ships passing by, so the Britishers had removed the magnet.
There was deity of Sun in the temple, but the temple was attacked in 15th century by Muslim Yavana army. The priest smuggled the statue of Sun god to Puri temple, but the temple was badly damaged. Nature took over the destruction from there. Over the centuries, the sea receded, sand engulfed the building and salty breezes eroded the stone. It remained buried under a huge mound of sand until the early 20th century, when restoration began under the British.
We returned to Bhubhaneshwar by about 9:30 a.m. and got the tyres repaired. We took breakfast and left hotel by about 10:30 a.m. for Vishakhapatnam. We had got Aaloo paranthas packed for the journey. The NH 5 is very good. We could reach Vishakhapatnam by about 6:30 p.m. but it took long time to search suitable hotel. We could settle in the hotel Sai National by about 8:30 pm. This hotel was just one month old. The rooms were good. They arranged food from outside as they do not have Restaurant.
We decided to leave by about 5:30 a.m. so that we could reach Chennai (a distance of about 850 kms.) by evening.
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