Indian Columbus

When you think about  Mysore , the heritage city of India, you cannot avoid thinking about two great places – Mysore Zoo and Mysore Palace. Mysore zoo is one of India's oldest and most beautiful zoos. The King of Mysore, Chamaraja Wodeyar, established Mysore zoo in his Summer Palace, also called Pleasure Palace, in 1892 CE. In the beginning, the zoo was established with just 10 acres. The King kept increasing its area and opened it for the public. Whenever he traveled to other countries or other parts of India, he used to bring rare animals to this zoo. After independence, the Indian Government took control of this zoo and extended the area further. The century-old zoo, officially called Chamarajendra Zoological Gardens, has a lot of rare animals even today. You can find almost all the animals and birds such as tigers, elephants, monkeys, deer, bears, leopards, lions, peacocks, snakes, crocodiles, etc. here. Giraffe, chimpanzee, African elephant, and various colorful birds a...

Chennai  has some interesting places which cannot be found anywhere else in India. The Crocodile Bank is one such place.  Located at around 42 kms from the city center, the Madras Crocodile Bank Trust was founded in 1976 CE, and a public trust manages it. The Bank was established for the conservation and study of endangered crocodiles. When it was started, it hardly had 30 crocodiles. Now, there are around 2,400 crocodiles belonging to 14 different species. Over the years, the crocodile bank has supplied a lot of crocodiles to various zoos in India.  Besides crocodiles, the Bank also has 12 endangered species of turtles and tortoises, five species of snakes, two pythons, and some water monitor lizards.  You can get a close view of crocodiles live in the wild as they are housed in enclosures very similar to their natural habitat. I am not sure if you can find many such crocodiles belonging to different species anywhere else in India.   If you are lucky, you c...

Snake Park - It is such a unique place in Chennai. Today, there are malls and amusement parks across the country. But, till 1990s, it remained one of the important places of interest. Those who visited Chennai never missed it. Established in 1972 CE, the park houses varieties of snakes such as python, vipers and cobra. Besides, we can also find different types of crocodiles and reptiles too. This remains as one of the best choices for a weekend for the past 30+ years for Chennai people. Happy travelling. Visit my site,  krishnakumartk.com , to know more about the travel guides and other books that I have written.

It is unbelievable! Such a beautiful place with so much of flora and fauna! Indeed, it is located within the city limit.  Yes! The National Park at Guindy in Chennai is one of a few forests situated within the city limit in entire nation of India.  Besides housing varieties of plants and trees, the park also serves as the home for various animal species such as jackals, python, hyena, different types of deer, a wide variety of snakes and tortoises, birds and monkeys. The endangered blackbuck is one of the highlights of the park. Guindy National Park is also known as Children’s park as it was started to provide children a natural environment. I believe the park has met the objective as it keeps educating them about animals and creating awareness on conservation for the past several years. Go to this place, along with your children. You will enjoy your weekend for sure. Happy travelling. Visit my site,  krishnakumartk.com , to know more about the travel guides and other bo...

Karumariamman temple in Thiruverkadu is one of the most famous temples of Mother Goddess located in and around Chennai city. Thiruverkadu village is very ancient, and there are references about the place in some old texts. There is no doubt about that. However, I feel that the Karumariamman temple might not be ancient. This might be around 100 years old, even though there are people who claim this temple has many legends and old stories. The principal deity of the temple is Karumariamman. There are more shrines enshrining other deities such as Ganesha, Verkanni Amman, Subramanya with Valli-Devasena, Srinivasa, Rama and Sapta Matas (seven divine mothers).  The temple's major attraction is the holy snake hole under the neem tree, which is being worshiped. This temple is famous for snake worship, as devotees believe that Karumariamman took the form of a snake.  Happy travelling. Visit my site,  krishnakumartk.com , to know more about the travel guides and other books that I ...