St. Mary's Islands

The Story

Millions of years ago, a volcano hurled out dense, viscous basaltic lava that cooled quickly. As the molten rock congealed, it contracted and cracked into a sequence of spider-web lines — forming the hexagons and polygons that today stand stacked like giant pencils on the shore.

The columns look as if they were cut by a stone mason — regular, smooth-sided, and impossibly precise. On Coconut Island, the largest of the group, the formations march down to the water's edge, where the sea has polished them into one of Bhārat's strangest coastlines.

Legend gives the islands a different origin story: local tradition says they are the petrified remains of the demon Darukasura, slain by the goddess Bhagavathi — making the site a place of both geology and pilgrimage, with an ancient church standing on the main island.