The East Coast Road starts at the Old Mahabalipuram Road crossing at Tidel Park, Chennai’s IT colossus. It runs about 4 km east to Thiruvanmiyur where it turns sharply south to skirt the coast all the way down to Cuddalore. I’ve only been as far as the former French colony of Puducherry, approximately 150 km away. The ECR is billed as an ‘Express Highway’. Indeed, the only thing it has in common with ‘Express’ or ‘Highway’ is that it becomes a toll road at Uthandi. Up until this point it’s like any other Indian intra-city road, two-lanes, winding through dense traffic in tough ethnic neighborhoods of indistinguishable hues. Along the way one is treated to a dense pastiche involving temples, churches and mosques; dogs, cows and camels; retail shops, big and small; and every form of transport ever devised by mankind from ox-cart to Mercedes-Benz. This stretch contains food courts, multiplex theaters, resorts, and amusement parks.
From Uthandi on, the traffic thins considerably. The road remains two-lane and has numerous speed bumps and metal (swerve) gates especially as one passes through any one of the many fishing villages that dot the coast. There are now panoramic openings between these settlements. The Bay of Bengal is to the left. The vegetation alternates between scrub palms and cacti suited to arid climes; and coconut palms and banana leaf more abundantly found along India’s opposite Malabar Coast. The stretch between Uthandi and historic Mahabalipuram contains world class resorts such as the Taj’s Fisherman’s Cove and GRT Resort. Curiosities like Dakshina Chitra and Romulus Whittaker’s Madras Crocodile Bank are worthwhile stops along the way.
From Mahabalipuram on south, the ride becomes interesting from the perspective of landscape alone. You begin to see rice paddies along side the road. The vegetation becomes decidedly tropical. Sometimes the Rain Trees form a dense canopy across the road for several miles on end. Add an oxcart to the scene, and you have a quintessential picture of the South Indian state of Karnataka.
Suddenly, the lush greens give way to pale, blinding lunar scapes. To the west there are unbroken salt flats as far as the eye can see. Tiny dark figures in white loincloths harvest the salt and gather it in conical mounds. The vegetation is non-existent to sparse. Cacti line the endless flat; a few paltry strands of grass; a lone scrub palm. Somewhere I noticed a shed snakeskin bleaching in the sun.
And then, just as suddenly, the lush tropical greens are back. I notice a Hanuman temple; whole villages built entirely of thatch. Gradually, the traffic increases as the towns begin to merge into one another once again. Puducherry is but a few miles away. We blow past the University (a good one, I am told); ditto, Auroville (I have little interest in cults). Our first stop is the Sri Manakula Vinayagar (Ganesha) Temple - complete with live elephants - in the French Quarter. By now, we’re pretty hungry after our three-hour ride. Some French food sounds good just about now. We ask a rickshaw driver for directions to Satsanga (restaurant), famous for its soupe de poisson and its terrine de lapin or poulet piment vert et frites. We’ve also heard some good reports about the crème caramel as well as the coffee. Here in India, that’s saying something.
No comments:
Post a Comment