Rajendra Chola I was a king who named his capital after a river trip. After a military campaign that carried his armies as far as the Ganges, he founded a new city about the year 1025 and called it Gangaikonda Cholapuram, the city of the Chola who took the Ganges, and he built a great temple to Shiva at its heart. It stood for two and a half centuries as the capital of one of the great South Indian empires, which at its peak had a navy that reached Southeast Asia. Today the city has gone, but the temple remains, an enormous pyramid of granite rising about fifty-five metres above the surrounding fields, with a tower whose stepped profile is gently curved rather than straight, a style so refined that it feels almost organic.
It belongs to the Great Living Chola Temples, a UNESCO group that includes the Brihadisvara temple at Thanjavur, built by Rajendra's father, and the Airavatesvara at Darasuram. The word living matters: worship still goes on here every day, with priests, flowers, oil lamps and bells, so you share the courtyard with pilgrims, not only visitors. There is an enormous Nandi bull carved from a single block of stone facing the sanctum, and the walls carry fine sculptures of gods and dancers.
The riding is the Kaveri delta at its most generous. This is flat, fertile country, a green quilt of paddy, banana and coconut palms with red-earth roads, temple towers on the horizon and the heat of Tamil Nadu pressing down. The main highways are well surfaced but busy with trucks, buses and autorickshaws, so overtaking needs patience, and the stretches through village centres are full of speed bumps. Summer, from April to June, is brutally hot, so start at first light, and the northeast monsoon from October to December can bring heavy rain and flooding.
The nearest town of any size is Jayamkondam, about nine kilometres away, where you will find petrol stations, shops, small lodges and simple restaurants. Thanjavur and Kumbakonam are larger centres a good distance off. Food in this part of Tamil Nadu centres on rice, sambar, dosas and filter coffee, and the banana leaf meals served at roadside restaurants are good value.
Remember to dress modestly and remove your shoes before entering, and note that the stone courtyard becomes surprisingly hot by midday. Arrive early or late for the best light.