Pilgrimage to St Alphonsa’s
Shrine & sight seeing tour of Munnar
- Simon Lasrado, Bangalore
Bangalore, Apr 30: Thirty three us, young & old from ten families across
6 parishes from Bangalore & Mangalore lead by Rev Fr Peter Mascarenhas,
delegation Superior of Montfort Fathers set out on a pilgrimage to St Alphonsa’s
Shrine on 23rd April late evening. After a 14.5 hours of journey by the train we
arrived at Kottayam railway station on the following afternoon. There we were
received by sisters of Diocesan Vocation Centre , & we all traveled by the
pre-arranged A/C bus for an hour to the pilgrim lodging facility also run by the
Diocesan Vocation Centre located just opposite the Shrine.
This Shrine is situated at a place called Bharananganam very close to Palai in Kottayam district. We visited the newly built Church, tomb shrine of St Alphonsa, the Convent and the Museum of all the relics of the saint. Rev Fr. Mascarenhas offered mass for the intentions of all the participants at the chapel adjacent to the shrine. Masses were offered on all the three days of the trip at Bharananganam & Munnar. All the participants were spiritually enriched by the homily. Rosary, singing of hymns & Konkani songs filled the journey. Hallmark of the trip was 12 young children, some were below 8 years among 33 participants who took active role both in singing hymns as well as Konkani songs. The Shrine, Church & the Museum-Convent are all beautifully built & maintained. Even the road to Bharananganam has been well laid & maintained by the Govt of Kerala.We used the bus for all our travel around Kottayam & Munnar for three days.
We also had a house-boat ride at
Komarakom near Kottayam & visited few sight seeing places at Munnar on the
following day like Eravikulam Park where we could see a rare kind of mountain
goats, Blossom Park where we could see variety of flowers, roses, cactii and
also visited Madupatty Dam, and Echo Point. There are many more tourist spots at
Munnar which may require two more days to see. Travel to Munnar is about 5 hours
from Bharananganam & at Munnar we stayed at a hostel run by Vijayapura Diocese
of Kottayam.
On the following day we started off to Ernakulam , after traveling for 4 hours
by bus reached Ernakulam. We visited St Mary’s Church & St Francis of Assissi’s
Church at Ernakulam. We also traveled across the sea by house boat to
Muttanchery near Cochin & visited Jewish Synagogue, only one of its kinds in
India.
We returned by the Ernakulam- Bangalore train leaving Ernakulam at 5:00PM &
arrived at Bangalore on 27th early morning at 04:15 AM.
For those interested in visiting the shrine following tips may be useful:
At Kottayam you need half a day to visit St Alphonsa’s Shrine & Shrine of
Blessed Chavara & another half a day more if you want to go for a boat ride at
Kumarakom. If you think of visiting Munnar which is about 5 hours drive from
Bharananganam plan a day or two more. In all a total of 4 days you can cover
both. For accommodation you can stay at Diocesan Vocation centre at Bharanganam
& Vijayapura Diocesan Hostel adjacent to Mount Carmel Church at Munnar. Both
these facilities are available if you are in a pilgrimage trip accompanied by a
priest at reduced rates. For pre arranged bus, sisters will help you to book it
in advance. This is the second trip arranged by Rev Fr Peter Mascarenhas,
earlier one was during Oct 2008 when there were 56 participants & group
experienced a miracle,during the trip.For any guidance / assistance you are
welcome to contact Rev Fr Peter Mascarenhas ( Tel +91 9448845137, smmpeter@yahoo.com
) or Joseph Veigas (+91 9886645671, veigas@rediffmail.com)