Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu holds India's oldest continuous civilisation and its grandest temple architecture. Madurai - over 2,500 years old - is anchored by the Meenakshi Amman Temple, a riot of 14 gopuram towers covered in thousands of painted sculptures, with a nightly ceremony carrying the god to the goddess's chamber. South-east, the holy island of Rameswaram holds the Ramanathaswamy Temple (one of the 12 Jyotirlingas) with the longest temple corridor in India, and the haunting ghost town of Dhanushkodi at the very tip of Pamban Island. At Kanyakumari, the subcontinent ends - three seas meet, and you can watch the sun rise and set over the ocean from the same spot, with the Vivekananda Rock Memorial and the 133-foot Thiruvalluvar statue offshore. Inland, the Western Ghats lift into the cool hill stations of Ooty - the 'Queen of Hill Stations' with its botanical gardens and toy train - and Kodaikanal, the 'Princess of Hill Stations', set around a star-shaped lake. The coast tells a different story. Pondicherry preserves a French Quarter of mustard-yellow villas, boulevards and seaside cafés, alongside the experimental township of Auroville. Chennai, the state capital, balances the colonial Fort St. George, the 12th-century Kapaleeshwarar Temple and the long sweep of Marina Beach. Tamil Nadu rewards the traveller who wants culture with depth - temples that have never stopped functioning, and hills and coastline that frame them.