Manali, Himachal Pradesh

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   Manali:                                  Manali is a high-altitude Himalayan resort town in India’s northern Himachal Pradesh state. It has a reputation as a backpacking center and honeymoon destination. Set on the Beas River, it’s a gateway for skiing in the Solang Valley and trekking in Parvati Valley. It's also a jumping-off point for paragliding, rafting and mountaineering in the Pir Panjal mountains, home to 4,000m-high Rohtang Pass.        Manali is the real starting point of an ancient trade route which crosses the Rohtang and Baralacha passes, and runs via Lahul and Ladakh to Kashmir while divergent road connects it with Spiti. Now the motor link have been provided up to Leh in Jammu & Kashmir, Pangi valley in Chamba and Kaza of Lahul & Spiti. There are regular bus services to these places from Manali during summer season. It is situated at a distanc...

Kerala

 Shree Padmanabhaswamy Temple:


        The Shree Padmanabhaswamy Temple is a Hindu temple located in Thiruvananthapuram, capital of the state KeralaIndia. The name of the city of 'Thiruvananthapuram' in Tamil and Malayalam translates to "The City of Lord Ananta", (The City Of Lord Vishnu[1] referring to the main deity of the temple. The temple is built in an intricate fusion of the Chera style and Dravidian style of architecture, featuring high walls, and a 16th-century gopura. While the Ananthapura temple in Kumbla in Kasaragod district in Kerala is considered as the original spiritual seat of the deity ("Moolasthanam"), architecturally to some extent, the temple is a replica of the Adikesava Perumal temple in Thiruvattar in Kanyakumari district in Tamil Nadu.

The principal deity Padmanabhaswamy (Vishnu) is enshrined in the "Anantha Shayana" posture, the eternal yogic sleep on the infinite serpent Adi Shesha. Padmanabhaswamy is the tutelary deity of the royal family of Travancore. The titular Maharaja of TravancoreMoolam Thirunal Rama Varma, is the current trustee of the temple.

 Several extant Hindu texts including the Vishnu Purana, Brahma Purana, Matsya Purana,[8] Varaha Purana, Skanda PuranaPadma PuranaVayu Purana and Bhagavata Purana mention the Padmanabhaswamy Temple. The Temple has been referred to in the (only recorded) Sangam period of literature several times.[9] Many conventional historians and scholars are of the opinion that one of the names that the Temple had, "The Golden Temple", was in cognisance of the Temple being already unimaginably wealthy by that point. Many extant pieces of Sangam Tamil literature and poetry as well as later works of the 9th century of Tamil poet–saints like Nammalwar refer to the temple and the city as having walls of pure gold.[12] Both the temple and the entire city are often eulogised as being made of gold, and the temple as heaven

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