Utkal · Eastern Coastal Plains
A twelfth-century temple in the Kalinga order, roughly 65 m high, standing inside a double enclosure with some hundred and twenty subsidiary shrines, a kitchen, a granary and a market. Entry is restricted to those of Indian-origin faiths, which the temple states plainly at the gate; the Raghunandan library roof and the outer enclosure give the view for everyone else.
Best time: November–February; Ratha Jatra in Asadha for the chariots.
A thirteenth-century temple built as the sun god's chariot — twenty-four carved wheels along the plinth and seven horses drawing it. The main tower has fallen; the jagamohana survives, filled with sand for stability. The wheels are functioning sundials, readable by the shadow of the spokes.
Best time: November–February, early morning.
The eleventh-century high point of the Kalinga temple order — a 55 m rekha deul with the characteristic curvilinear tower and a sequence of halls added in front of it. Non-Hindus view it from a platform outside the wall.
Mukteswar, of the tenth century, carries a free-standing arched torana found on almost no other temple in the region; Rajarani, of the eleventh, is unusual for having no image inside and for the carved directional guardians ringing its tower. Together they are the clearest lesson in how the Kalinga style developed.
Jain rock-cut residential cells of the first century BCE cut into two facing sandstone hills, low-ceilinged and meant for sleeping rather than assembly. The Hathigumpha inscription of Kharavela here is the principal document for early Kalinga history.
A rock face above the Daya carrying Ashokan edicts, with an elephant carved from the living rock above them. What is inscribed here is the pair of Separate Edicts addressed to the officials of the conquered country — and the famous edict expressing remorse for the Kalinga war is not among them at this site.
The largest brackish lagoon in Asia, around 1,100 km² in summer and larger in monsoon, with a resident population of Irrawaddy dolphins near the Satapada mouth and Nalabana island filling with migratory waterfowl in winter. A new sea mouth cut in 2000 changed the lagoon's salinity and its fishery with it.
Best time: November–February. Getting there: Boats from Satapada for dolphins, Barkul and Rambha for the open lagoon, Balugaon for Kalijai island.
A single street of houses whose verandahs are all workshops — pattachitra, palm-leaf etching, cow-dung toys, masks — with gotipua akhadas training in the same village. Designated a heritage crafts village in 2000.
Three excavated Buddhist monastic sites on low hills within a short drive of one another — a great carved doorway and stupa at Ratnagiri, monasteries and an apsidal shrine at Lalitgiri, and a relic casket that established the antiquity of the complex. Occupied for roughly a thousand years.
The delta's old capital on the tongue between the Mahanadi and Kathajodi, with the Barabati fort moat and gate, the eleventh-century stone revetment along the Kathajodi that protected the town from flood, the filigree workshops, and the Bali Jatra ground on the riverbank.
Mangrove creeks holding one of India's largest saltwater crocodile populations, and the beach at Gahirmatha beyond it — among the largest known mass nesting grounds for the olive ridley turtle, whose arribada brings several hundred thousand animals ashore in a few nights when it happens.
Best time: December–February for the mangrove; nesting is unpredictable.
An appliqué town on the Bhubaneswar–Puri road whose shopfronts are hung floor to ceiling with canopies and umbrellas. The chariot coverings for Ratha Jatra are made here.
The village claimed as Jayadeva's, on a small river lined with early temples and sculpture. The Prachi valley is the densest concentration of pre-thirteenth-century temple remains in the region outside Bhubaneswar.
The Vishnu temple pilgrims go to during anasara, when the Puri deities are out of sight. It exists in the calendar as the alternative destination for a fortnight, which is an unusual thing for a temple to be.
A large Balabhadra temple with its own chariot festival and its own well-known offering, rasabali. The delta's counterweight to Puri, on a smaller scale and with far fewer visitors.
Places worth visiting in Utkal — heritage sites, wildlife, pilgrimage and landscape, with the best time to go. (15)