Gokarna is a coastal town in Northern Karnataka. It is a famous for it Shiva temple but much popular for it's beaches, especially with foreigners. There are around 5 popular beaches around Gokarna besides it's own. The most popular of them being the Om Beach. Visit date : 4th Feb 2005.

The Shiva temple called the Mahabaleshwar temple was very furstrating in Photographic view point. The temple is completely surrounded by walls and the Gopurams of the temple are quite small. In the photo the temple is in the end of the narrow street which leads from the Gokarna beach. The temple is a strict hindu temple (foreigners are not allowed) and for the first time in Karnataka I felt hounded. As soon as you enter the temple you are surrounded by priests and within minutes two archanas were performed in my name. I have never experienced in Karnataka where the people are mostly docile. In the sanctum sanctorium besides the idol of Mahabaleshwar, there is a big naturally formed atma linga (bigger than that in Murdeshwar).

As I could not get a good shot of the temple I have taken one of the rath. This rath is alleged to be one of theoldest in India. I have no confirmation of the same.

This beach is one of the most awesome beaches I have been to. I rate it just below with the Karwar beach. The sand is neither as soft as Karwar or hard and white as Murdeshwar, but, somewhere in between both. It is relatively safe, that is the sand below you feet is pretty firm however, the waves are not mild like in Murdeshwar. The beach is quite long and very clean.

Another edlightful sight is those of the seagulls. There are a lot of them sticking to each other. They are however very wary of human company (rightly so).

Like Murdeshwar the sunsets here are great and thelocal population come out to see the sun go down.

The strange part about Gokarna is that most of the tourists seem to be foreigners rather than Indian. This enterprising guy has got 2 camels to take people on the rides. The photograph on the left is of the two camels silhouted by sunset.

The great part about Gokarna and the beaches close to it is that there small hills between each of them. Its great to walk between beaches by climbing up (they all have well formed walkways). Kudla beach is the next close beach to Gokarna. It seems to be completely for foreigners only ( a lot of hippie crowd too). I entered a small and empty looking restaurant and It was filled with foreigners who seemed as shocked to see me as I was to see so many of them. The waves here seemed to be much milder than in Gokarna.

On the next hill after Kudla beach is the most popular Om beach. It is called so as it is shaped like the Om character in Hindi (or sanskrit). In this photograph the Om figure is reversed as it was taken from the north end. Here you can find a mix of both Indian and foreign tourists. Its really a speactacular looking beach. However, the waves looked very mild and looked like a very safe beach.

Another photo of the Om beach from the hill on the South side.

On the south side cliff i saw this lonely tree and it looked like a good photo. I have no idea on what kind of tree it is even.