Trip to Pandalam Palace.

Every time we crossed Pandalam while driving down to Chenganoor, Anil would comment that we should once visit the Pandalam Palace. So finally we did that during Dussera weekend of September. Since we were not too sure of the route from the sign board on the MC road to the Palace, we parked our car on MC road and followed the sign board. It's just a few meters from the sign board and we took a walk. I was not sure what to expect, though I had vague idea not to expect huge, palatial kind of palace. It just took us two minutes walk to see the first board of ‘Pandalam Kottaram’ .

Typical Kerala architecture, simple but elegant structure - but it seemed closed, we did not try to find out way inside as it being Dussera day was a public holiday. Since it was very small palace, we thought probably there is some other palace further down. So we walked down the lane . It’s a narrow road – just single lane, and it was a good decision to leave our car on the main road. Walking down the road we saw some more boards of small palaces/kottarams and realised that each royal family member’s house is a small Kottaram. All these kottarams (palaces) are very modest and still being maintained in their old glory and ‘Nallukettu’ style.

We took the narrow lane venturing on our own - it reminded so much of our village in Angamaly - the dark green carpet like moss-ed red stone boundary walls, the rain drenched roads, fields, trees and leaves – the quietness , the simplicity … each house, well in the house - masterpiece of traditional Kerala architecture. We soon came across the hanging bridge over ‘Achankovil river’ which has been reconstructed in the recent past. This route and bridge is very important as it is part of the annual ‘Thiruvabharanam

procession to Sabarimala by the traditional route” According to legend, Lord Ayyappan, the presiding deity of Sabarimala had his human sojourn at Pandalam as the son of the King of Pandalam. During Sabarimala pilgrimage season, devotees come to Pandalam in large numbers to worship the deity of Valiyakoikkal Temple near the Pandalam Palace. This temple is on the banks of river Achenkovil. Three days prior to the Makaravilakku festival, the sacred ornaments of Lord Ayyappan (known as Thiruvabharanam) are taken in a procession from Pandalam Temple to Sabarimala.

Crossing the bridge we reached Kulanada, on the other side of the river. We didn’t see anybody on the road, and when we happened to see a guy on a scooter, we stopped him and asked where is the Kaipuzha palace?  He responded ‘Well there is no Palace as such, it’s just board which panchayat has kept, I mean you can go and see the houses where the royal members used to live, people still live there and public is not allowed inside except during the season time, when the whole place is crowded for the Procession’. We thanked him, and decided to walk a little more and see. As he had mentioned there were small houses ‘kottarams’ old and lonely looking, we just glanced through saw couple of temples from outside , as it was afternoon time and the main doors of the temples were closed. 

Pandalam has two palace complexes now: one around the Valiya koikkal Temple and other around the Kaipuzha Temple. The Valiya koikkal temple is on the left bank of the river Achenkovil and the Kaipuzha temple, about 200 meters down the river on the right bank (by road the distance between the two is around 1 km.) We walked all this way and it was lovely heritage walk, especially for children. For religious reasons this place is very sacred and I am sure people who are Ayyapan followers know the importance of this place and route much better, but historically also this place and the Padalam Royal family has lot of importance, and I would highly recommend this place for children to get the glimpse of our heritage !