Gokarna

Gokarna is a Shaivite pilgrim town on the Karwar coast that spent the last thirty years also becoming a beach town, and it carries both without much fuss. The Mahabaleshwara temple keeps the Atmalinga which Ravana, in the story, was tricked into setting down here on his way to Lanka; it is worshipped through an opening in the floor, and men enter bare-chested in a dhoti. Around it run Car Street and the temple bazaar, lined with matha buildings, brass shops and the Koti Tirtha tank where families perform rites for their ancestors.

Walk south over the headland and the coast changes character: Kudle first, then Om Beach, whose two curves really do trace the syllable, then harder scrambles to Half Moon and Paradise, where the shacks run on generators and the path is laterite and cashew scrub. A good day begins with the six o'clock abhisheka at the temple, moves to a swim before the sun gets hard, and ends on the Kudle cliff path watching fishing boats work the horizon. Shivaratri in February or March brings a five-day rathotsava, when a tall wooden chariot is dragged through town by hand.

Mirjan Fort's laterite walls stand twenty-two kilometres north, and the karst spires and cave shrine at Yana are about two hours inland.