The road from Thiruporur to Nemmeli cuts through an expanse that is stalked by desolation. It’s a sweltering Sunday, and herds of cows and buffaloes graze on stray patches of grass. Besides these bovines, there’s nothing that is noticeably breathing and moving on this land. Motorists however sail over it taking a bridge that makes up a section of this road, which links two busy corridors — Old Mahabalipuram Road and East Coast Road. Under this vehicular overbridge winds the course of the curiously-named Great Salt Lake. Yes, it indeed shares its name with the mammoth saline lake in Utah, United States. The lake in Utah has a deluge of features to draw a cross-section, including hydrologists, geo-scientists, ecologists, land-artists and, of course, tourists. Chennai’s Great Salt Lake certainly pales in comparison, but where it touches Nemmeli, it does manage to have some admirers .
The backwaters at Kundrukadu in Kovalam
As a salt lake, it serves the purpose it has to. It’s endorheic, with the seawater that courses through it during times of favourable tidal action, getting trapped. With the water going only up through evaporation, salt is deposited in the land. Due to extremely high salinity, there is little greenery close to the course of the lake, except for patches of grass here and there. On this Sunday, the lake does not have a globule of water. Barren and stark, it glitters white in the sun like a well-polished slab of Makrana marble. The lake is part of a backwater course stretching from Muttukadu to a little beyond Mahabalipuram. The section that could be called The Great Salt Lake is between Nemmeli and Kovalam. According to a resident, decades ago, salterns would be set up to extract salt at the Nemmeli section of the lake. Until a few years ago, one would witness a similar exercise being carried out on a huge scale besides the Kovalam-Kelambakkam Road, which also has a bridge to facilitate the flow of the backwaters.
The approach road to the Great Salt Lake in the evening.
The Great Salt Lake draws a modest number of ‘tourists’, especially in the evening. At the crepuscular hour, from the east, a view of the winding road climbing onto bridge with a crimson sun hovering over it, can be breathtakingly beautiful. People hang around the bridge for the view and the gentle breeze. A grove of palm trees on the road leading to the lake is popular as a bivouacking spot, especially during summer. A warning: It’s better to head there as a group. Disappointed at not finding any water in the lake, I have my eyes peeled for a swab of moisture along its course, as I drive back to Chennai, taking East Coast Road. At Vadanemmeli, I notice water, but don’t find an easy route leading to it. Finally, I notice a pathway leading to a water-filled section of the backwater course, in Kundrukadu, Kovalam.
It’s noon and I have a promise to keep and head back home, but return to the spot in the evening, when I notice that the waters have receded as part of a diurnal tidal cycle. Here, paddling fibreboats, fishermen go fishing. Under the failing light, I take a boat ride. Except for a strikingly elegant painted stork foraging for food in the waters, the avian presence is not significant. However, I am told that early in the morning, a deafening twitter of birds would settle over the waters. I pencil in a date to visit these waters for this pre-dawn concert.
