By road
~170-180 km from Madurai
South India · Tamil Nadu
Rameswaram, Tamil Nadu
An island temple at India's sea edge · ~170-180 km from Madurai
Getting there
By rail
Rameswaram (RMM), its own station in town
By air
Madurai Airport, ~163-179 km
Best time to visit
October to April — sea winds keep it bearable
Don't miss
Ramanathaswamy Temple corridors
Dhanushkodi
Dr. Kalam Memorial
Things to do
The Pamban Bridge crossing
Holy bath ritual
Kite-surfing flats
Where to eat
Sources: wikimedia, Photo: Shubham Gupta · CC BY-SA 3.0
What to pack
Modest temple wear, change of clothes for the 22-well bath ritual
A quieter corner
Dhanushkodi ghost town at dawn, where the road ends in the sea
Before you go
Both a Jyotirlinga and a Char Dham on one island; pilgrims bathe in the sea and then in the temple's 22 wells before darshan (carry a change of clothes).
About Rameswaram
- Island
- Coastal
Where it is
Rameswaram is a temple town on Pamban Island in Tamil Nadu's Ramanathapuram district, between Palk Strait and the Gulf of Mannar, linked to the mainland by road and rail bridges and about 40 km from Sri Lanka's Mannar Island.
History
In the Ramayana, Rama is believed to have worshipped Shiva here and built a bridge across the sea to Lanka, which makes Rameswaram one of Hinduism's holiest places. The Ramanathaswamy Temple took its present form from the 12th century under the Pandyas and was greatly enlarged by the Sethupathi rulers in the 17th century; the Pamban railway bridge opened in 1914, and a cyclone in 1964 destroyed Dhanushkodi at the island's tip.
People
Rameswaram's people speak Tamil, and many families live by fishing in Palk Strait and the Gulf of Mannar or by serving the pilgrims who bathe in the sea and in the temple's sacred wells. The town was the birthplace of A. P. J. Abdul Kalam, President of India from 2002 to 2007.
Known for
- Ramanathaswamy Temple and its corridors
- Holy baths at Agni Theertham and the temple wells
- Dhanushkodi, the ruined town at land's end
- The Pamban Bridge crossing
- The A. P. J. Abdul Kalam memorial
Did you know?
The Ramanathaswamy Temple's pillared corridors are often described as the longest of any Hindu temple in India.
Shrines and sites
- Ramanathaswamy Temple
- Dhanushkodi ghost town and the land's end
- Agni Theertham
- Pamban Bridge
Traditions
- Hindu
We haven't written a guide for this place yet — you can still plan a trip here.