Stories from the Road and beyond...

The Khandgiri and Udaygiri Caves near Bhubaneshwar show the presence of Jainism in Odisha since ancient times.

Bhubaneshwar is a city of temples. In this post, I talk about a few temples, and put them in context of the city and how it developed.

The Vaital temple is one of the oldest temples in Bubaneshwar, dedicated to the goddess Chamunda. There are some beautiful sculptures of various forms of Shiva, the goddess as well as Surya

Rajarani Temple Bhubaneshwar has some of the most beautiful Ashtadikpala sculptures

The Yogini Temple at Hirapur is an unique temple to different forms of the goddesses

2 lesser known ancient goddess temples in Odisha near Konark - Varahi Temple and Gangeshwari Temple

Two visits to Chilika Lake and our birdwatching experiences on both trips - one in peak season and another in off season.

Many years back, when I visited the National Museum in Delhi, one of the images that I was most impressed by, was the Surya from Konark. I remember being rooted to the ground as I stood in front of the sculpture, admiring every detail, simply unable to walk away. There are various ideas of where the sculpture was placed in the temple, but wherever it was placed, there is no question that it would have drawn all eyes. I remember wondering back then, if this single sculpture wa

A visit to the temple town of Puri, and my experience of seeing Lord Jagannath

Odisha is a state I have visited twice. The first time was a sponsored trip, visiting a resort to write about them, as well as some of the more popular places to visit. I wrote the required content, but never got around to writing about the trip on the blog. This May, I visited Odisha for the second time, this time with family. The timing wasn’t great – it was either raining or it was terribly hot; besides, I wasn’t in the best of health and I couldn’t quite do as much as I l