Nagarjunakonda

NAGARJUNAKONDA, or "Nagarjuna's Hill", 166km south of Hyderabad and 175km west of Vijayawada, is all that now remains of the vast area, rich in archeological sites, submerged when the huge Nagarjuna Sagar Dam was built across the River Krishna in 1960. Ancient settlements in the valley were first discovered in 1926; extensive excavations carried out between 1954 and 1960 uncovered more than one hundred sites dating from the early Stone Age to late medieval times. Nagarjunakonda was once the summit of a hill, where a fort towered 200m above the valley floor; now it's just a small oblong island near the middle of Nagarjuna Sagar Lake, accessible by boat from the mainland. Several Buddhist monuments have been reconstructed, in an operation reminiscent of that at Abu Simbel in Egypt, and a museum exhibits the more remarkable ruins of the valley. VIJAYAPURI, the village on the shore of the lake, overlooks the colossal dam itself, which stretches for almost 2km. Torrents of water flushed through its 26 floodgates produce electricity for the whole region, and irrigate an area of almost 800 square kilometres. Many villages had to be relocated to higher ground when the valley was flooded

Both APTDC places are on the other side of the dam as you approach the lake from the direction of Hyderabad: the Punnami Vihar ( 08680/277361; Rs500–1000) has spacious rooms with balconies and a good restaurant, and is 2km further up the hill from the Punnami Hill Colony ( 08680/276540; Rs150–700), which also has a dorm (Rs100).

The island and the museum

Boats arrive on the northeastern edge of Nagarjunakonda island (daily 9am-5pm; $2 [Rs5]), unloading passengers at what remains of one of the gates of the fort, built in the fourteenth century and renovated by the Vijayanagar kings in the mid-sixteenth century. Low, damaged, stone walls skirting the island mark the edge of the fort, and you can see ground-level remains of the Hindu temples that served its inhabitants. Well-kept gardens lie between the jetty and the museum, beyond which nine Buddhist monuments from various sites in the valley have been rebuilt. West of the jetty, there's a reconstructed bathing ghat, built entirely of limestone during the reigns of the Ikshvaku kings (third century AD). The maha-chaitya, or stupa, constructed at the command of King Chamtula's sister in the third century AD, is the earliest Buddhist structure in the area. It was raised over relics of the Buddha - said to include a tooth - and has been reassembled in the southwest of the island. Nearby, a towering statue of the Buddha stands draped in robes beside a ground plan of a monastery that enshrines a smaller stupa. Other stupas stand nearby; the brick walls of the svastika chaitya have been arranged in the shape of swastikas, common emblems in early Buddhist iconography.

The museum (daily except Fri 9am-5pm; Rs3) houses stone friezes decorated with scenes from the Buddha's life, and statues of Buddha in various postures. Earlier artefacts include stone tools and pots from the Neolithic age (third millennium BC), and metal axe heads and knives (first millennium BC). Later exhibits include inscribed pillars from Ikshvaku times showing Buddhist monasteries and statues. Medieval sculptures include a thirteenth-century tirthankara (Jain saint), a seventeenth-century Ganesh and Nandi, and some eighteenth-century Shiva and Shakti statues, and there is also a model showing the excavated sites in the valley