Cherpulassery Ayyapan Kavu — Attraction in Kerala

The Ayyappa Temple of Cheruppulasseri is very ancient and more than 1000 years old. Cherpulassery Sri AyyappanKavu is also known as Women’s Sabarimala, Malabar’s Sabarimala, Valluvanad’s Sabarimala, etc. As these names indicate, it is a very major Ayyapa temple. Mandala Pooja and Theeyattu from the first vrichikom. The main Ulsavam is celebrated for ten days in the Malayalam month of Kumbham. Main Prathistha or diety is Sree Ayyappan. Upaprathistas include Sree Ganapathy, Navagrahangal, Sree Brahma Rakshassu, Nagaraja, etc.. Event called Theeyattu starts on 1st of Vrichikam month of Malayalam calendar. It lasts for 40 days. Aarattu is on the 10th day of Uthram in Kumbham month. Also used to have Kalam Paattu on these days.

From November to January, tens of thousands of devotees from Palakkad, Malapuram and Thrissur districts reach Ayyappan Kavu to wear the Ayyappa mudra and to start their pilgrimage to Sabarimala. During this season, a number of Ayyappan Vilakku are also performed in front of the temple. Cherpulassery Ayyappan Kavu is one of the few temples where marriages are performed in the presence of Lord Ayyappa. A traditional temple art called Thiyyattu is also performed at the temple during the 10-day festival season. A Swayambu kshetra and covered with a gold Kavacham. Ilayada Nivedhyam is the specialty of this temple.

The annual festival is observed in Malayalam Kumbham month (February – March). Cherpulassery Ayyappan Kavu festival starts with flag hosting and ends with Arattu on the last day. The annual festival is noted for various rituals including Thiyyattu.

Thousands of people arrive on the day to witness various rituals and festivities. Special poojas are held during the festival days in which thousands of devotees participate. Chendamelam and panchavadyam also form a part of this festival. Parayeduppu and elephant procession provides a visual treat to the devotees.

Traditional performing arts, music and dance are staged during the period. The temple is traditionally decorated with plantain, coconut leaves, flowers, leaves, traditional...

What a terrible online booking system!!

I have been trying to book a pooja for the last 3 days and i am totally frustrated with the online system in place.

The issues i have seen are (1) In their online book a pooja screen, the "add to pooja" button is placed at the very top of the page while the listing of available poojas are more than a page long. That means, (a) you have to scroll down, (b) put a tick mark in the selected box (c) Scroll all the way to the top of the screen (d) Click add to pooja (e) Add name, nakshatra, quantity etc and (f) repeat the entire process if you have to book multiple poojas.

(2) I went through all these steps and when i reached the payment step, i was really surprised to find obscure names like "Bandhan Bank" while the most popular bank in India, which is "State Bank of India" was missing from the net banking option

(3) Since Amazon Pay was an option listed for payment, i created an Amazon pay account on my laptop purely to pay for this transaction. Guess what? The temple website will only accept amazon pay if paid on your cell phone and not your desktop

(4) After multiple tries that were extremely frustrating and that too over multiple days, i tried again today. After selecting the required poojas, i was going to make the payment using "pay as guest" option. Now the system says, my user name is already used. How can my user name be already used when i have not even created an account?

I have finally given up and decided to visit some other ayyappan temple rather than go through this torture again.

I would have given them zero stars for wasting my time. unfortunately i am forced to give atleast one star.

Being a government entity, i am not expecting any change or improvement. but i only wish to post my review simply as an alert for other...

The Cherpulassery Ayyappan Kavu is one among 108 Sastha temples. Here in this temple Lord Ayyappa resides as a family man with his Wife Prabha and Son Satyakan. The temple is also known as the 'Sabarimala of Malabar'.

The Temple located on the roadside itself with plenty of parking space available. On busy days the Parking is payable. It is also located very near to the Cherpulassery town.

The temple is almost 1200 years old with old Kerala Style Architecture.

The temple opens at 5:00am for Morning Darshan and closes at 11:00am. Then again it reopens at 5:00pm for Evening Darshan and then closes at 8:00pm. When there is Theeyattu, Nada closes after Theeyattu. During Udayasthamana Pooja and Ulsavam days there will be deviations from normal schedule.

Ganpati, Shiva, Navagraha, Nagam, Brahma rakshassu, Bairavan resides here as Upadevatha.

The temple is a must visit and not to miss spot when visiting Cherpulassery.

Nearest Busstand: Cherpulassery (750m) Nearest Main Railway Station: Shoranur Junction (17km) Nearest Airport: Cochin International...