Elephanta Island

Not to be confused with Elephant Island or Elephantine Island.

Elephanta Island
—  neighbourhood  —
Elephanta Island Location of Elephanta Island in Mumbai and India
Coordinates	18°57′36″N 72°56′06″E
Country	India
State	Maharashtra
Time zone	IST (UTC+05:30)

The island as seen from close to the boat landing.

Sculpture inside a cave.

Elephanta Island (also called Gharapuri Island or place of caves) is one of a number of islands in Mumbai Harbour, east of Mumbai, India. This island is a popular tourist destination for a day trip because of the island's cave temples, the Elephanta Caves, that have been carved out of rock.

The island is easily accessible by ferry from Mumbai, being about 10 kilometres (6.2 mi) from the south east coast of the island city. Boats leave daily from the Gateway of India, taking about an hour each way for the journey. The tickets for these can be bought at the Gateway itself (130 Rupees [round-trip ticket] for "luxury boats"; should you choose to sit on the upper deck of the boat you'll need to pay 10 Rupees more each way on the boat). The first ferry leaves at 9 am, the last at 2 pm. From the boat landing stage on the island, a walkway leads to steps that go up to the famous caves. There is also a narrow-gauge toy train that you may choose to ride from the boat area on the dock to the base of the steps leading up to the caves (about 600 meters) which costs 5 Rupees per passenger each way. Along the path, hawkers sell souvenirs that may bought at a reasonable price. There are also stalls to buy food and drinks; be aware that you will likely pay a little more than the MRP stamped on food/drink as many vendors charge more due to the "difficulty" of obtaining and cooling these items on the island. Small monkeys play along the sides of the path, occasionally thieving items from the hawkers or trashcans. You may also get local guides.

Known in ancient times as Gharapuri, the present name Elephanta, was given by 17th century Portuguese explorers, after seeing a monolithic basalt sculpture of an elephant found here near the entrance. They decided to take it home but ended up dropping it into the sea because their chains were not strong enough. Later, this sculpture was moved to the Victoria and Albert Museum (now Dr Bhau Daji lad Museum) in Mumbai, by the British.

The island has an area of 16 km² (6.2 sq mi). It is located at approximately 18.95°N 72.93°E / 18.95; 72.93. The area comes under the jurisdiction of the Raigad district in Maharashtra State.

A narrow gauge train takes tourists along the 1 km pier to the base of the steps that lead to the caves.

The island is thickly wooded with palm, mango, and tamarind trees. The island has a population of about 1,200 involved in growing rice, fishing, and repairing boats. It was once the capital of a powerful local kingdom.

There are total three villages viz; Shentbandar, Morabandar, and Rajbandar, of which Rajbandar is known to be the capital. Caves and Stalls can be seen in Shentbandar. Morabandar has thick forest.

References

• Elephanta
• Elephanta caves
• Duffer's Guide to Elephanta, Mid-Day, Feb 22, 2007, pg A14
• A blogger's description of the Island after having visited the Elephanta Caves - Broken link