White Town

Pondicherry, also known as Pondy/Puducherry, is one of the seven union territories of India. It is the most charming places in South India located on the eastern coast of India, retaining its old beauty in a very delightful manner. This town in the east gives you the complete vibe of a French town right from the food to the architecture. In fact, you can easily spot old French people wearing Indian attires roaming around the streets who are actually living in Pondicherry since ages dwelled into South Indian culture. You'll be amazed to know that a lot many people speak fluent French and there are French sign boards around too.How many days are ideal to visit Pondicherry?We went to Pondicherry in the month of October for celebrating my birthday. Fortunately, I was born on 2 nd October (Gandhi Jayanti), which is a national holiday in India. I can easily turn it into a long weekend and plan a trip. Since we were traveling from Pune to Pondicherry, which is a bit far, we took 4 days instead of 3, but you can easily cover all the places in and around Pondicherry in 3 days.Since we had enough time, we also visited Pichavaram Mangrove Forest - the second largest mangrove forest in the world (Read more in the later section).The trip to Pondicherry begins here.We took a direct flight from Pune to Chennai and then took a Make My Trip Cab from Chennai, which costed us around Rs.1700 for one way drop from Chennai to Pondicherry. Since we were four people so it just cost us Rs. 425 each person. There are 3 routes to reach Pondicherry from Chennai.Read more on the best way to reach Pondicherry in our Quick travel guide.Where We Stayed?Since white town gives you the true feeling of beautiful Pondicherry as a French town and is in close proximity to Promenade beach and various wonderful cafes are open till late night, we took our stay in a French studio/hotel named Le Capucin Heritage Guest House. It is located in the center of White-town at a walking distance from Rock Beach.

White town in Pondicherry is dearest place for film industry and photographers. The colourful buildings left by French are making the city look beautiful. Walking, admiring, and clicking pics along the white town is one of the craziest things tourist do in Pondicherry.

The second stop : → White TownStreets in Pondicherry are very exciting. They are so parallel and organized. We did a little bit of Photoshoot there, in front of yellow, blue and white buildings.The third stop : → Promenade Beach

Our hotel was close to White Town, where most of the beaches and tourist spots are present. So on the first day, we decided to explore the local places. We walked to White Town and it looked as if someone had opened a portal to France. The place was boasting of painted houses with bougainvillea-laden walls, churches, streets and road signs of French names and most importantly, a pristine beach - Rock Beach. We walked through the Promenade, with colonial-era buildings on one side and the sea on the other. The walk through the Promenade was amazing - there was the French War Memorial, Mahatma Gandhi Statue, Le Cafe and many local shops selling items made of seashells. We felt like eating sea-food and hence went to De-BlueFin Hotel which served the best squid and lobster.