Konark sun temple was always in my mind, so myself and 3 more friends arranged a 8 day tour in the month of february 2003 from mumbai.it took about 38 hours by the konark express we opted to take darshan of lord jaggannatha first we got down at khorda road prior to bhubhaneshwar a connecting train and we were at puri , we took a hotel to stay very near to the beach rested the whole day.
next morning we enjoyed the puri beach, its a very long beach with real large waves and clear water it was fun .
we hired a taxi took darshan of the lord jaggannatha, my advice beware of the ’pundas’ they really harrass you .30 kms from there we visited the konark sun temple, it is amazing I really appreciate the ruler who built the temple.the temple not only a masterpiece of sculpture has a figuristic power to change the mankind of that time.the sculptures are meant to provoke the sadhus who had left material life into family life and pleasure through women , thus helping to increase the population of the dynasty.great ruler making use of the media of stones.one must hire a guide here.visited some temples around bhubhaneshwar and back to puri.next day we went to chilka lake 60 kms by a taxi to see the dolphins and the migratory birds, we hired a small boat all the way across the huge lake and reached balugaon , it was a 6 hrs exploring boat journey just great. we stayed at balugaon next morning took a train to bhubhaneshwar (1 1/2 hr). it took a whole day to visit the nandankanan zoological park(its closed on friday), white tigers are the main attraction it is the best zoo I have ever seen.next morning we took the train back to hyderabad we spent a couple of days to visit the museum , golconda fort and ramoji film city and were back to mumbai with loads of memories.