Kovalam

Kovalam is the Kerala coast's most developed beach destination — three crescent bays curved below a lighthouse headland just south of Trivandrum — and the first international beach resort in South India, where the infrastructure has been adapting to foreign visitors since the 1970s.

Lighthouse Beach, the most developed of the three bays, has a seafront of restaurants, massage parlours, and souvenir shops that represents the Kovalam model in its most commercial form. Hawa Beach and Samudra Beach to the north are quieter and increasingly preferred by travellers who want the landscape rather than the resort economy it supports.

The Padmanabhaswamy Temple in Trivandrum, eighteen kilometres from Kovalam, holds the largest single deposit of treasure discovered anywhere in the world — a collection of gold ornaments, statues, coins, and gems valued at approximately $22 billion when a Supreme Court commission opened five of its six vaults in 2011, the sixth chamber remaining sealed under judicial order. The proximity of this extraordinary fact to the beach resort economy gives Trivandrum a double life that most coastal destinations lack.

Places to Visit in Kovalam

• Lighthouse Beach
• Hawah Beach
• Vizhinjam Lighthouse

Things to Do in Kovalam

• Ayurvedic massage and treatments
• Beach relaxation
• Lighthouse viewpoint visit