Vintage India - Tamil Nadu

 This set of vintage photos is from the beautiful state of Tamil Nadu, on the south east coast of India.  While there I dipped my toes in the Indian Ocean, a transcendent experience for a small town girl whose previous beach experience was a single trip to Atlantic City, NJ.

 I visited the beach temple of Mahabalipuram, above, and detail, below:

 I toured the Meenakshi Temple, in Madurai, and I still remember it vividly.  The painted carvings are intricate and fascinating:

 I climbed up the interior and leaned out precariously to pose for this shot:

 And from that vantage point took this photo:

 On this next set I am perhaps fudging it a bit--I prefer positive identifications, but memory has faded, and intensive google image searching has failed to turn up anything definitive.  I believe it is a Jain temple shrine in Tamil Nadu, but can't be sure.  It's wonderful, regardless, so I am including it. Here's the approach to the shrine:

EDIT: many many thanks to the anonymous poster who correctly identified this shrine as GOMMATAGIRI - Jain temple shrine of Mysore - KARNATAKA. 

 A group of school children on an outing waiting in the line, along with a coconut water vendor:

 The view I had while shuffling very slowly up a long line to the statue in the shrine:

 The gorgeous view back over my shoulder while waiting in line, of flooded rice paddies:

 The statue at the top of the shrine, with a ceremony underway:

 Attendants and visitors to the shrine, looking a bit askance at the foreign visitors:

If you are new here, you can see more vintage photos by clicking on "India" under Labels in the right toolbar.  I am revisiting my time there as a student in the 1970's in preparation for a return trip later this summer.  So stay tuned, and thanks for reading.