My trip to DANUSHKODI( GHOST TOWN) in TN.

We were on a 4 DAYS road trip from CHENNAI- MAHABALIPURAM- PONDICHERRY- VALENKKANI- RAMESHWARAM- DANUSHKODI- RAMNATHAPURAM-MADURAI - CHENNAI in Mar 2020 just before the Covid lockdown was announced  by Indian govt.... The road journey  upto RAMESHWARAM  was awesome and needless to say about our stay at HYATT PLACE HOTEL, RAMESHWARAM ....After our Darshan at RAMESHWARAM Shrine, we planned for a drive upto Danushkodi.... it was during my college days that I visited RAMESHWARAM  and again I was here after 30+ yrs.... The place looked so different now, lot of development  caught my eyes too ....Now 3/4 good hotels have come up besides those Darmashala's that existed from ages for pilgrims visiting the Shrine ( Jyothirling).....

       DANUSHKODI, is an abundant town at the SE of Pamban Island in Tamil Nadu state. The town was destroyed  during the 1964 RAMESHWARAM CYCLONES and remained uninhabited  in its aftermath....The town is believed to be the place where  Lord Rama had ordered Lord Hangman to built a bridge which could carry his army across to Srilanka, were Ravana, the demon king kept Mata Sita  captive, as per the mythological story of Ramayana.Danushkodi , is also known as the last  land of India  and got Bay of Bengal on one side & Indian Ocean on other side.....it got a beautiful  stretch of newly constructed  NH road strip, designed using Galion box technology  of IIT, MADRAS to protect the road stretch from Tidal actions.

       

After we left the town of RAMESHWARAM towards DANUSHKODI, it looked so deserted..only few vehicles were driving that strip.... few kms of the drive on the new Danushkodi road was surrounded by jungle stretch on both sides of the road and some patches of water bodies ....As we returned that Ghost town of Danushkodi, the landscape was totally different....sands on both sides of the road and its turquoise  waters of the ocean welcoming us with all those ruins of the old Town of Danushkodi scattered here & there all across on both side of the road stretch...

After we crossed the uninhabited  town of Danushkodi, Ram setu starts .... to some extent of the stretch of road , vehicles r allowed & there after one need to walk down a 1km and half  to the edge of the road strip...it is said that earlier this road didnot exist & to reach the edge one had to walk down & mostly the bikers made their way down upto the edge and after that its Srilankan waters ....I had a personal realization, that as I entered Danushkodi, my mobile signal went of & some international  signal was noticed.... after we started walking down to the edge of Ramsetu, I saw so many Tamilians  walking the stretch barefooted  in scorching  sun ...ultra violet rays r so strong that I could hardly make out what I was capturing on my camera lens ...😀BSF  personal  stopped me from video shooting the zone too ....But the place is so picturesque  that no one can stop one's temptation  to film  it in frame

we really had a beautiful  experience  standing on the last Road of India ...... I personally  feel that each one who in taking on the long journey upto RAMESHWARAM, should definitely  add Danushkodi to their itenary  besides the Samadhi of our beloved DR.KALAM'S & his home at Rameshwaram town........