Apr 2 –Rock Bird and a Drive

We are headed south, leaving Cochin mid-morning.  Some photos of the backwaters around Cochin.

A church that looks like it was transplanted from a small English village.

Other churches and mosques.

And lots of traffic.  Well.  In reality, it wasn’t a lot of traffic but it sure seems like it as they they keep trying to share the same space and the same lanes.  Traffic just seems to flow around the oncoming traffic that is in their lane.

We stopped at a beautiful hotel...

where we were met by a friend of Tara’s.  Lunch was good and the views of the waters was great. 

And they had a large, old boat filled with spices.

The main destination today was the Jatayu Earth Center.  Jatayu was a divine demi-god bird that tried to prevent Ravana from stealing Lord Rama’s wife Sita.  Ravana clipped Jatayu’s wings and he fell to the earth but he lived long enough to tell Lord Rama what had happened to Sita. 

The sculpture is billed as the world’s largest bird sculpture.  It is 20 feet in length, 150 feet wide and 70 feet high. It has 52 wing and tail feathers and has a floor area of 15,000 square feet.  It is made of concrete and was built in 2017 and 2018.  A most unusual site to visit. 

From there we headed on to Trivandrum and our next stop.