Places to visit in Chennai, and the order to see them

The British East India Company built this fort in 1644, and the city of Madras grew up round it. Today it holds the Tamil Nadu Assembly and offices, but the Fort Museum is open: East India Company coins, uniforms, weapons and portraits, in a 1795 building. A few minutes away inside the walls is St Mary's Church, the oldest Anglican church east of Suez (1680).

One of the oldest museums in India, opened in 1851 in red Indo-Saracenic buildings in Egmore. The bronze gallery is the reason to come: Chola bronzes of Shiva as Nataraja, Parvati and the saints, some a thousand years old. The National Art Gallery building next door and the round museum theatre are worth a look from outside too.

A Vishnu temple in Triplicane, first built in the 8th century, where Krishna is worshipped as Arjuna's charioteer, with a moustache and scars from the battle. It is one of the oldest temples in Chennai, with carved halls and a big tank in front.

The big Shiva temple of Mylapore, with a tall gopuram covered in painted figures and a large temple tank beside it. The temple as it stands was built in the 16th century, after the older one by the sea was lost. The streets round it are full of flower sellers, brass shops and small cafes serving filter coffee.

A tall white neo-Gothic church by the sea, rebuilt in 1896 over what is believed to be the tomb of St Thomas the Apostle. A small museum and the tomb chapel are underneath the church. It is about 1 km from the Kapaleeshwarar temple.

A wide sandy beach that runs about 6 km along the city, one of the longest town beaches in the world. In the evening the whole city comes out: families on the sand, kites, horse rides, and stalls frying sundal and bajji. Kamarajar Salai along the top has statues, memorials and old buildings such as the university and Presidency College.

A round 19th century building on the Marina, once an ice house that stored ice shipped from America. Swami Vivekananda stayed here for nine days in 1897. It now holds a photo exhibition on his life and a meditation room.

A memorial to the Tamil poet Thiruvalluvar, built in 1976 with a 39 m stone chariot like the temple car of Thiruvarur. The 1,330 couplets of his Thirukkural are carved in the hall. It reopened in June 2025 after a big renovation.

India's first reptile park, started in 1972 by Romulus Whitaker inside the Guindy forest. You see cobras, pythons, crocodiles and turtles, and there are talks on snakes and how to stay safe. The Guindy Children's Park is next door.

A temple by the sea at Besant Nagar for the eight forms of Lakshmi. The shrines are set on several levels, and you climb up and round to see them all.

A quieter, cleaner beach at Besant Nagar in the south of the city, with cafes along the road behind it. Locals call it Bessy.

One of the biggest zoos in India, spread over about 600 hectares of scrub forest on the edge of the city: white tigers, lions on a safari ride, elephants and a big aviary. It needs half a day.

An artists' village started in 1966 on the East Coast Road. Painters and sculptors live and work here, and there is a gallery and a sculpture garden open to visitors.

A Tamil Nadu Tourism boat house on the backwater at Muttukadu, with rowing, pedal and motor boats. It is a short ride from DakshinaChitra.

A living museum of south Indian homes. Real old houses from Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh were taken apart and rebuilt here, with their kitchens, courtyards and tools. Potters, weavers and puppeteers work on site, and there are crafts to buy.

A reptile zoo and breeding centre started in 1976 by Romulus Whitaker. It holds thousands of crocodiles and alligators of many kinds, plus turtles, lizards and snakes, under the trees by the sea.

A small rock-cut shrine from the 8th century, with a ring of tiger-like faces carved round its opening. It sits under trees near the sea at Saluvankuppam, 4 km before Mahabalipuram.

Five temples shaped like chariots, each cut from a single block of granite in the 7th century, with a stone elephant, lion and Nandi beside them. They are named after the five Pandava brothers and Draupadi, and show different temple styles side by side.

A huge rock face carved in the 7th century with more than 100 figures: gods, people, life-size elephants and a cat doing penance, round a crack where the Ganga comes down from the sky. Up the hill behind it are Krishna's Butter Ball, a giant boulder that seems about to roll, the Varaha and Krishna cave temples, and the old and new lighthouses.

Two granite temples standing on the edge of the sea, built about 700 to 728 by the Pallava kings. They are part of the Mahabalipuram World Heritage Site. Rows of carved Nandi bulls line the walls, and the waves have worn the carving soft.

The oldest temple in Kanchipuram, built in sandstone by the Pallava king Rajasimha around 700. Small shrines run all round the courtyard, each carved with gods and lions, and some still have traces of old paint. It is on the west edge of town and much quieter than the big temples.

The largest temple in Kanchipuram, for Shiva as earth, with a gopuram about 59 m tall and a long hall of a thousand pillars. In the inner courtyard is an old mango tree said to be 3,500 years old, with each branch giving a different fruit in the story.

The goddess temple at the heart of Kanchipuram, for Kamakshi seated in a yoga pose. Its gold-covered tower over the shrine shines above the town, and the streets round it are where the silk shops start.

The great Vishnu temple of Kanchipuram, in the east of town. Its hundred-pillar hall is carved with horse riders, hunters and stone chains, and a big tank sits in the outer courtyard. The wooden Athi Varadar idol under the tank comes out only once every 40 years (next in 2059).