Mahabalipuram

Mahabalipuram (Mamallapuram), 60 km south of Chennai on the Coromandel Coast, is one of South India's greatest archaeological and architectural sites — a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1984, encompassing the 7th-8th century Pallava dynasty rock-cut temples, monolithic chariot-shrines, cave temple excavations, and the magnificent Shore Temple standing directly at the water's edge of the Bay of Bengal.

• The Pallava capital here under the great king Narasimhavarman I (Mamalla, meaning "the great wrestler") produced India's most innovative early medieval architecture in a single 50-year burst of creativity.
• The Five Rathas (Pancha Rathas) — five complete temples each carved from a single large granite boulder in different Dravidian tower forms (named after the Pandava brothers and Draupadi, though predating the naming by centuries) — demonstrate in microcosm the full repertoire of South Indian temple architecture.
• Arjuna's Penance (or Descent of the Ganges from Shiva) is the world's largest open-air stone bas-relief: approximately 29 metres wide and 13 metres tall, carved on a single granite cliff face with over 100 individually sculpted figures of gods, humans, animals, and celestial beings.
• Krishna's Butter Ball — a 5-metre diameter granite sphere balanced on a 1.2-metre-wide point of smooth rock at an angle that appears physically impossible — has resisted every attempt at removal — in 1908 the Madras governor reportedly had seven elephants try to shift it, without success — and has held its place through 1,000 years of Bay of Bengal storms.
• The Shore Temple (700-728 CE) is among the oldest surviving structural (built with cut stones rather than carved from rock) temples in South India — three linked shrines to Shiva and Vishnu standing directly on the sand, weathered by 1,300 years of salt spray into a romantic ruin of eroded sculpture and salt-grey granite.
• For vegetarian travellers, Mahabalipuram has a good coastal café and restaurant culture built around international tourism: the Lotus Restaurant (since 1970) serves South Indian breakfast and vegetarian thali; beach-facing cafés on the promenade serve Tamil Nadu and continental vegetarian menus.
• November-March is ideal for comfortable sightseeing.