6 Best Sights in Mumbai, India

This serene, criminally undervisited temple complex is considered one of the city's holiest sites. It's also the oldest surviving structure in Mumbai. The small, somewhat dilapidated temples are built around a holy pool of water and surrounded by the ever-encroaching houses of Mumbai's newer residents. Cows and people mingle freely here, as do bathers who come to obtain the purportedly healing powers of the water. Life around here harks back to earlier, more traditional times.

To get the flavor of a large, traditional Indian temple that's nevertheless jammed in the heart of a busy city, a visit to the Babulnath Temple is a must. And climbing the few hundred steps to reach the temple, perched on a hillside, will also reward you with a panorama of South Mumbai. The first Babulnath Temple was apparently built by Raja Bhimdev in the 13th century and named after the babul trees (a type of acacia native to India) that forested this area. The architecture of this imposing shrine, one of Mumbai's most important, isn't especially remarkable, but it's interesting to watch the melée of worshippers coming, going, and milling about. Outside are rows of flower sellers hawking a temple-visit kit—coconut plus flowers plus rock sugar—and a cluster of vendors concocting sweets in karhais (large woks) in the open air. Temple authorities are sometimes prickly about allowing foreigners into the innermost areas, but it's worth a try; more often than not they don't object. For Rs. 2 you can avoid the climb and take the elevator.

Set far out on a thin, rocky jetty in the Arabian Sea, this striking, dilapidated white shrine was built in honor of the Muslim saint Haji Ali, who drowned here some 500 years ago on a pilgrimage to Mecca. When a coffin containing his mortal remains floated to rest on a rocky bed in the sea, devotees constructed the tomb and mosque to mark the spot. The shrine is reached by a long walkway just above the water.

At high tide the walkway is submerged, making the shrine unreachable. But walking there when the sea has completely receded is not too romantic, because the exposed rocks smell of garbage; choose a time in between.

The walkway is lined with destitute families and beggars ravaged by leprosy, some writhing, chanting, and (calling on the Muslim tradition of giving alms) beseeching you as you make your way down—this can be a deeply upsetting experience, but it's one that is unfortunately quintessentially Mumbai. Inside, the shrine is full of colored-mirror mosaics and crowded with worshippers praying over the casket, which is covered with wilted flower garlands. Men and women must enter through separate doorways. On many evenings a busker plays

(a style of Muslim music) after the sunset prayers. There's no admission charge, but you may consider giving between Rs. 20 and Rs. 50 to the mosque charity box. The shrine closes at 10 pm.

What may be the most impressive temple in Mumbai belongs to the prosperous, strictly vegetarian Jains, the largely Gujarati followers of Lord Mahavira. The colorful interior of their main Mumbai temple is filled with marble, but at the same time it's understated and peaceful—check out the intricate work on the walls and ceilings. Jain worship here is rather different from the general chaos at Hindu temples; it's more introspective and humble in aspect, which reflects the Jain faith. At around 8 am daily, freshly bathed Jain devotees in swaths of unstitched off-white cloth walk here barefoot from their nearby—often quite ritzy—homes to pay homage to the splendid idol of Adinath, an important Jain prophet. (Jains show respect by arriving clean and without shoes—originally Jains used to wear only a silk cloth, the highest quality and hence most respectful material, but plenty now also wear cotton, and many others simply make do with ordinary clothes.)

Children love playing on the "Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe" structure here, at this small park on the eastern side of the top of Malabar Hill. It's primarily a children's playground—and an old-school one at that, so if your kids are used to the finer things, this park may seem impossibly quaint—but it also has gorgeous views of the city below that are worth checking out if you happen to be in the area. From the special viewpoint clearing you can see all of Marine Drive and the Mumbai skyline, from Chowpatty Beach to Colaba Point—try to come up after dark to see why Marine Drive, sparkling with lights, is known as the Queen's Necklace. Just across the road another park, the Hanging Gardens (also known as the Pherozeshah Mehta Gardens), also has pleasant views and a topiary garden. A few minutes north of here, heading down the hill, are the Towers of Silence, where Mumbai's Parsis—followers of the Zoroastrian faith—dispose of their dead. Pallbearers carry the corpse to the top of one of the towering cylindrical bastions, where it is left to be devoured by vultures and crows (a roughly two-hour process) and decomposed by the elements. None of this is visible to would-be onlookers, even relatives, and high walls prevent any furtive peeping.

This charming, old-fashioned three-story Gujarati house, painted brown and cream and in a quiet, tree-shaded Parsi neighborhood on Malabar Hill, was the home of Mahatma Gandhi from 1917 to 1934. Now overseen and lovingly maintained by the Gandhi Institute, it houses a library and an interesting and attractively presented small museum on Gandhi's life and work. Gandhi's simple belongings are displayed in his room, including his original copies of the Bible, the Koran, and the Bhagavad Gita (a famous discourse within the ancient Indian epic, the Mahabharata); other displays include spectacular colorful miniature dioramas of his life, photographs, and some important and moving letters from the fight for Indian independence. Don't miss the humble and polite letter to Adolf Hitler asking him to not go to war.