Panchamukha Hanuman Temple (Floating Stone)

A little over a kilometre west of the great Ramanathaswamy Temple, on the main Pamban road that carries almost every visitor into Rameswaram town from the bridge and the railway station, the Panchamukha Hanuman Temple is one of the island's most-visited smaller shrines.

• It stands close to Lakshmana Theertham, a fifteen to twenty minute walk from the temple's western side, or a few minutes by auto-rickshaw.
• Pilgrims come for two things: a striking five-faced (panchamukha) image of Hanuman, and a cluster of so-called 'floating stones' kept in a water trough beside it.
• The presiding image is coated thickly in vermilion renewed layer upon layer over the years, and tradition reads its five faces as those of Hanuman himself together with Narasimha, Garuda, Varaha and Hayagriva, a composite protective form invoked in devotional literature against fear and obstacles arriving from every direction.
• The floating stones are the shrine's signature draw.
• Rough, pitted and pale, they are substantial blocks rather than pebbles, yet they sit low in the water and genuinely stay afloat, and an attendant will usually lift one out so visitors can touch it.
• Devotees connect them to the setu, the causeway that the Ramayana describes being built across the sea towards Lanka, and which gives Rameswaram its long association with the epic; that link is traditionally said to explain the stones rather than being a proven origin for any one of them.
• Geologists explain such buoyancy through the very low density and high porosity of pumice-like volcanic rock and of certain weathered coral limestones, which trap enough air to float until they slowly waterlog.
• At this shrine, faith and physics are allowed to sit companionably side by side.
• Rameswaram is a working fishing island, so pure vegetarian food is easy to find in the pilgrim belt but should never be assumed.
• The streets ringing the Ramanathaswamy Temple, a short ride east of the shrine, hold many pure-veg 'meals' hotels and small messes; look for a board that explicitly says 'pure veg' or 'sudha saivam' and confirm at the counter before ordering, since some multi-cuisine hotels on the main road and near the harbour serve seafood.
• Traditional South Indian meals houses and Udupi-style tiffin rooms serve unlimited banana-leaf sappadu at lunch, with dosai, idli, medu vada and filter coffee through the day; tender-coconut and fresh-fruit carts line the Pamban road near the shrine itself.
• The Ramanathaswamy Temple's annadhanam (free vegetarian meal) and its prasadam counters are run by that temple, not by this shrine, but form part of the same pilgrim day.
• Carry water, and note that most kitchens wind down soon after the evening rituals.