Hampi... the city rocks... literally...
(Originally a mail to my family members!!!)
_________
Dear All,
First, i realize that its been some time that we are back from our Hampi-Hospet-Bijapur trip (Shamsunders wedding) and this mail can be termed late ... However badly i wanted to write these details - the photos didn't get downloded on time and hence the delay. But thinking about remembering Hampi while i recollect the moments... doesn't put the delay too bad
We started off on 30th June 2006 from Mumbai for Miraj by Mahalaxmi train. Well, reaching Dadar to catch the Mahalaxmi train was an event in itself... since it was a weekend and project delivery date for Rohini, we got into the hush-hush mode - office to home, some packing, locking doors and then running with the fear that we would miss Mahalaxmi exp. We left SEEPZ for GGN at 6:30 - not to mention the traffic - to catch Mahalaxmi at 8:30pm - "Just imagine". we had begun our eventful journey.
Thanks to GOD,we were just in time to catch Mahalaxmi - though Rohini had to get down at Bandra to help an ailing women in the train. atleast we managed to catch the train... Miraj came - another hr and half wait to catch another train - Chalukya exp - till Hubli. In Hubli we had lunch - light lunch - explored outside to cover for hush-hush misses of necessary accessories... and back on a Hampi exp for Hospet. We reached Hospet around 8:45pm... enquired in station and took their recommendation on accomadation - Hotel Malligi - to our surprise was a 3 star hotel - http://www.nivalink.com/malligi/index.html - while we were not sure of such an accomodation for a one night stay, we decided to stay put after a long and tiring journey...
Had dinner - and came across another interesting character - our waiter... he heard us speak marathi and enquired... he was from Solapur and gave a virtual tour of Hampi and some nice tips... while other customers sweared at him, he never gave us any private moment to eat our dinner... anyways, next day morning we got up had bread-butter for breakfast and bargained with a rick driver to show whole of Hampi (15 Temples) and Tungabhadra Dam for Rs. 250 (sans dam visit, Indica costs 850, Ambassdor costs 650 and local KSTDC bus costs 180Rs per seat) our plan was to come back by 3 or 4 - so we could take rest and reach hall early rather than late... however, that was not to happen and the reason is as below...
Hampi... historical city... Kishkinda of Ramayana age... when we set out to sight-see, we were not expecting much but ruins - as we have read.. however, the pleasant climate...the cool breeze... not so sunny climate... occassional drizzle... less bumpy roads.... ignorable crowds... cleanliness... greenery among huge rocks... and an informative driver Shivraj made us look forward to the whole trip...
we started with Virupaksha Temple - (for a one liner description) - The temple contains the shirines of Lord Shiva, Pampa and Bhuvaneshwari and the temple work style dates back to 11th or 12th century. Ofcourse, we offered our prayers to the lord there... and took some snaps - among them was a photo of group of people from a village - Talakal - that i need to send them... anyways, in the temple, there is a small place where the shadow for the huge front structure looks upside down - elementary physics funda - nevertheless interesting to see... also, in another place there would be a man who would ask you to peep in a mirror of dark room where his waving hands would be upside down. Then there was an Holy elephant at the door who would bless you on offerings of fruit or money - coconut? sorry, doesn't qualify for blessings!!! :)
next was Kadelekalu (gram seed) Ganesha - a monolithic statue told to be more than 25 feet high... however, don't think the temple is workshiped anymore - nevertheless its majestic... and hence tourist attraction... the scene from the temple is good... actually its in slope of Hemakatu hill... on one side it will be mountains and rocks while the other side you can see the Virupaksha market
then very nearby - another monilithic Ganesha called Sasivekalu (mustard seed) - we had a very short visit here.. however, the GOD is in open mandapa... huge again - probably 18 feet or so... fence around the mandapa and hence one cannot go in - there are watchmen at every such temples or monuments... place is kept really neat and clean... greenery around like a small garden.... kept beautiful.. we took another snap with the Talakal people...
next came Balakrishna temple - Unfortunately, the temple is empty but it was supposed to show young Krishna holding butter in the right hand... again, beautiful temple with side racks and too much of sculptures...
next was on the way - Twin sisters - Two huge huge rocks supporting each other... the story is - these were 2 sisters who announced Hampi as a worse/ugly/bad city and were cursed to be rocks... huge rocks... wow!!! see it to believe it... and to tell you more - there are mountains of rocks.. you would be surprised to see just rocks everywhere... and hence many of the idols are monolithic - no wonder...
then came the underground Shiva Temple - surrounding is beautiful but as you approach the 'gabhara' it did stink - was all dirty - probably the ling was not there - but we didn't venture inside... the steps in one of the snaps are from there... it was here that we enjoyed gusty winds...
we drove to HazariRama Temple passing some palace we saw from our chariot - the auto!!! Again lot of sculpture seen here - huge temple and beautiful... garden around it looked beautiful that day... it drizzled here... the walls contains - supposedly - stories from Ramayana.
then the Ugra Narasimha - Here Lord Narasimha - again huge statue with Adishesha hood... rest is all open... Currently you see just the Lord however, its says that there was statue of Lakshmi on his lap - Lakshmi's statue was destroyed during the mughal invasion and only a hand remains on the left side of his body.
near Ugra Narasimha is a Shivlinga called Badavi Linga meanin Poor mans Linga as it was commissioned by a poor lady. its again huge monolithic linga surrounded by water (maybe it was rain water - not sure) We had goTi soDa here.. :)
Visited the Zenana Mahat - required a ticket to purchase - beautifully maintainted area - had interesting structures like Lotus Mahal and Elephant stable... We had lotsa and lotsa of coconut water here... sat for some time and...
left for Vithala Temple - the musical temple - our last place of visit in this tour - We hired a guide here... and he told us about the origins and progress of the temple. the story is something like this... People before Krishnadevraya became king used to visit Pandharpur for Lord Vitthals darshan. however, they faced a lot of problems travelling etc... so, Krishnadevraya asked the Pandharpur guys to give the idol. obviously, they refused with lotsa conditions... so, our dear king decided to build his own temple - The Vitthala Temple. The Idols were ideal. however they were destroyed during islamic invasion and the gabhara is empty - only bats reign... interesting part is - one of the queens of the king was a 'nrityangana' (dancer) and the temple has a dancing hall - IMPORTANTLY - all the pillars of this hall is equivalent to different musical instruments - strings and beats - e.g tabala, mrudang, sitar etc... you need to just bang on the pillars and you hear the wonderful sound. now, you need to put your ear to the pillar - however, they say that when it was built the music could be heard in a radius of 1KM. amazing... really hard to describe the experience... also, you will see the beautiful chariot - the symbol of Hampi.. The wheels of the chariot actually moved... however, now are cemented... beautiful sculptures on the wall... portugese traders, design of bangles, place to keep paNti (lamps), route for rain water to form beautiful view and in the corner ONE single design for combination of multiple animals or idols seen from different angles - 1.some animal on frog back 2. Dog face 3. ShivLing and snake 4. Flying Hanuman 5.and i was so overwhelmed that i missed taking a snap!!! :( by the way - the musical pillars are not hollow cause the archeological dept has cut one to find out exactly whats in there...also, they are trying to rebuilt such pillars and German engineers are involved... amazing... we were rich with brains earlier...
and that was it - we ended with lunch as we spent a lot of time looking through only these - Hampi demands atleast 3 days of tourist attraction... and even that might be less... amazing place... worth visiting atleast twice - as DineshDada has done... we too will plan for a dedicated visit again...
we packed up and went to the wedding Hall...
(30th June) friday - left Mumbai, saturday - kept travelling, sunday - Hampi, monday - wedding, tuesday - Raamteerth (Dada-Vahini Wedding Anniversary - 4th July), wednesday - Torvi (Narasimha), thursday - reached Mumbai (6th July)
On 4th July - Which was Dada-Vahini's 3rd Wedding Anniversary - we - Mothe Kaka, myself and Baba - performed Abhishek on the Lord!!!
Chalo that was it - not all, but there are few snaps attached and will follow with mails with the same subject...
enjoy and take care!
regards
Rohini and Vinod
NOTE: Photos follow next 7 zips. However, I’ve zipped them into sets under 1 MB. I’m sorry for the trouble. However, hope that you will enjoy the quality compromised photos. For those who are not used to long mails - my sincere apologies - however, its just keeping in tune with the almost-established tradition of descriptive mails!!! so, enjoy!
_________
Dear All,
First, i realize that its been some time that we are back from our Hampi-Hospet-Bijapur trip (Shamsunders wedding) and this mail can be termed late ... However badly i wanted to write these details - the photos didn't get downloded on time and hence the delay. But thinking about remembering Hampi while i recollect the moments... doesn't put the delay too bad
We started off on 30th June 2006 from Mumbai for Miraj by Mahalaxmi train. Well, reaching Dadar to catch the Mahalaxmi train was an event in itself... since it was a weekend and project delivery date for Rohini, we got into the hush-hush mode - office to home, some packing, locking doors and then running with the fear that we would miss Mahalaxmi exp. We left SEEPZ for GGN at 6:30 - not to mention the traffic - to catch Mahalaxmi at 8:30pm - "Just imagine". we had begun our eventful journey.
Thanks to GOD,we were just in time to catch Mahalaxmi - though Rohini had to get down at Bandra to help an ailing women in the train. atleast we managed to catch the train... Miraj came - another hr and half wait to catch another train - Chalukya exp - till Hubli. In Hubli we had lunch - light lunch - explored outside to cover for hush-hush misses of necessary accessories... and back on a Hampi exp for Hospet. We reached Hospet around 8:45pm... enquired in station and took their recommendation on accomadation - Hotel Malligi - to our surprise was a 3 star hotel - http://www.nivalink.com/malligi/index.html - while we were not sure of such an accomodation for a one night stay, we decided to stay put after a long and tiring journey...
Had dinner - and came across another interesting character - our waiter... he heard us speak marathi and enquired... he was from Solapur and gave a virtual tour of Hampi and some nice tips... while other customers sweared at him, he never gave us any private moment to eat our dinner... anyways, next day morning we got up had bread-butter for breakfast and bargained with a rick driver to show whole of Hampi (15 Temples) and Tungabhadra Dam for Rs. 250 (sans dam visit, Indica costs 850, Ambassdor costs 650 and local KSTDC bus costs 180Rs per seat) our plan was to come back by 3 or 4 - so we could take rest and reach hall early rather than late... however, that was not to happen and the reason is as below...
Hampi... historical city... Kishkinda of Ramayana age... when we set out to sight-see, we were not expecting much but ruins - as we have read.. however, the pleasant climate...the cool breeze... not so sunny climate... occassional drizzle... less bumpy roads.... ignorable crowds... cleanliness... greenery among huge rocks... and an informative driver Shivraj made us look forward to the whole trip...
we started with Virupaksha Temple - (for a one liner description) - The temple contains the shirines of Lord Shiva, Pampa and Bhuvaneshwari and the temple work style dates back to 11th or 12th century. Ofcourse, we offered our prayers to the lord there... and took some snaps - among them was a photo of group of people from a village - Talakal - that i need to send them... anyways, in the temple, there is a small place where the shadow for the huge front structure looks upside down - elementary physics funda - nevertheless interesting to see... also, in another place there would be a man who would ask you to peep in a mirror of dark room where his waving hands would be upside down. Then there was an Holy elephant at the door who would bless you on offerings of fruit or money - coconut? sorry, doesn't qualify for blessings!!! :)
 |  |
next was Kadelekalu (gram seed) Ganesha - a monolithic statue told to be more than 25 feet high... however, don't think the temple is workshiped anymore - nevertheless its majestic... and hence tourist attraction... the scene from the temple is good... actually its in slope of Hemakatu hill... on one side it will be mountains and rocks while the other side you can see the Virupaksha market
then very nearby - another monilithic Ganesha called Sasivekalu (mustard seed) - we had a very short visit here.. however, the GOD is in open mandapa... huge again - probably 18 feet or so... fence around the mandapa and hence one cannot go in - there are watchmen at every such temples or monuments... place is kept really neat and clean... greenery around like a small garden.... kept beautiful.. we took another snap with the Talakal people...
next came Balakrishna temple - Unfortunately, the temple is empty but it was supposed to show young Krishna holding butter in the right hand... again, beautiful temple with side racks and too much of sculptures...
next was on the way - Twin sisters - Two huge huge rocks supporting each other... the story is - these were 2 sisters who announced Hampi as a worse/ugly/bad city and were cursed to be rocks... huge rocks... wow!!! see it to believe it... and to tell you more - there are mountains of rocks.. you would be surprised to see just rocks everywhere... and hence many of the idols are monolithic - no wonder...
then came the underground Shiva Temple - surrounding is beautiful but as you approach the 'gabhara' it did stink - was all dirty - probably the ling was not there - but we didn't venture inside... the steps in one of the snaps are from there... it was here that we enjoyed gusty winds...
we drove to HazariRama Temple passing some palace we saw from our chariot - the auto!!! Again lot of sculpture seen here - huge temple and beautiful... garden around it looked beautiful that day... it drizzled here... the walls contains - supposedly - stories from Ramayana.
then the Ugra Narasimha - Here Lord Narasimha - again huge statue with Adishesha hood... rest is all open... Currently you see just the Lord however, its says that there was statue of Lakshmi on his lap - Lakshmi's statue was destroyed during the mughal invasion and only a hand remains on the left side of his body.
near Ugra Narasimha is a Shivlinga called Badavi Linga meanin Poor mans Linga as it was commissioned by a poor lady. its again huge monolithic linga surrounded by water (maybe it was rain water - not sure) We had goTi soDa here.. :)
Visited the Zenana Mahat - required a ticket to purchase - beautifully maintainted area - had interesting structures like Lotus Mahal and Elephant stable... We had lotsa and lotsa of coconut water here... sat for some time and...
left for Vithala Temple - the musical temple - our last place of visit in this tour - We hired a guide here... and he told us about the origins and progress of the temple. the story is something like this... People before Krishnadevraya became king used to visit Pandharpur for Lord Vitthals darshan. however, they faced a lot of problems travelling etc... so, Krishnadevraya asked the Pandharpur guys to give the idol. obviously, they refused with lotsa conditions... so, our dear king decided to build his own temple - The Vitthala Temple. The Idols were ideal. however they were destroyed during islamic invasion and the gabhara is empty - only bats reign... interesting part is - one of the queens of the king was a 'nrityangana' (dancer) and the temple has a dancing hall - IMPORTANTLY - all the pillars of this hall is equivalent to different musical instruments - strings and beats - e.g tabala, mrudang, sitar etc... you need to just bang on the pillars and you hear the wonderful sound. now, you need to put your ear to the pillar - however, they say that when it was built the music could be heard in a radius of 1KM. amazing... really hard to describe the experience... also, you will see the beautiful chariot - the symbol of Hampi.. The wheels of the chariot actually moved... however, now are cemented... beautiful sculptures on the wall... portugese traders, design of bangles, place to keep paNti (lamps), route for rain water to form beautiful view and in the corner ONE single design for combination of multiple animals or idols seen from different angles - 1.some animal on frog back 2. Dog face 3. ShivLing and snake 4. Flying Hanuman 5.
and that was it - we ended with lunch as we spent a lot of time looking through only these - Hampi demands atleast 3 days of tourist attraction... and even that might be less... amazing place... worth visiting atleast twice - as DineshDada has done... we too will plan for a dedicated visit again...
we packed up and went to the wedding Hall...
(30th June) friday - left Mumbai, saturday - kept travelling, sunday - Hampi, monday - wedding, tuesday - Raamteerth (Dada-Vahini Wedding Anniversary - 4th July), wednesday - Torvi (Narasimha), thursday - reached Mumbai (6th July)
On 4th July - Which was Dada-Vahini's 3rd Wedding Anniversary - we - Mothe Kaka, myself and Baba - performed Abhishek on the Lord!!!
Chalo that was it - not all, but there are few snaps attached and will follow with mails with the same subject...
enjoy and take care!
regards
Rohini and Vinod
NOTE: Photos follow next 7 zips. However, I’ve zipped them into sets under 1 MB. I’m sorry for the trouble. However, hope that you will enjoy the quality compromised photos. For those who are not used to long mails - my sincere apologies - however, its just keeping in tune with the almost-established tradition of descriptive mails!!! so, enjoy!
posted by Vinod Kaulgud at 5:43 AM
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