Sun Temple & Stepwell Sunday

I have now been in India for about a week and am starting to feel settled. I even found out about the Indian version of Yelp – Zomato – so all is well in the world. After a late night on Saturday, that included bootlegged liquor (I guess the state of Gujarat decided to take the SF prohibition themed bar trend a little more seriously and ban alcohol for real), a group of us made it out to two beautiful places outside of the city.

The first is called the Adalaj Stepwell. I found the story behind it’s creation to be disturbing, so naturally I wanted to share; It was made in the 1400s and according to legend, was built when a widowed queen, grieved by the death of her husband, agreed to marry the man who killed him and overtook his rule, only if he first built her a stepwell. After he had it completed in record time, she jumped into the well and drowned herself as an ultimate display of devotion. On a lighter note, it’s pretty amazing that something as simple as a well is built so ornately. I didn’t get too many good photos (the last 3 are from here) but trust me on this one.

Next stop was the Sun Temple in Modera, which was built in the 1000’s and dedicated to the Hindu Sun God, Surya. The only tragic story I have for this one is that during the Muslim rule, a lot of the temple was destroyed and the carvings defaced. It was still beautiful though, and we were lucky to be there in good lighting (thanks to our late start). A new idea for a photo series also came to me while visiting the sun temple; I will take a picture of every person who asks to take mine. I don’t know if it will be possible to keep up (must have happened 10 times that day), but I shall try!

That’s all for now! If you want to see pictures of the actual temple, instead of just the random bits and people I found interesting, click on the link and wikipedia will be of service. Enjoy the photos.