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Photo: Adityamadhav83, CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons
Bavikonda Buddhist Complex lies about 16 km from Visakhapatnam, in the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh, on a hill about 130 metres above mean sea level. The term Bavikonda in Telugu means a hill of wells. As per its name, Bavikonda is a hill which has wells for the collection of rainwater. Bavikonda Monastic ruins dates back to the 3rd century BCE.
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A collection of Buddhist monuments at the hilltop. It consists of a Maha Stupa, along with other votive stupas. It has a beautiful beach nearby.
11 km away from the city, this has become a popular tourist spot that even the locals frequent. A lot safer to wade into than the R.K. Beach, cradled among hills, this used to be an excellent beach away from the madding crowds. AP Tourism Development Corporation has a beach resort (Punnami) on the hillside overlooking the beach.
A crafts village showcasing and preserving the old, including woodwork, jewellery, clothes and local crafts of rural India. There are 36 stalls where you can buy assorted handicrafts and artwork. There is also an entire village where you can find realistic-looking sculptures of villagers carrying out their traditional crafts.
The zoo is home to native mammals like elephants, one-horned rhinos, tigers, lions, leopards, striped hyenas, dholes, sloth bears, gaurs, sambar deer and rhesus macaques, as well as exotic mammals like hippos, giraffes, zebras and chimpanzees. It also has birds including ostriches, rosy pelicans, grey herons, Indian peafowl and black swans. Furthermore, there are reptiles like crocodiles and gavials.