Voyage 361

Wayanad Greens

Sun rise through the Chembra peak

Oct 27^th 2012, it was yet another weekend but with a difference, since we were heading towards Kerala and my first time crossing Kerala border. So was a lot excited about it, and had done enough research on the places to visit in Wayanad and the routes from Bangalore. After lots of googling and discussions we settled with the plan to go by Nagarhole route which passes by Nagarhole National Park and Wayanad Tholpetty Wildlife Sanctuary. En-route cover Irrupu falls and reach the resort which we had booked in Kalpetta, on the same day evening planned for Pookode Lake and on the next day cover Lakkidi and Banasura sagar dam. In reality though the plan didn’t change but time we thought we reach changed dynamically.

First things first, about the place and places to visit in Wayanad district,

So referred here as green as you find lots of greenery all around, with tea and coffee estates being common. Two of the greatest peaks to conquer, one being Chembra peak and the other Banasura Hills both of over 2000m above sea level. Lots of waterfalls to make you really wet Meenmutty, Kanthanpara, Soochipara to name a few. Some of them to explore like Banasura falls, Karlad Lake, Neelimala view point, Sunrise valley view point, Chethalayam Water Falls. Some popular places like Edakkal caves, Therunelly Temple, Lakkidi view point. There are a few more popular water bodies apart from waterfalls including Kuruva Islands, Banasura sagar dam and Pookode Lake. Tholpetty wildlife sanctuary and Muthanga wildlife sanctuary for wildlife enthusiasts.

Travelogue:

Route taken:

Day1: Bangalore-Mandya-KRS Road-Hunsur-Nagarhole-Kutta-Irrupu-Kutta-Kalpetta-resort-Chundale-Vythiri-Pookode lake-Resort

Day2: Resort-Kalpetta-Banasura sagar dam- Pozhuthana-Vythiri-Lakkidi view point-Chain tree-Kalpetta-Sultan Bathery-Muthanga-Bandipur-Gundlupet-Mysore Palace Road-Bangalore

Total distance covered: 705km

We were all packed our luggage on Friday night with all the batteries charged and it was sat early morning 4.30am we left east Bangalore in a mini bus and after two pickup points we were officially outside Bangalore at around 6am, we were already 30min out of our schedule. All of them were sleeping, we were near Ramanagara where we had some spectacular beauty of sunrise with sun turning out to be completely orange. Having had the beautiful morning we crossed by Maddur by 7.30am, we missed the breakfast here as it was still early to have food. After reaching nearby Srirangapatna we took right towards ranganathittu on the KRS road which we thought is a shortcut since it won’t run into the Mysore city, later turned out to be a completely wrong decision as the road was in a really bad condition making our day a little tired, after a long time we finally routed back to the Mysore-Hunsur road, we were happy to see the road so smooth and we reached hunsur by 9am for our breakfast (We were already 1hr behind our schedule reason being 3 pickup points and lazy loading of luggage and taking KRS road). After having some masala dosa’s we headed towards Nagarhole road. Here be careful about the road since there is one more route which goes by Gonikoppal(don’t take this route). We were carrying Google navigation on android device and also were taking the local people advice about the routes.

Nagarhole Road

Chital herd at Nagarhole

The Nagarhole road is also not in good condition and for our bad luck we rarely spotted any wildlife inside Nagarhole until we reached the forest office in Nagarhole were we spotted a lot of deer’s and only deer’s. We then reached Kutta and took a diversion towards Irrupu falls. We were at Irrupu temple at almost 12 noon since the road from kutta to Irrupu is again bad and very narrow for our mini bus to pass by. We parked our vehicle in front of Irrupu temple and started to trek towards Irrupu falls. There is an entrance ticket of 20Rs/person. The trek is for a km and is easy. There is a small hanging bridge which you’ve to pass on the other side of the river stream, after which there are steps paved all the way till the falls. Irrupu falls is actually a cascading waterfall which slides from the rocks from inside the forest and slides from a height of 170ft in many drops which makes it more beautiful. Best thing about this falls is we can actually play in the water and sit below the falls, except during monsoons when the water level will be high. We spent almost 45mins playing in water and relaxed sitting below the waterfalls where the water falls from a height on top of your body giving a bumpy body massage. For photo enthusiasts this place is like a heaven as you can play with your exposures and can shoot the beautiful nature all around and the numerous butterflies flying all around you. I spotted a big one and a white butterfly with a curvy wings and a blue butterfly which I had earlier never seen, not even in butterfly park of Bannerghatta.

We headed back towards the parking area, the actual trek up was only about 15min and down was less than 10mins. There are restrooms at the parking place but were dirty as in all other tourist spots in India.

Pookode lake

We left the place at 1.30pm and headed towards our resort, on the way had our lunch which we had packed (Dharwad rottti’s). We again went through a rutted ride till we reached Kerala border, through Tholpetty wildlife sanctuary. After travelling for some time we reached the check-post and paid tax of Rs3,500 to enter Kerala since we were in a commercial vehicle. The road then turned out to be bad again for almost 1 hour till we reached Kalpetta, and then we reached our resort at 4pm (here our schedules were actually too far to imagine). It was a quick decision to take as it was about to get dark and for information all the tourist spots in Wayanad closes by 5-5.30pm. So in no time checked in to the resort and headed back towards Pookode lake. On the route you pass by Chandale tea estates which was pretty scenic and then for our fate the road was jammed completely near the lake, so we had to walk till the lake which made it a little more delay and we reached the lake entrance only by 5.15pm, and were disappointed to see the booting closes by 5pm, but a little lucky a we were allowed to enter inside the lake and the lake entry also closes by 5.30pm. The whole area was so much crowded that we felt it more crowded than Lalbagh flower show. We realized that it was a festival weekend with Bakrid and Dasherra festivals just behind. The entrance ticket here was Rs15/person and Rs25/camera. We had a walk around the lake and it was pleasant to walk away from the crowd.

Pookode Lake

This lake is better than the Ooty Lake since it has a walkway all around the lake. One more interesting thing about this lake is there are thousands of spiders with huge spider webs all through the walkway around the lake; we also spotted a huge yellow snail which was a rare sight. After spending some time in the lake we came out and it was still traffic outside.

Hundreds of such spiders were found in Pookot lake

The doors of the lake close by 6pm, so you cannot stay inside after 6pm. We reached the resort by 7pm and for our surprise we spotted the amazing view of the Chembra peak in the moon light, right from the balcony where we were staying. We had our dinner and spent some time playing till we ended our day, with excitement to see the sunrise early morning through the Chembra peak valley.

The next morning I got up at 4.30am and got ready before everyone woke, it was 5.30am when the first sights of light fell on the valley turning Chembra peak into light blue hills. Slowly the view turned out to be more exiting as I continued to enjoy the view for another 30mins before everyone woke up and started getting amazed about the view.

Early morning view of Chembra peak valley

It was around 6.30am when we had our coffee in the balcony having a nice view of the coffee plantations below and the tea estates below the Chembra valley. Sun started rising above the mountains, but unfortunately behind the trees, else we would have a wonderful sunrise view from our balcony itself. It was around 8am before everyone arrived at the breakfast having views of the valley along the dining hall. We had some bread butter jam and puri’s and Kerala special Puttu, which was new for me.

In the middle of Coffee estates

We then started our trek down the hill by 9am started with the coffee estates and then passed by a small water stream and then climbed up through the coffee estates before we could open up with the most amazing moment of the whole trip, we suddenly ended up being in the tea estates and the view was more thrilling to see the Chembra peak behind it and endless tea estates all around. We just walked through the tea estates for some time enjoying the tranquility of the nature and then turned back towards the resort to checkout and it was by 11am we left the resort towards Banasura sagar dam.

Coffee seeds

Panorama of 5 stitched photos of the tea estates

View of resort where we stayed from the tea estates

view of the Chembra peak through the tea estates

Reached the dam at 12noon (which was wrong time to visit dam since it was damn hot sun), we parked the vehicle and took entrance tickets and jeep tickets to go to top of the dam, Entrance charges were Rs15 and Jeep charges were Rs80 for 8persons for both pickup and drop. It was crowded even in the afternoon and we had to wait for the jeep service for 30mins. After we reached the top of the dam spent some time in the park area and then moved towards the boating area to get the tickets for speed boating, but we were again disappointed to see the board saying 2hrs waiting, so we had to drop the plan for going for speed boating as it was not worth waiting for 2hrs in the hot sun.

There is no good place to hang out at the dam area and can’t spend more than 30mins. So we had some group photo and started back towards the parking area through the Jeep.

Banasura Sagar Dam

We left at around 2.30pm towards our last destination Lakkidi. The road from Banasura to Vythiri is very scenic, at the first few kilometer you pass by the dam backwaters and later once you cross Achoor until Vythiri there are tea estates on both sides of the road which made the journey more fascinating.

View from Banasura-vythiri Road near Pozhuthana

After Vythiri about 4km towards Kozikode you reach Lakkidi, which is the gateway to Wayanad and suddenly you witness the breathtaking view of the Thamarassery Ghats at about 700m above sea level. It was 4pm when we reached Lakkidi view point.

Lakkidi View Point

From here you get to see the valley down at a greater depth, making it difficult to view at distances, also the highway which goes by the Ghats is visible from here. Due to the sudden depth of the valley there is a lot of variation in the climate here, in a matter of few minutes the mist can cover the roads and after some time you can have a clear sky.

Ghat road as seen from Lakkidi

View point at Lakkidi

Ghat road as seen from Lakkidi

If you are too lucky you can witness clouds covering the mountains and mist is not covered so that you can get a clear view. So evening time and sunrise time would be ideal, expect there shouldn’t be any rains, else you won’t get a proper view because of the mist.

After spending some time here we headed back towards Bangalore, on the way stopped for lunch at Chain tree and had some Kerala special Kerala parota, glad we liked it a lot, some of the best Kerala parota I ever had. One note here is that you almost never see a pure veg restaurant in Wayanad, so either search for the only udupi restaurant somewhere near sultan bathery or settle down for some decent restaurant whenever you spot.

Chain tree

After having lunch here we left lazy at around 6pm nonstop towards Bangalore, as we had lunch late we didn’t stop for dinner, instead we had snacks and bread in the bus itself. Again the roads were in bad condition somewhere near gundlupet and then passed by Mysore Palace having the night view of the city it was looking so clean and pleasant compared to ever busy Bangalore roads. We reached Bangalore around 1am and after all the drops we finally ended up in east Bangalore at around 2.30am. It was one more unforgettable trip for me with all the excitements, embarrassments, disappointments and beautiful memories.

We had to drop our plans of visiting Soochipara falls since we already visited Irrupu falls and also didn’t think of Edakkal caves to avoid the weekend crowd.

Note: Nagarhole closes from 6am-6pm and Bandipur closes from 9pm-6am on the Wayanad Mysore routes. So plan schedules accordingly.

Photos of Resort:

Related Posts

A Visit to the Ooty Gardens

Weekend drive to Mysore

Micromax Superfone Canvas 2 A110(Jet Black/Calm White):

After using it for a week, I felt pretty good about my decision for going with a new brand like Micromax over the mighty Samsung Galaxy S Duos and Sony Tipo Dual. Particularly not sure about its reliability but the build quality looks pretty decent. Below are my ratings for the phone aka Phablet.

Build Quality (8/10):

The build quality was above my expectations keeping in mind of the price tag, from front it looks just like a Galaxy high end smartphone like SIII or Note II. It has a matte finished back cover which is good for protection towards scratches and there is a metal casing all around the phone, which adds up the beauty of the phone. One more advantage of this phone is it has a touch home button instead of a hard button as seen in iPhone and Galaxy phones.

Camera (5/10):[8MP autofocus (Tap to Focus), dual flash, supports up to 3264x2448 pixels, Panorama]

Don't fall for the specs as it is said to be 8MP but it gives a 5MP quality, under low light or in indoors don't even expect to get a satisfactory image, although outdoors it gives pretty good photos. The only positive about the camera is it has auto focus which can be spotted on the screen and the focus can be set manually. Although it a dual flash it can barely spread the light on the subject. It gives pretty decent panorama pics.

Secondary Camera (7/10): [0.3MP, resolution 640x480 pixels]

Secondary camera does its job for video chatting, nothing more can be expected here; you can also click photos of 640x480.

Video Recording (8/10):[supports up to 1280x720 pixels@30fps, continuous focus]

The best part of the camera so far is its video recording. It records in HD and the video is seamless and smooth, trust me I have handy cam, compact camera and DSLR, but I feel this video being top class, may be not up to the mark of DSLR but definitely better than most compact camera’s. Most interesting part is it has a continuous automatic focus, so u need not to worry about focusing, you can just keep capturing your best moments.

Basic Phone performance (9/10): [dual SIM-GSM+GSM]

Coming to the most basic phone performance the call clarity is pretty good and has a noise reduction from both sides of the mic so you can hear better and talk clearer. The phone coverage is also very good. I no more loose calls while in lift. I use two SIM cards Tata DoCoMo and Airtel, standby for both the SIM is good without any problem.

Connectivity (6/10): [3G, GPRS, Bluetooth 3.0, Wi-Fi, USB 2.0]

It provides USB charging and connects to my PC without any problems. Coming to the Bluetooth path I tried searching for a galaxy phone but couldn’t find it, may be the reason is since there were more than 15 devices already found, but suddenly when I tried searching a Micromax phone I was able to find it, strange but confused. The Bluetooth file transfer was done without any problems. Last and most important part is the Wi-Fi, this device lacks a bit when it comes to connecting to Wi-Fi compared to connecting from iTouch and Laptop, couldn’t connect to the Wi-Fi from far. But no problems downloading even big files, I did install a 600MB game by downloading directly on phone from Google play store.

Speed/Response Time (7/10): [1 GHz dual core ARMv7 Processor, Mediatek Chipset, PowerVR Graphics]

The response time and touch sensitivity was pretty decent compared to other smart phones with higher price tag, but low when compared to SIII and Note II. There was no lag in opening apps and while using the home screen, but after installing Go Launcher and many go launcher apps and with live wallpaper the response time became a bit slow since the RAM is less for a phone with high configurations.

Screen (7/10): [16.8 million color, 12.5CM (5") IPS screen, FWVGA 480 x 854 pixels, 196 ppi, 5point multi touch, Screen Protection- AGC Sodaline]

The screen looks huge and bright, but without CORNING® GORILLA® GLASS it is more prone to scratches, so a scratch guard is a must, it is already available in the market. The resolution is quite decent, and with IPS it is easier to view the display from any angle. The color looks more vivid compared to most of the phones under Rs20,000. The screen is bright enough to be visible in sunlight outdoors.

Design (9/10): [Dimensions-147 x 76.5 x 9.7 mm]

The best part of the phone is its looks and design, many of my friends felt it as Note II or SIII, though the design looks pretty identical to these phones, it has a unique back panel with matte finish, giving more grip to hold this huge phone in single hand. The Camera bezel at the back sits above the body of the phone making it more prone to breakage. It is very sleek in design about 9.7mm.

Video playback/Video Streaming (8/10):

The video playback is one more good thing about this phone, although I played videos with 480x854 resolution and didn’t tried playing HD and full HD videos, the result was a smooth and steady playback, without any lag in time. Also tried viewing youtube videos in HQ and there was no buffering nor any lag time, which was quite amazing with the big screen.

Music Playback with speakers/earphone (7/10):

I play songs more often on phone and this phone felt comfortable with the play back quality and the sound looks better on earphone. There are many options including equalizer and bass booster, reverb, which can be very handy while playing different kind of music. One can try a higher quality earphone to make best use of the music player. There is FM radio also and it the clarity is just average but there is feature to auto search next station and display the station name and the song details currently being played and can also be recorded. The speaker is less audible but gives a clear output.

Gaming (6/10):

This phone may not be for the high end games, but most of the games can be played without any problem.

Battery Life (7/10): [2000 mAh]

This has a jumbo battery with 2000mAh, after using it for almost a week the average battery life comes around 1day, with more than 4hrs of usage which includes 50% of playing games, browsing with Wi-Fi, watching videos; and remaining 50% usage includes listening to music, camera and phone calls. Being a smart phone with the specs you expect it to come for 2 days after moderate to heavy usage. The average charging time is around 3hrs.

Memory (5/10): [RAM-512 MB, External SD- supports up to 32GB, For V1 ROM : Inbuilt Memory-500 MB & Internal SD-2.5 GB; and For V3 ROM : Inbuilt Memory-1.48 GB(available) & Internal SD-1.05 GB]

One of the major drawbacks of this phone is its low RAM memory. After installing all my apps I barely have less than 100MB RAM available for running apps. Having high configuration and features, it also needs to have at least 1GB RAM, this may lead to slowing down the phone when multi-tasking. Can’t install many RAM intensive software’s like launchers and live wallpapers. The internal memory is pretty decent with available memory of 2.5GB. It has an option to insert microSD card up to 32GB, which many High end smart phones doesn’t allow including Xperia and HTC phones.

OS (9/10): [Android Ice Cream Sandwich 4.0.4, upgradable to Jelly Bean 4.1.1]

It runs on the most powerful mobile OS Android ICS, and can install apps from android market. Now you can upgrade to JB too.

Ease of Use (8/10):

It is pretty user friendly with volume controls on the left side and power button on the right, making it easily reachable from the fingers considering its jumbo size. The 3.5mm jack is provided on the top along with the USB, the USB connecter is a standard one which can be used from any other micro USB cables.

Value for Money (9/10): Rs9,999

Considering its specifications and performance it is pretty good value for your money.

Overall Rating: 7.4/10

If you are looking for high end specs and decent build quality with lesser budget then this is the best bet.

Quick pros:

1. Sleek and high end design

2. video recording and playback

3. price

Quick Cons:

1. Camera

2. RAM

3. Although has acceleration transducer, direction sensor, and proximity sensor but lacks gyroscope and light sensor.

Small update after a month of usage,
No complaints yet, tried with 2G netowrk and GPS on long drives, though GPS takes a lot of time to get the position it was accurate, and on 2G internet it was pretty slow. At times the phone gets a little lag but not at all a problem. I uninstalled the Go launcher since it was becoming a little slow. Launchers are not advised and even task managers are not required.

Regarding the basic accessories for this phone, the screen guard is in the market specially made for this model, and it costs anywhere between Rs100 - Rs300, glossy one is recommended over the matte. Also there are many different kinds of covers available, S-line silicone back cover is specially designed for A110, with a small stand while watching videos, it costs from Rs150-Rs200. There is also a flip cover just like Galaxy Note, which is priced at 400Rs and more. All these are available in www.ebay.in

Here are some of the sample pics (unedited) clicked from my Micromax A110.

And finally the sample video captured from the Micromax Canvas2

Update (08-Mar-2013) after 100days of usage:

Good news for Micromax A110 Canvas 2 users, Android Jelly Bean update coming next week.
But watch out! unlike the Samsung, Sony or HTC, Micromax is not offering an OTA (over the air) update for A110 Canvas 2 or neither you can do it by connecting to computer. But as they say, something is better than nothing, you can do it by taking your phone to the nearest Micromax service center. What you have to make sure is, you will need to call the nearest Micromax service center, make sure the service center has received the relevant firmware before you physically head for the service center to get your Micromax A110 Canvas 2 flashed with the latest Jelly Bean. Keep posting you experience after you update to JB 4.1

Update (15-Mar-2013) :
As promised Micromax official upgrade to Jelly Bean is out on the net and in service centres.
Follow the detailed steps from the below link on upgrading to 4.1.1 (Jelly Bean from ICS) right from your home PC.
Upgrade to Jelly Bean from home PC, I've done it successfully from genuine Micromax upgrade, now you do it to enjoy jelly UI flow
http://sandeepyc.blogspot.com/2013/03/micromax-a110-jb-update.html

For detailed steps on taking backup of your phone data and apps click here

Keep posting your comments on the phone, i try to give out the response at real time.

Brought new phone and confused about what apps to install??
Here is my collection of 20 Must have Free apps for Android ICS
http://sandeepyc.blogspot.in/2012/12/20-must-have-free-andriod-apps-for-ics.html

Official link: http://www.micromaxsuperfone.com

20 Must have free Andriod apps for ICS

Developer:MAGIX
Category:Photography
Camera MX

Get creative with your camera - combine effects and photo frames live in the camera. Optimize and edit your best photos. More than 20 customizable realtime photo effects: HDR, Vintage Lomo, Tilt-shift, Pop Art, Sepia etc.

Developer: Fingertips Software
Category:Tools

Desi Calendar provides a view of all Indian festival in a Calendar format. Now you would not miss any Indian festival and would not have to go through multiple web sites to find the dates for each of the festival. Desi Calendar does it for you.

Developer:Adobe Systems
Category:Productivity

The global standard for reliably viewing and sharing PDF documents
Adobe® Reader® is the free, trusted leader for reliably viewing and interacting with PDF documents across platforms and devices. Install the free Adobe Reader mobile app to work with PDF documents on your Android tablet or phone. Easily access, manage, and share a wide variety of PDF types, including PDF Portfolios, password-protected documents, fillable forms, and Adobe LiveCycle® rights-managed PDF.

Developer:Rovio Mobile Ltd.
Category: Arcade & Action

The most exciting of avian adventures continues!
What happens when everyone's favorite fierce fowl get caged and shipped to Rio? They get very angry!

Developer:srsdev
Category:Personalization
PicSpeed HD Wallpapers 300,000

Simple and easy to use wallpaper application. Free backgrounds hd wallpapers.
** The BIGGEST collection of TOP QUALITY wallpapers, images and pictures for any taste. Every image is FREE and AMAZING! **

Developer:appjigger studios
Category:Personalization
wp clock design live wallpaper

This stylish design live wallpaper clock will display a lot of useful informations directly on your home screen :
- time, date, month, year and week or day of the year;
- wifi / wlan (SSID) & telephony provider with signal strength and network type (like umts, hsdpa, lte, 3g, edge)
- battery status in % with charging icon
- current weather and temperature (celsius or fahrenheit and weather condition)

Developer:Wasabi
Category:Personalization
Galaxy S3 Dandelion LWP

Get Galaxy S3 Dandelion on your devices!
Download the free Galaxy S3 Dandelion live wallpaper featuring flying seeds.
Now with "Water Droplet" effect! Enable this effect in the settings screen.
Touch or tap the screen to add water drops on your home screen!
wallpaper contains "NO notification or icon ads"!!

Developer:sportstracklive.com
Category:Tools

The popular free "StopWatch & Timer" app on Android. Clean, simple and reliable.

Developer: Anuj Tenani
Category:Media & Video
Hide It Pro

Hide the Pictures/Videos you don't want anyone to see.
Hide Pictures ,Videos, Applications, Messages , Calls in your phone. COMPLETELY FREE and UNLIMITED version.

Developer: TeslaCoil Software
Category:Personalization

Highly customizable, performance driven, home screen replacement for Android 4.0+
Accept no substitutes! Nova Launcher is the original and most polished customizable launcher for Android 4.

Developer: Sunny Moon
Category:Tools

most powerful and fully featured Unit converter, Currency converter and Calculator. Features fast, real time currency and unit conversion in a clean interface.

Developer: Merriam-Webster Inc.
Category:Books & Reference

In addition to all the definitions from Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, this app offers voice search – to let you look up a word without having to spell it – along with synonyms, antonyms, example sentences, Word of the Day, and more.
The app is free, and supported by ads. No internet connection is required to view any of the definitions.

Developer: AVAST Software
Category:Tool avast! Mobile Security

Full-featured, best/top-rated Android antivirus & security app.
Antivirus: Scans installed apps and memory card content on demand and new apps upon first use.

Developer:SHAPE
Category:Communication
IM+

IM+ supports all major IM services, including Facebook, Skype (as in-app purchase), MSN/Live Messenger, Google Talk, Yahoo!, AIM/iChat, ICQ, RenRen, Jabber, MeinVZ, Gadu-Gadu, mig33, SINA Weibo, Fetion, Mamba.Ru, VKontakte, Odnoklassniki.Ru, Yandex IM and Mail.Ru Agent.

Developer:Android Does
Category:Personalization
Fancy Widgets

Personalize your Android home screen with highly customizable clock widgets, weather widgets, home (clock & weather) widgets, forecast widgets, and more with lots of customization options.

Developer:J2 Interactive
Category:Media & Video

MX Player - The best way to enjoy your movies, with HARDWARE DECODING, MULTI-CORE DECODING, PINCH TO ZOOM, SUBTITLE SCROLL, KIDS LOCK.

Developer:Opera Software ASA
Category:Communication
Opera Mobile web browser

The premium web experience for rich, interactive content on mobile devices.Fast, smooth and easy to use, when you're browsing on a tablet or smartphone, Opera Mobile helps you get more out of your time online, whether you're finding information or relaxing with entertainment

Developer: Teragon
Category:Personalization

This live wallpaper features tree silhouette, on top of a morning sky background with soft cloud moving, birds flying, and rainbow appearing occasionally.

Developer: Nikolay Ananiev
Category:Tools
Tiny Flashlight + LED

Flashlight app. Use your device's camera LED / flash / screen as a torch.
Flashlight app for your device! Incredibly simple and yet very useful flashlight application. Will use your device's camera LED / flash / screen as a torch.

Developer:Kingsoft Office Software Corporation Limited
Category:Business
Kingsoft Office 5.2.1 (Free)

Kingsoft Office is the only mobile Office with full-features FREE. Support for running on Android 2.1 and above system.
Support 23 kinds of files, including DOC/DOCX/TXT/XLS/XLSX/PPT/PPTX/PDF

Follow up on Belur, Halebid, Gadag, and Posts on Bangalore and Shivanasamudra falls.

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Bagalkot Heritage Drive:

November, just when the cold breeze starts cooling up the environment which is the ideal time for going on long drives especially to hot regions like Bagalkot. This was yet another trip but not until experiencing the 1500years old chalukyan world, it was just like passing by the Ancient Indian world. I must say that, this was not another boring heritage drive, but most exiting trip of prehistoric India.

Though this was a pretty long drive but never felt boring, covering 1,150km in 3 days 4 nights. The experience was so long that it can’t be written in a single post so I’ll be writing in several sections.

Bagalkot Heritage Drive - Day 1 – Almatti

Day1: Bangalore - Tumkur - Chitradurga - Hospet - Kushtagi - Ilkal - Hungund - Almatti back waters - Rock Garden - Fountain Garden – Kudala Sangama

Distancecovered: 521km

Placesvisited: Almatti back waters, Rock Garden (Silver Lake, Reptile Park, & Sunrays Park), Musical Fountain Garden

Entrance Plaza

Travelogue: It was Friday (TGIF) & we started from Bangalore early morning before the sunrise & zipped in through the NH4, awesome road should be the best one at least in Karnataka, can easily drive through 150km/h till half the way. On the way enjoyed the sunrise on NH4 & had breakfast on the way which we packed from home. Reached Chitradurga at around 10am & then the road condition started changing a bit & it was some NH13 which leads till our destination Almatti, but still no problem with the roads throughout the journey, passed by Hospet & again it was still a 4-lane NH. After passing by Kudala Sangama you pass by the Mallaprabha river bridge & just after that you have to take a left turn away from the NH13, into the Almatti road, Almatti is around 7km from the NH13.

Roads of Almatti

We passed by the Krishna river through the Almatti dam gates and then a huge Almatti gate & then entered one of the best well planned roads with Beautiful 4-lane roads with 3-line trees & footpath on both the sides & garden at both the ends, Bangalore should learn from these model roads.

Almatti Map

The road ended at a huge circle where we parked our vehicle & started to do some walk to the back waters of Almatti Dam. The view from here was not that good as it was covered with huge fence & no proper view point, so just spent 10mins over here, & already sun getting ready to go beyond the water’s.

Circle at Almatti end

Almatti Dam Backwaters

Entrance for the Dam bridge, not open for public.

We then left the place & reached Rock Garden, the gate of Rock garden itself was so beautiful on both the sides there are huge faces of different cultures lifting the hands on the front are gents & on the other side are the ladies. It was very creative the way it was built.

Rock Garden Entrance

As you enter you find the serene silver lake, there is also pedal boating available here.

Inside the Rock Garden

Silver Lake, Rock garden

As we passed by the lake we entered the reptile world& there are huge dinosaurs built with well paved walkways throughout the garden. There are many other parks like snake world, Animal world, bird world, butterfly world, & Adivaasi/Tribal World which we couldn’t cover since it was already getting dark, so we directly went to the sunrays park.

Silver lake view from the opposite side

View of Silver lake from the other side - HDR

Structures Inside Rock Garden

Reptile Park

There is actually a view point constructed to view the sunrays park. Sunrays Park was totally worth after walking around half km from the rock garden entrance, by this you can imagine the vastness of the whole rock garden, it must be around 50acres, so one needs to spend at least half day to cover the whole Rock garden. Having covered the 3 important spots in the rock garden we went to the Krishna garden which is exactly opposite to the rock garden entrance, but unfortunately it was closed as it was already around 6pm.

People of different cultures holding hand around the Indian map/flag, Sunrays park

Sunrays park view from viewpoint

On the way to Sunrays park

walkways inside the park near the reptile park

well paved walkways inside the park

Reptile Park

Pavements made for sitting and relaxing in the center of the park

Park Square

So we directly headed towards the Musical Fountain garden. There is a huge entrance plaza constructed at the entrance of the park which gives a palace look with semicircular corridor with RCC columns & arches. The corridor is 6 m (20ft) wide. The actual musical fountain is again around 500m from the parking but you won’t get bored as there are neatly designed parks & fountains (still under construction) all through the way.

Main Entrance Plaza

Infront view of the Musical Fountain entrance

Finally we reached the ticket counter & had to wait for 30mins before the musical dancing fountain started which was at 7.30pm. There is a huge circular stadium built for it with the fountain at the center. The seating was pretty well planned to give a perfect view of the event. It was quite a good pass time in the evening relaxing in front of the open air musical fountains. It ended at 8pm.

Musical Fountain

View of the Hydro power station

Musical Fountain Stadium

Almatti Dam (all gates closed)

Some facts about the musical fountain: Musical Dancing Fountain is designed on five grids circular grid having 20 m diameter at center & four elliptical grids measuring 20 m & 7.20 m as major & minor axis respectively. The seating galleries are placed around the fountain with a grade, so that uninterrupted vision is achieved by every spectator. There are four such galleries orthogonal to each other.

Just for information there is a 77acre park next to the musical fountain, getting constructed with Mughal garden, Italian & French gardens.

Entrance tickets were Rs10 for both rock garden & musical fountain & for camera it was Rs25.

By 8.15pm we started towards the hotel which we booked at Jain Yatri nivas hotel, Kudalasangama, which was around 30km. By the time we checked into hotel it was 9.30pm & had packed our dinner from home which we had at the hotel, north Karnataka hard roti’s, which ended our day 1. As we carried GPS devices with us it was not a big deal to find out the routes even at night.

Day 2 – Aihole Pattadakal Badami to be continued….

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Bagalkot Heritage Drive - Day 2 – Aihole Pattadakal Badami

Day 2: Kudala Sangama – Amingad – Aihole – Pattadakal – Banashankari – Badami - Kudala Sangama

DistanceCovered: 140km

PlacesVisited: Aihole (Huchchimalli Gudi, Ravana Phadi Cave Temple, Durga Temple Complex), Pattadakal temple complex, Shri Badami Banashankari Temple, Badami (4 Cave temples & Lower Bhoothanatha Temples)

Travelogue: Saturday morning we started our day with breakfast at Kamat Upachar at Kudala Sangama expecting lesser crowd at the temples as it was not Sunday. The road condition which passes by all these places are not great but merely manageable, as it passes by a number of villages the roads have been in very bad condition in most of the places, considering it as a UNESCO world heritage site since 1987 I was expecting a lot of developments in these areas for promoting tourism but I was pretty disappointed. 1500 year old Indian culture should be preserved well & developed properly, but I see the roads which leads to these temples are narrow & in bad condition & most importantly many of the temples are all surrounded by village houses & has been kept in dirty condition & many of them are sharing their house walls with these ancient temples, especially one example is the Papanatha temple in Pattadakal where the access road has been made as open drainage with sewage water from the village is kept to flow on the road towards the Mallaprabha river which is opposite to the temple. One good thing about the maintenance from the government inside the temple premises is very neat & clean.

Bagalkot Heritage Drive - Day 2 – Aihole

Durga Gudi temple

Some facts about Aihole: Aihole has historical significance & is called as cradle of Indian architecture. Aihoḷe has the potential to be included as a UNESCO World heritage site. The village has 125 temples & is said to be a laboratory of experiments in rock cut architecture. Aihole was the first capital of the early Chalukyas. Aihole dates back to the 6th century. There are many inscriptions found in Aihole describing the Chalukyan periods written in Kannada, one of which is the Meguti Temple, well preserved dating back to 634 A.D.

Coming back to the travelogue we reached Aihole through amingad which is very famous for the local sweet Karadant.

We started to explore Aihole from Huchchimalli Gudi temple, built in the 7th century shows an evolution in the temple plan. There is also a Steep Tank in front of the temple. I won't tell much about these temples here, look out for the images at the bottom which were put up at the temple premises from the Archeological survey of India (ASI) for more information about these temples.

Huchchimalli Gudi

Next on the way was Ravana Phadi or Ravalaphadi Cave Temple. The entire structure is carved out of a huge rocky outcrop of sand-stone. It is about 30ft in length with a depth of 20ft & a height of about 10ft. At the entrance is Sankhanidhi & Padmanidhi in human form on either side. The interior has a tall dancing Shiva in his ten-handed form, dances beside Ganesha & Parvati, equally tall Saptamatrikas observing Shiva's dance(Shown in the photo below). This is assigned to the 6^th Century A.D dedicated to Shiva. The roof has also been carved to form beautiful design which you find even in modern palaces.

Ravana Phadi Cave Temple

Ravana Phadi Cave Temple, Dancing Shiva in his ten-handed form,

Ceilings carved beautifully inside the cave

We then moved towards Meguti temple, there is no road for this temple which is on top of a small hill surrounded by the village, we managed to go a little bit & finally realized that our Innova is not going to make up & we had to come back with a disappointment that there was no road for such an important temple which had inscriptions made during 634 A.D. There is also Mallikarjuna Temple complex & Jyotirlinga Temple Group at this place which we couldn't cover as we had Pattadakal & Badami left for the day.

So we directly moved to the main Aihole Temple complex which is just behind these temples. This is a must visit in Aihole & the main & most beautiful among Temples of Aihole. There is a nominal entrance ticket maintained by the Archeological Survey of India. The temple premises are well maintained by the government & the complex covers Durga Gudi Temple, Suryanarayana Gudi Temple, Lad Khan Temple, Gaudara Gudi Temple & Chakra Gudi Temple being of more importance. The complex also includes Aihole Museum, Chakra Gudi well & Badiger Gudi Temple.

Aihole Main Temple Complex

The first temple was the Durga Gudi temple, which is the largest & perhaps most beautiful temple at Aihole. This name might be due to the word durga meaning fort. The temple was built in 7^th century A.D. It also resembles the Parliament of India. There are a lot of sculptures which are of importance here; most popular among them are Harihara, Durga, Varaha, Vishnu with Garuda, Narasimha & Shiva with Nandi.

There is a small tank next to the temple which is well maintained & filled with water.

There was one smaller temple near the Durga temple which had nicely carved pillars inside.

Durga gudi Temple

Water tank in front of Durga gudi Temple

This needs to be reassembled on top of the Durga gudi Temple Shikara

Small temple behind the Durga gudi Temple

Next was the Suryanarayana Gudi Temple, assigned to the 7^th or 8^th century, which is famous for the Surya deva (Sun God) statue which is around 0.6m tall, which is also very rare.

Statue of Surya deva

Further on the way is the Lad Khan temple dating back to 7^th century A.D, which is the 2^nd most popular in this complex after Durga gudi. It is called lad Khan temple because a man by name Lad Khan lived in the temple & hence people began to call it so. This must have been a Shiva temple originally. Two distinctive features makes it more popular one is Instead of the usual tower, a rooftop shrine (the structure on top of the roof) is positioned over the center of the mandapa, & the other being the temple's sloping two-tiered roof, which imitates wood construction, is furnished with stone "logs" that cover the joints between the roofing slabs. Also found in this temple is the Emblem of the Chalukyas (shown in the photo below) which include a boar, a curled-up lotus stem (behind the boar), a solar disk above, & a circular object (mirror?) on a stand to the right. There are also windows carved from stones of different patterns found in the temple.

Chalukya Emblem

Lad Khan Temple

3 Different Windows carved out of stone at Lak Khan temple, collated photos

Nandi at Lak Khan Temple

Small temples facing near Lad Khan temple

Next to Lad khan is the Gaudaragudi temple. Not known why it is being named as Gaudara gudi (Gauda meaning village head), this must be the Bhagavati/Lakshmi temple, according to the ASI this temple appears to be the oldest among the present Aihole temples, of the 5^th century A.D. Sixteen square shaped pillars with abacus hold the roof. The roof is in two tiers one above the other & is made of sloping stones.

Gaudaragudi temple

Last one in the lane is the Chakra Gudi temple assigned to the 9^th Century, known for its 20 sculptures of amorous couple engraved on the doorframe of the sanctum which has Garuda holding two snakes on the lintel. The temple has well preserved Nagarashikhara on the Garbhagriha, & the prominent round Amalaka at the Stupi which may have brought the name Chakragudi.

Nagara shikhara of Chakragudi

There is also a Chakragudi well in-between Chakragudi temple & Lad khan temple.

Chakragudi Well, also in the pic is Badigergudi Temple

We had opted for a guide at Aihole & paid 200Rs for our group, it was noon & the sun was heating up the open spaces around the temple complex, so we had tender coconut & started our journey to the most popular Chalukyan temples, Pattadakal & the 2^nd UNESCO world heritage site in Karnataka after Hampi. You can also get a tourist guide book & photos of the important monument’s here.

Photos of the information boards put-up in-front of each of these temples by the Archaeological Survey of India,

Bagalkot Heritage Drive - Day 2 – Pattadakal to be continued…

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Bagalkot Heritage Drive - Day 2 – Pattadakal

Some facts about Pattadakal: Actually Pattadakal represents the final or culminating stage of the early Chalukyan style of architecture. It is believed that the experiments made in Aihole was later implemented in a more professional manner in Pattadakal & hence it has more matured & finished monuments compared to Aihole group of temples. Both Dravida & Nagara type of temples were built at Pattadakal during the reign of the early Chalukyan kings. Sangamesvara, Virupaksha, Mallikarjuna & Jaina temples belong to the Dravidian style, whereas Galaganatha, Papanatha, Kasi Visvesvara, Kadasiddesvara & Jambulinga temples belong to Nagara style. The temple building activity started from the early 7^th Century & continued up to the middle of the 9^th century A.D. Thus 300years saw a glorious epoch in the evolution of temple architecture in Pattadakal. There were master architects like Revadi Ovajja, Anivarita Gunda, supported by sculptors like Changamma, Pullappan & Beladeva.

Galaganatha Temple(750 AD), Sangameshwara Temple(720 AD) & Virupaksha Temple(740 AD)

Back to the travelogue, it was almost 1pm by the time we reached Pattadakal temple complex which is just 13km from Aihole. Unlike Aihole, the temples here are not scattered at different, so it will be easier to locate the temples all at one campus. There is a nominal entrance fee for the maintenance. As you enter the temple complex you find all the temples at a glance right from the entrance. Also this is the most visited & most beautiful among the Chalukyan temples.

The temple complex consists of Jambulinga temple, Galaganatha temple, Sangameshwara temple, Kashivishwanatha temple, Mallikarjuna temple, Virupaksha temple & Papanatha temple in the order of distance from the entrance.

Galaganatha-Jambulinga-Sangameshwara-Nandi Mandapa-Virupaksha-Mallikarjuna-Kashivishwanatha Temples(left-to-right)

We opted for a guide here also, & he first took us for the Galaganatha temple built in 700-750 A.D., even from a distance it attracts our attention because of the presence of the prominent northern type Shikhara. It is described as belonging to Rekha-Nagara type, also found in Bhubanesvar in Orissa. The entire Shikhara is highly proportioned & this is the unique feature of this temple. The garbhagriha has a polished black-stone linga of the 12^th century.

Subsequent to this was the Jambulinga temple, Built probably in the middle of the 7th century A.D. The superstructure over the sanctum is of the rekha-nagara (northern) style. This was just looking like a miniature of the Galaganatha temple next to it.

Jambulinga temple(back) & Galaganatha temple(front)

Further we moved towards the Sangameshwara temple, which is Dravidian type temple built by Chalukyan king Vijayaditya (693-733 A.D) & he established Vijayesvara Siva linga in it. Southern parts of the mandapa have fallen down. Efforts have been taken to preserve & maintain the remaining part of the temple.

Last in the lane was the Mallikarjuna temple, both Virupaksha temple and Mallikarjuna temple look similar, with one difference is that Virupaksha tower has a square top, while the top of Mallikarjuna is a dome. Also the interiors of both the temples are similar.

This temple was built around 740 A.D. by one of the Queens, Trailokyamahadevi of Vikramaditya II (733-45 A.D.) to commemorate her husband’s victory over the Pallavas of Kanchipuram built for the same purpose as Virupaksha temple.

tales of Panchatantra

The epic & puranic episodes carved on the pillars of the sabha-mandapa include goddesses fighting Mahisasura, churning of the ocean (samudra-manthana), Narasimha fighting Hiranyakasipu “exploits of Krishna” slaying of Maricha etc., . The amorous couples relieved on the engaged columns here are slightly bigger in size & better preserved than those in the Virupaksha temple.

Mallikarjuna Temple south face

The Samudra Manthan: Scene from Hindu mythology depicting the Churning of the Primordial Ocean of Milk in order to obtain Amrita or Amrit, the nectar of immortality

One more important sculptures found on the pillars are the tales of Panchatantra, “The mongoose & the farmer’s wife” & “The monkey & the crocodile”; here the first one teaches “Don’t act in haste. Think & act” & the later’s moral says that “At times, presence of mind pays well”

For a detailed explanation on the Panchatantra tales follow this link http://www.bharatadesam.com/literature/panchatantra_stories/tales_of_panchatantra.php

Just beside Mallikarjuna temple is the Kashivishwanatha temple, built in the middle of the 8th century A.D, probably the last to be built in the Early Chalukyan style at Pattadakal. It contains on plan a garbhagriha housing a linga & a Nandi-mandapa opposite to it.

Mallikarjuna Temple & Kashivishwanatha Temple

The superstructure displays the fully evolved rekha-nagara (Northern) Sikhara rising in five stages with its amalaka & kalasa missing. A mesh-like design covers its surface completely. The well-developed sukanasa projection has a fine sculpture of dancing Uma-Maheswara within the Chaitya-arch.

Virupaksha-Mallikarjuna-Kasshivishwanatha temple(left-to-right)

360 degree view of Pattadakal(from left to right - Jambulinga, Galaganatha, Sangameshwara, Nandi mandapa, Virupaksha, Mallikarjuna, Kashivishwanatha temple)

Next was the most important temple of Chalukyan architecture, The Virupaksha Temple, which I will be posting it separately... to be continued…

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Bagalkot Heritage Drive - Day 2 – Pattadakal Virupaksha Temple

We then went to Lokeshwar/Virupaksha Temple which is the most magnificent temple of the Chalukyan style built by Lokamahadevi, the Queen of Vikramaditya II in 740 A.D. in commemoration of his victory over the Pallavas of Kanchi. The architects of Pallava country built this temple; Anivarita Gunda was the chief architect. In fact this temple is believed to have been a model for the Kailasa temple at Ellora.

The temple is quite big with an area of 224ft & 105ft in length & breadth respectively. The temple consists of a garbhagriha, pradakshinapatha, mahamandapa, mukhamandapa & separate Nandi mandapa in front of the temple. The garbhagriha has a Dravidian type Shikhara of three tiers. The square garbhagriha has a highly polished Sivalinga on a square panipitha.

Virupaksha Temple

The most important part of the temple is the 18 pillars in 4 rows at the spacious mukhamandapa. They contain fine sculptures of Ramayana, Mahabharata & Bhagavata purana. There are also pictures depicting the Illusions. Poses of couples on pillars & the Series of amorous couples in various intimate poses.

Mukhamandapa inside Virupaksha temple

Poses of couples on either side of the entrance

At the main entrance of the Virupaksha temple from the eastern porch, the inner ceiling with huge image of Surya, the god of the sun, is driven in his chariot across the heavens in this panel from the ceiling of the temple. This rather symmetric composition includes a radiant crown for the god; makaras disgorging smaller figures at his shoulders; Aruna ("Dawn"), his legless charioteer, at the bottom of the panel, holding the reins of seven horses representing the days of the week; a plethora of other divinities; & scalloped clouds (the usual convention) on either side. The archers standing by Surya's legs personify the light of Dawn, whose arrow-like rays dispell the darkness at the break of day.

Surya deva, driven in his chariot holding the rein of 7 horses

This temple is considered as one of the most important for Hindu scholars & Ancient Indian history. Also found here are the halegannada (Old Kannada) inscriptions

Halegannada Inscriptions

You can spend some meaningful time trying to unlock the stories of the sculptures on the pillars, each of the 18 pillars here have a different story to tell.

There are Guardian on both sides of the entrance, this nonchalant guardian's oversize club, as a martial art & form of exercise(shown left in the below pic). As an attribute, the club can belong to Shiva or Vishnu. Since the guardian holds aloft a snake in his right rear hand, his affiliation is undoubtedly to Shiva. Here is another guardian, with a different kind of club, in a somewhat relaxed if not quite so casual pose as his brother in the previous photo(shown right in the below pic).

Guardian on both sides

Also found here is Vishnu Trivikrama takes an acrobatic step across the universe. The temple, although dedicated to Shiva, also includes Vaishnava images such as this one. Harihara, with a trident-bearing gana on his right & Lakshmi(?) on his left. His left upper hand holds a conch. His right upper hand holds a worn attribute which looks suspiciously like a chakra, although this would not be correct for the "Shiva half" of Harihara. Shiva Ardhanarishvara is half-man & half-woman, here accompanied by a gana who seems astonished by the transformation. Also found are the sculptures of Narasimha, Durga Mahishasuramardini , Ravana lifting kailasa, Shankha Nidhi & Padmanidhi.

Scene from Ramayana and inscriptions in Kannada below that describing as Rama, Lakshmana & sita

Scene from the Mahabharata: Detailed scenes from the epics (Mahabharata & Ramayana) are carved on the pillars. The central band here may depict Bhishma lying on the bed of arrows (from the Mahabharata). During the fight his body was pierced with so many arrows that they supported him above the ground when he fell.

Scenes from Ramayana & Mahabharata

A decorated ventilator, thats supposed to be a single rope fashioned into a grill

monuments on the walls

Illusion 1 : all 3 dancers here share the leg and hand of one another when tried to cover the other two with ur hand you can see one full structure of a dancer

Illusion 2 : two different animals sharing the same face, on the right is elephant and on the left probably a horse or a bull.

There is a Nandi mandapa in front of the Virupaksha temple, which has a fine large stone bull which face the temple. The pillars here shows some sort of ornamental structures on it making it look more beautiful.

Nandi Mandapa

Nandi statue inside Nandi mandapa

Ornamental structures inside the Nandi mandapa

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Bagalkot Heritage Drive - Day 2 – Pattadakal Papanatha Temple

Papanatha temple view from behind

After Virupaksha temple we just felt as if it was the last in the Pattadakal temple complex, as the guide went after this taking his fee of Rs200. But I wasn't filled my mind so wanted to explore more, none of them from my group of eight joined me so I went alone to explore beyond the Nandi mandapa in front of the Virupaksha temple, as there is Mallaprabha River flowing just after the temple. Went down to see the river & was not much impressed to see the river being in bad condition as any other river in India, people washing cloths & bathing. So didn't feel like to go down the steps to the water, so straight away went on the other side of the banks of the river & was surprised to see a lawn after the compound wall of the Pattadakal temple complex, & decided to see what it is & stopped right away to see a small road in-between the two compound walls & sewage water left flowing on the road making it no tourists visiting the other side, but I just didn't bother to wait & followed the path & seen the board saying Papanatha Temple, & as I walked further the temple was visible & was pretty much surprised to see such a big temple being isolated from the Pattadakal temple complex.

Mallaprabha river infront of the temple almost dry

Route stone

No wonder why this temple is not visited by any of the tourists & felt bad when even the tourist guide didn't say anything about such a beautiful temple. This was 2^nd best temple for me in Pattadakal after Virupaksha temple. Felt bad to see how the villagers have spoiled the surroundings from sewage water & all the dirt from their houses. Leaving behind all these I went to see all around the temple to see such beautiful sculptures on the walls of the temple. There was a watchman kept for this temple alone may be the reason being it might be damaged for being isolated from the main temple complex. I spent almost 20mins here alone & even till I left the place I didn't see any other tourist coming to this place, reason being boards not put properly for the route. Most of them end their Pattadakal journey at Virupaksha temple Nandi mandapa.

Front view of Papanatha temple

Coming back to the temple structure, Papanatha Temple is dedicated to Mukteswara constructed in 740 A.D. Initially, the construction was started with Nagara style, but later it was switched to Dravidian style. This combination of south & north Indian characters, namely Dravidian & Nagara, some scholars refer to as Vesara. The Shikhara belongs to the Rekha-Nagara type while the other characters like shala, kuta & hara belong to the Dravidian type. The sculptors who designed Virupaksha temple also designed Papanatha temple, namely Sarvasiddhi Achari, Beladeva & Changamma.

Beautiful artwork on the walls of the temple

The wall surfaces are relieved with niches (devakoshthas) housing Saiva & Vaishnava deities & depicting episodes from the Ramayana.

Pillars of the entrance porch bear Kinnara couples & engaged columns have the figures of Dvarapalas. Lions & sardulas are carved at the corners above the entablature & the ceiling panel depicts dancing Siva with Parvati & musicians & flying figures.

Shiva & Parvati dancing. Their feet are crossed in 'Swastika' posture

Lions carved at the corners of the ceiling

I then tried to see from the small entrance door & thought there is nothing much to see inside as it was totally dark & stinking inside, when the watchman said me to remove my slippers before entering inside & I had a second thought by then when I finally decided to explore what was inside, as I had traveled all the way 300m from the main Pattadakal temple complex so I entered inside to see total darkness & not much impressed till I seen some intricate carvings on the ceiling & just tried to capture photos but failed to see anything in the pictures then had to click with flash & suddenly the bat’s started flying away & was a bit panicky that time but after seeing the picture in the camera. I tried all my best to use some long exposure photos to capture the amazing art work on the whole of the ceiling, some of the best I've seen, & I was totally felt worth for exploring this, by the time I realized that it was too late since I left my group at the main temple complex I started running back to the parking lot as it was already late, so couldn't do much exploration on the pillars & inside the temple, called up my group & we started towards Banashankari temple as it was already 2.30pm & thought the temple might close.

Sculptures on the ceiling

Most beautiful Sculptures on the ceiling

Some information about the inside of the temple, Pillars & pilasters of the other mandapa's are relieved with medium-sized graceful sculptures of damsels & couples (mithunas) in playful moods. The central bay ceiling of the sabha-mandapa is adorned with panels depicting Anantasayana surrounded by the Dikpalas, nagaraja & Gajalakshmi from east to west. Here figures of rearing lions are cared projecting from above the entablature. Central ceiling of the ardha-mandapa has relief sculpture of dancing Siva in the company of Parvati & musicians. The western ceiling here has figure of Nagaraja. Both the mandapa's & the sanctum have ornate doorframes.

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Bagalkot Heritage Drive - Day 2 – Shri Badami Banashankari Temple

Shri Badami Banashankari Temple is around 18km from Pattadakal & we reached there by 3pm & had darshana & spent some time near the beautiful water tank in front of the temple.

The original temple was built by the 7th century Kalyani Chalukya kings, who worshipped goddess Banashankari as their tutelary deity. The present refurbished temple was built in 1750, by Parusharam Agale, a Maratha chieftain.

There is a 360 ft (109.7 m) square water tank in the forefront of the temple at the entrance, called as Harishchandra Tirtha. The pond is enclosed with stone mantapas (halls) on three sides. A pradakshina or circumambulatory path surrounds the tank.

Lamp towers (Deepa stambhas) are seen in the foreground of the temple on the west bank of the pond & also at the entrance. The tower on the bank of the tank is also an uncommon guard tower which is "reflects the Vijayanagara blend of Hindu & Islamic style". It is called the Victory Tower.

By the time we left the temple it was already 3.30pm & we were pretty late for our lunch & in 15mins we were in Mayura Chalukya Hotel in Badami town, while we left the restaurant it was already 4.30pm & we were bothered if we can finish Badami temples by dusk. We headed straight to Badami Cave Temples which is 2km from the restaurant.

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Kudala Sangama – Bagalkot Heritage Drive - Day 3

Bagalkot Heritage Drive - Day 2 – Badami Cave Temples (1 & 2)

Some Facts about Badami: Badami or Vatapi (Sanskrit form) was the capital of the early Chalukyas. Pulakeshi I, one of the early kings of this dynasty built a strong fort at Badami & made it his capital in the year 547 A.D., and from that time onwards the later kings of this dynasty built rock-cut & structural temples here for about three hundred years & hence Badami became a great center of Karnataka architecture and Sculpture.

The Early Chalukyas chose the sandstone cliffs of Badami, for rock excavation.Badami was the headquarters of the Early Chalukyas, who ruled much of Karnataka in the 6th - 8th centuries.The Badami cave temples are an early example of the Chalukyan style of architecture.

Back to the travelogue: After a ten min drive from the restaurant we reached the Badami cave temples at about 4.40pm & started to climb up the steps, there are a total of 4 caves here, 3^rd one being the most important, first 3 have been dedicated to Hindu Gods and the last one to Jain. First one dedicated to Shiva, 2^nd and 3^rd to Lord Vishnu and the 4^th to Lord Mahavira.

These cave-temples essentially consist of a rectangular pillared verandah (mukha-mandapa), a more or less square pillared hall (maha-mandapa) and a small almost square shrine-cell (garbha-griha) at its rear, all in an axial plane and entirely rock-cut, constituting the flat-roofed mandapa type of temples.

The whole Badami is so beautiful with both the beautiful red sandstone cliffs and the beautifully carved cave temples and the Badami fort on the cliffs and the temples surrounding the more beautiful Agasthya tank. No wonder why so many movies were shot at this place listed below,

Hindi movies (Bollywood): Rowdy Rathore (2012), Guru (2007).
Kannada movies (Sandalwood): Veera Madakari, Sanju Weds Geetha
Telugu movies (Tollywood): Daruvu (2012), Brindavanam (2010), Dhamarukam (2012), Vikramarkudu (2006), Shirdi Sai (2012), Shakti (2011), Nagavalli (2011), Magadheera (2009)
Tamil movies (Kollywood): Siruthai (2011)

There is a ticketing counter here & enough parking spaces, we started towards the 1^st cave which is about 40 steps from the bottom.

Badami Cave 1:

Shiva cave temple

The first in the series and is dedicated to Shiva and is built in 585 A.D, it is larger than the cave 2 and smaller than cave 3. Its facade, just below the square-cut columns, displays a long frieze of dancing ganas.

Shiva Panel: Shiva in his dancing form – as Nataraja depicted with eighteen arms. The celebrated Shiva panel is located on the right wall of the facade, perpendicular to the entrance. The gana frieze, also turns the corner to continue on this wall. In the panel, a fine carving of Shiva, multi-armed & dancing, is flanked by Nandi on the viewer's left, with Ganesha & a drummer on the viewer's right.

Shiva panel

Ceiling Bracket: A fanciful animal issues from the mouth of a makara on the ceiling bracket.

Column & ceiling bracket

Columns: A rounded engaged column is shown in the left; a detached, square-cut, column is visible in the photo left. The engaged column sports a pincushion capital, & is interrupted midway by a square section.

Columns

Ardhanareeshwara: the eight feet tall Ardhanareeshwara with sage Bhringi (the skeleton like figurine) and Nandi on left & Parvati in the right, is another elegant sculpture. The left portion in the photo is symbolic of male while the right is female.

Ardhanareeshwara

Harihara: a fusion of Shiva and Vishnu – the coming together of two sects – the Shaivites & the Vaishnavites. On the left in the photo is Shiva, accompanied by Nandi & Parvati, while on the right is Vishnu, with Garuda & Lakshmi by his side. Shiva has his matted hair piled up atop his head, a snake holding it together, a moon decorating it, while Vishnu has a jeweled crown. Shiva has snakes as ornaments while Vishnu has jewels galore. They hold their signature weapons, such as the noose & the conch. Every aspect of the two gods has been depicted so beautifully that one can just stand on & on staring at it!

After about 15mins here we started towards the 2^nd cave which is again about 64 stairs from the 1^st cave.

Harihara

Beautiful carvings on the pillars

Some sculptures on the ceilings

Badami Cave 2:

Vishnu cave temple

Constructed after cave 3 in the late 6th century, it is dedicated to Vishnu, & is the smallest of the 4 caves.

Vishnu Trivikrama: Vamana is described in the Puranas as the fifth Avatar of Vishnu. Vishnu saves the world from Bali. Several episodes of the story, as it unfolds in time, are shown at once (continuous narrative):

First, at the bottom right of the main panel, Vishnu disguised as Vamana visits Bali underneath a royal umbrella; the demon king & his court are shown standing to the right of the dwarf.

Second, in the main action of the panel, Vishnu takes his giant step and in the process defeats Bali, who is shown upside down just below Vishnu's outstretched foot. The strange-looking face in the upper right corner is not identified; it may represent the sun, looking on in surprise.

Finally, photo left, Bali admits defeat & clings to Vishnu's standing leg in submission. The whole composition is supported on a prominent frieze of dwarf musicians.

Vishnu Trivikrama

Varaha: Varaha is the third avatar of Vishnu, taking the form of a boar. Vishnu's boar incarnation rescues the earth goddess, Bhu Devi. Her body bends toward the boar in a graceful arc, as she drapes her right arm over the end of Varaha's muzzle. His discus (chakra) in the other hand. His left foot rests in the netherworld, as he rescues Bhudevi from the depths of the ocean. The denizens of the netherworld, the snakes, led by their king, Vasuki, are shown praying to the Lord’s foot which rests in their land.

Below the main scene is the usual frieze of dancing dwarves.

Varaha

Beautiful work on the ceiling: There is a wheel which has 16 spokes; each of these spokes is a fish, made on the ceiling of a cave. There is swastika pattern seems to be a popular one. The most interesting thing about this pattern is that these four swastikas can be drawn without lifting our pen from the paper.

four swastikas can be drawn without lifting our pen(top) and wheel of fish(bottom)

Beautiful work on the ceilings

After the 2 cave temples we have to flight through another 60 steps to reach the 3^rd cave, and got one of these sight of the Badami town between the sandstone cliffs, an hour before the sunset.

Leading from cave 2 upto cave 3

view of the Badami town in between the rock formations

There is also a natural cave between 2^nd and 3^rd cave. As you rise through the steps you cross by the door to end up directly to 3^rd cave.

Bagalkot Heritage Drive - Day 2 – Badami Cave Temples (3 & 4)… to be continued….

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Bagalkot Heritage Drive - Day 2 – Badami Cave Temples (3 & 4)

Badami Cave 3:

Most beautiful view of entire Chalukyan architecture

Vishnu cave temple

Probably the oldest of the 4 caves, dedicated to Vishnu, is the largest of the series and was excavated, according to its inscription, in Saka 500, i.e. A.D. 578, by Mangalesa. The cave facade is divided by six squared-off columns, beneath which is a frieze of dwarves. The dwarves are presented in small groupings, unlike the continuous frieze on Cave 1.

Vishnu: The eight-armed deity wears a tall crown, and carries numerous weapons (including bow, middle left arm, and arrow, middle right arm) in addition to his usual shell (upper left arm) and chakra (upper right arm). His lower right arm holds the hilt of a sword, which is broken in the middle. The upper part of the blade extends past the right side of his face.

The god's martial aspect is appropriate to the royal dedication of this cave.

Vishnu

Harihara: unlike in the cave 1, here, the details are somewhat clearer, in spite of the wear and tear of the rock on which the figure has been carved. The differences on the Shiva and Vishnu sides are more apparent here.

Harihara

Vishnu Seated on Sesha: This sculpture, from the left end of the portico, presents Vishnu seated in lalitasana (the posture of "royal ease") on the Cosmic Snake, Shesha, with attendant figures including Garuda (Bottom left). The execution of the work is very fine, although the god's face is rather worn.

Vishnu seated on sesha

Narasimha: Avatar of Vishnu, 4th of the 10 primary avatars. Vishnu's lion incarnation is posed with attendant figures. His lower left forearm rests on a club whose bottom part has broken off.

Narasimha

Trivikrama: The iconographic features of this Trivikrama are similar to the sculpture of the same subject in Cave 2: the demon king is shown clinging to one of Vishnu's legs, upside down beneath the other leg, and bottom right with his court. The dwarf and most of his umbrella, however, have been lost.

Trivikrama

Bracket Couple: Cave 3 is noted for its finely decorated brackets. The theme is auspicious fertility, with a

divine couple and female dwarf attendant in a floral setting. The pair may represent a Yaksha couple.

Bracket couple

view from the cave

huge column structures with beautiful carvings

Badami Cave 4:

The Jaina cave-temple at the very top of the hill is later by about a century from the rest, dedicated to the Lord Mahavira

Jain sculptures in cave4

Relief of Tirthankaras: The undifferentiated Jain saviors in this relief were, according to the Blue Guide, carved later than the major images in the temple.

Relief of Tirthankaras

We were in a hurry and couldn't see the cave 4 in detail as it was already 5.30 pm & just spent few more mins taking some snaps of the lovely landscapes from the caves also can have a full sight of the other temples around the Agasthya Lake from these caves. Didn't waste any more time started descending back to the parking lot, although took some more beautiful snaps of the landscapes around. Our next destination was Bhoothanatha group of temples which I’ll be covering in the next post.

Bagalkot Heritage Drive - Day 2 – Badami Group of Temples … to be continued….

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Bagalkot Heritage Drive - Day 2 – Badami Group of Temples

By 5.45 pm we left the Badami caves & started towards the Museum which was on the opposite side of the caves, it is around 1.5 km for us, but as per Google maps it is around 1km. Though it is only about half a km from the caves but there are no proper roads to reach here, Government has failed a bit here in claiming some land & protecting the road to these places, we had to struggle a lot to make way for our Innova, as the road is so narrow that even if there is another vehicle on the other side one of us must have to reverse the car back to the road, but luckily no other vehicle came in the opposite direction till we reached the fort gate.

Also there are a few temples which reside inside the town with all the houses in the town surrounding the temples which has a history of over 1500yrs. I felt there should be a protected area around the temple at least to protect it from being encroached. Due to the roads being very narrow & very less awareness of the places on the other side of the cave temples, most of the tourists go unnoticed after visiting the cave temples.

Apart from the four cave temples, Badami temples also include a number of other temples including Dattatreya Temple, Bhoothanatha temple Complex (Lower), Upper Bhoothanatha Temple or the Mallikarjuna group of temples, Lower Shivalaya Temple, Upper Shivalaya Temple, Malegitti Shivalaya Temple. Badami Museum also lies part of the other side of the Agasthya lake.

One has to go through the town market area to reach the fort gate, once you reach the fort gate there is the Badami archaeological Museum, which was already closed as it was around 6 pm, we further drove till the Mallikarjuna temple & again that was also closed, I wonder why even the compound gates were also locked so didn't get an opportunity to even see the temple walls from close.

Lower Bhoothanatha temple

Mallikarjuna group of temples: built in 11^th century A.D, also called Upper Bhoothanatha Temple, has a stepped superstructure, commonly found in Kalyani Chalukyan constructions. Constructed in Oriya style as compared to the Dravidian style of Lower Bhoothanatha temples. The temples are located on the northeast side of the Agasthya tank. Their typical Late Chalukyan features include plain walls, angled eaves over the mandapa's, and pyramidal towers with deeply carved and closely spaced horizontal courses.

Front view of Mallikarjuna temple

Mallikarjuna group of temples

The other noteworthy places to visit in Badami are the Badami Fort and the Archaeological Museum.

Archaeological Museum:The museum is opened to public from 10am to 5pm & is closed on Friday’s. It contains beautiful sculptures from the caves & rock cut temples which are worth seeing. The sculpture gallery is maintained by the Archaeological Survey of India on the Bhoothanatha Temple Road.

Badami Museum

We then parked the vehicle & started to walk along the lake side of Agasthya tank to reach the Bhoothanatha temple complex; it was during the sunset & had some breathtaking scenery of the Agasthya Lake & the sky colored after the sun set.

Agasthya Lake:this is a large water body framed at the center of the Badami fort surrounded by the red sandstone hills. To the north of the tank lies the Museum, Shivalaya temples & the Mallikarjuna temple complex, to the south is the four cave temples, to the east is the Lower Bhoothanatha temple complex, and to the west is the Dattatreya temple and the Badami town. Towards the north, west and east sides of the tank are built steps with red sand stones making it look more beautiful.

Agasthya lake as seen from Upper bhoothanatha temple, the cave temples are visible on the rocks

View of the lake during sunset

Bhoothanatha temples were also locked but had the opportunity to walk around the temple walls.

Bhoothanatha Temple Complex (Lower): built between late 7th century & 11th century. The temple platform extends into the east end of the Agasthya tank, in a delightfully picturesque setting. The sanctuary and inner hall are Early Chalukyan; the outer hall overlooking the tank is Late Chalukyan.

View of Lower Boothanatha temple from upper bhoothanatha temple

Bhoothanatha temple facing the Agasthya lake

Lower Bhoothanatha Temple

Then proceeded behind the temple as there was a walk way leading behind, just was curious to see where it leads to, but none of them followed me, as it was already dark, so thought to go alone and felt I was not mislead after seeing some rock carvings on the route, which made me more curious to continue the way & saw someone calling my name from behind, & it was our team members, they just followed me without my notice as they felt it was dark and unsafe to go to remote places like this.

sculptures on the rocks behind the Bhoothanatha temple

I finally ended seeing some cave and didn't even felt to enter inside as it was very small and didn't attract me so just took some more snaps of the colored sky above the Agasthya lake in almost dark.

Beautiful landscape painted after sun set

Later just felt to enter the cave to see total darkness & put the torch on from my phone & was surprised to see a sculpture of Vishnu inside the cave, & then felt that the day was ended with an amazement. This cave is behind the Bhoothanatha group of temples it houses a sculpture of Lord Vishnu sleeping on Ananta & attended by Lakshmi.

Cave temple of Vishnu behind the Bhoothanatha temple, Sculpture of Lord Vishnu sleeping on Anantha

Some more pics of the sunset with different exposures and locations,

Then started returning back quickly to the parking area, it was dark and no one around in this place, felt a bit unsafe after sunset in these places. It was around 7 pm by the time we left the place & started back to our hotel in Kudala Sangama, on the way we just took some chances on the route shown by the Google maps navigation, as it showed a shorter way to reach the Hotel, but Google didn't disappoint us even though the route was so remote that there were no villages for almost an hour of drive, but we reached our destination without any hassle. It was almost 2 hour drive to cover the 65 km through the village roads. We had our dinner at Kamat, Kudala Sangama & ended our day.

Before I take you to the day 3 - Kudala Sangama travelogue, here are few more temples which we had a glance from far away through my 250 mm lens, reason being we need at least half a day to cover these temples as one has to climb up the hill to visit these places, definitely I'm going to visit them in my next visit.

Malegitti Shivalaya: There are many temples at Badami of which Malegitti Shivalaya is significant from many points of view. Perhaps with the association of a woman who was a garland maker, this temple should have got that name. The very location of this temple is enchanting. It is built on a spur of the rugged hills which overlook the town of Badami. It is important from the evolution of the Chalukyan style of architecture. It represents a stage of Chalukyan art. It is a good example where the domical finial is octagonal & is supported by a series of small shrines. The tower above the garbhagriha is a typical Dravidian Shikhara. This temple is dated to the 7^th century A.D. It is perhaps the oldest temple & also the finest in Badami apart from the cave temples.

Malegitti Shivalaya temple

Yellamma Temple:built in 11^th century A.D, This Late Chalukyan temple, located at the west end of the tank, is notable for its tower, whose crimpled and layered roof describes a shape halfway between the curved Shikhara of North India and the pancake pyramids of the south. The sanctuary's outer wall lifts the roof upon a fabric of verticality, achieved by the single-minded division of its projections into a dense forest of tall, slender, closely-spaced, and delicately engaged pilasters

Yellamma Temple

Upper & Lower Shivalaya Temples: Up in the hills behind the Archaeological Museum lies a Chalukyan temple, Upper Shivalaya. It is situated on the tip of a natural gorge. Built by Pulakeshi II who was a devout follower of Lord Vishnu, it is capped by a Dravidian pyramidal tower. A little further down is the Lower Shivalaya. It is dedicated to Lord Ganesha. The lower Shivalaya has a Dravidian tower, and only the sanctum remains now.

Upper Shivalaya temple

Lower Shivalaya temple

Few more pics of the surroundings at Badami,

This must be watch towers on top of the rocks

One more temple almost encroached in the heart of the town surrounded by the homes.

Bagalkot Heritage Drive - Day 3 – Kudala Sangama … to be continued….

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Bagalkot Heritage Drive - Day 3 – Kudala Sangama

Some facts about Kudala Sangama: Kudala Sangama is in Hunagunda taluk of Bagalkot district in Karnataka state, India. It is just 8 Kms from Sangam cross on the National Highway 13. It is an important center of pilgrimage for people of the Lingayat religion. It is the place where the great social revolutionist of 12th century lord “Basavanna” was studied, preached & merged with GOD. The Krishna, Ghataprabha & Malaprabha Rivers merge here & flow east towards Srisaila (another pilgrim center) in state of Andhra Pradesh. The Aikya Mantapa or the holy Samadhi of Basavanna, the founder of the Lingayat faith along with Linga, which is believed to be self-born (Swayambhu), is situated here. The Kudala Sangama Development Board takes care of the maintenance and development of this place.

Every year during January 12^th to 15^th over a hundred thousand devotees gather here for the Sharana Mela held on the Occasion of Basava Kranthi Day, which was started since1988.

Shri Sangameshwar Temple

Back to the travelogue: It was our last day of the trip & we started our day with breakfast at Kamat which was in front of the Hotel, & we first decided to visit the Basava Dharma Peetha Ashram which was just beside the Hotel.

Basava Dharma Peetha:Basava Dharma Peetha is founded by "Lingananda Swamiji". He was a legend with the legendary force behind the organization. A brave caliber, introduced Guru Basaveshwara to the whole world. At that time, people were mistaken Basaveshwara as Bull and continued worshipping it. But through the preaching (pravachana) of Lingananda Appaji, he shown the truth that Guru Basaveshwara is a historical personality who created a victory in respect to religious, spiritual, & each & every aspects.

We just walked inside the Ashram & saw a small museum of painting depicting the age of Sharana’s of 12^th century & their life and what made me more interesting are the paintings of the Vachana Kranti (war for protecting the Vachana/scripts written by the saints & social reformers of Basavanna’s age)

We then proceeded towards the Sharana loka which has the statues of the Sharana’s (social reformers/saints) of the 12^th century. There is a Gana linga at the center, behind these is a way towards the Dyana mandira which is underground located below the Gana linga, the place is constructed for meditation which was very ideal for its purpose as it was relatively cold and silent. There is a sculpture of Basavanna here carved out of Marble stone.

It was about 12 noon & we then proceeded towards Sangameshwara temple before shopping some books at the shop here in the Ashram.

Sangamanatha Temple & Aikya Mantapa:a 5mins drive took us to the Sangamanatha temple where the road ends. The Vachana’s composed by Basavanna are dedicated to the presiding deity here, Sangamanatha. The temple consists of a porch, navaranga & the main shrine. The door frame of the garbhagriha is richly carved with floral designs and animal figures. In the shrine is the linga famed as Sangameshvara or Sangamanatha. The temple is of Chalukyan style.

Sangamanatha temple entrance

In front of the temple, in the midst of the river, is the Aikya Mantapa, Lord Basaveshwara’s holy Samadhi, a small stone Mantapa with a Shiva linga in it, & lofty cement concrete dry well has been built around it to protect it from submersion. It is here where the Krishna, Ghataprabha & Malaprabha Rivers merge.

On the other side of the river Krishna is the holy samadhi of the lady saint Neelambike, wife of Sri Basavanna. Here also a high cement concrete dry well has been built around the structure to protect it from the waters. One can take a motor boat from Sangamanatha temple or can drive through the bridge to reach the other side of the river.

It was lunch time then & we proceeded towards the Kamat hotel and had lunch and then drove towards the Basava International Centre.

Basava International Centre:it is also called as the Shatasthala the reason for which the building is divided into 6 floors. The word Shatasthala is derived from “Shat” means six and “sthala” which means stage. The tall Basava gopura is slated to house the Basava International Centre; it is more than 200ft., high symmetrical tower which is part of the Rs.450 million government project undertaken by Kudala Sangama Development Board. The structure is already being built but the interiors and the paintings are yet to be done. The structure looks very impressive and is least popular in Kudala Sangama, reason being not yet opened.

We then drove towards our last destination of our trip which was the Sabha Mantapa.

Sabha Mantapa: The colossal Sabha Bhavana. It is a spacious auditorium with a seating capacity for 6,000. The exquisite doorways on four sides named after Gangambike, Nilambike, Channabasavanna and Akka Nagamma, surround the huge grey dome in the center. As one enters the main door’s you witness the magnificent interiors of the auditorium, which houses the paintings of unique pattern of designs throughout the roof around the dome, each one of these designs are distinctive. Once you enter under the dome you find the whole place so relaxing. We spent some time relaxing inside the auditorium. Little known about the place is it is the largest open to air auditorium in India, having a huge dome at the center and doorways on 3 sides and a number of pillars holding the dome, and beside that is a circular flat roof structure which holds the center dome on a number of pillars on both the sides, beyond these pillars it is open to air making it air and light to flow to the auditorium and at the same time protecting it from the top. Also there are small openings on the top of the dome for hot air to flow outside the auditorium. This unique architectural design makes it feel colder inside even during warmer days.

It was late in the afternoon before we had to say adieu for our long heritage trip. We started around 4 pm way back to Bangalore & reached early morning on the fourth day.

This was personally my best trip till date, I leave here some of the information about the lengthy blog on Bagalkot Heritage Drive.

Sources:

· http://en.wikipedia.org

· http://templesofkarnataka.com

· http://kshetraconsultants.in

· http://asi.nic.in

· http://www.kbjnl.com

· http://przmm.blogspot.in

· https://maps.google.co.in/

· http://www.art-and-archaeology.com

· http://www.culturalindia.net

· http://www.lingayatreligion.com

How to reach: Kudalasangama & Badami are well connected by KSRTC buses from all over Karnataka & can be reached by road easily.

Nearest airport: Hubli, Belgaum. Nearest International airport is Bangalore.

Nearest railway station: Almatti, Badami

Camera Used: Canon 550D with 18-55mm lens & 55-250mm lens

Hotels & Restaurants:

Hotel Badami Court, station road, Badami
KSTDC Mayura Chalukya Hotel, Ramadurg Road, Badami (Veg & non Veg)
Kamat Restaurant, Kudala Sangama(pure Veg)
Jain Darshan Yatrinivas Hotel, Kudala Sangama

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Lakkundi:

As Badami, Aihole and Pattadakal are famous for there early Chalukyan ancient architecture with large temples and sculptures, so is Lakkundi famous for the later Chalukyan architecture with intricate carvings and door frames.
Since from my last visit to Badami, Aihole and Pattadakal, I was pretty much interested to visit Lakkundi while going to Badami, but unfortunately couldn’t make it up. But more fortunately I got an opportunity to stay in Gadag for some work, so decide to visit Lakkundi temples and also Trikuteshwara temple in Gadag, but later was only able to visit Lakkundi due to time constraint.

Suryanarayana Shrine

Some facts about Lakkundi: Lakkundi is in Gadag District (North Karnataka) of Karnataka is a tiny village on the way to Hampi (Hospet) from Hubli. Lakkundi is 11 km from Gadag in the east. It is 15 km from Doddabasappa Temple of Dambal and 25 km from Mahadeva Temple of Itagi and 50km from Sri Someshwar Temple of Lakshmeshwar(40km from Gadag).

Lakkundi is known for the temple architecture and Danachintamani Attimabbe (patronage for Kannada literature and Jainism). Most of the later Chalukya (Kalyani Chalukya) temples are preserved in Lakkundi. The architecture of the Kalyani Chalukyas of Kalyani are said to be a link between those of the early Chalukyas of Badami and the Hoysala who succeeded them. Other notable temples of Kalyani Chalukyas include Mahadeva Temple (Itagi), Trikuteshwar temple (Gadag), Doddabasappa Temple (Dambal), and Someshwar Temple (Lakshmeshwar).

Currently Lakkundi claims to have about 50 temples of various stature and antiquity. Some of the temples of note are Manikeshwara Temple, Suryanarayana Shrine (of Sun God), Kashivishwanatha Temple, Nanneshwara Temple, and Brahma Jinalaya. Most of them are dedicated to Lord Siva and his various aspects. Most of the tourists who visit Hampi and Pattadakal often miss out this amazing place which is on the highway itself, but the ones who take the extra bit of effort visiting this place is never disappointed. Lakkundi is also famous for its stepped tanks (Kalyani); most popular among them is the stepped tank at Manikeshwara temple called as Musukina Bhavi.

Back to Travelogue: It was 24^th Dec, 2012 on Monday for a change I was on a trip rather working in office, and we decided to go to Lakkundi first which was just 11 km from Gadag city. There are plenty of buses plying from Gadag old bus stand to Lakkundi, many special buses are also there just for Lakkundi and also many other buses which go via Lakkundi including Hospet and Koppal buses. So I suppose you should get a bus in every 10-15 mins. In just 20-25 mins we reached Lakkundi bus stand and as soon as we got down we were surrounded by the auto drivers who were looking pretty much pissed off due to low visitors visiting since it was a weekday. They offered me 300 Rs to cover entire Lakkundi which included around 11 temples according to them, but finally managed to settle down at a 70 Rs for covering only two temple complexes which had just above 2.5 km as total distance covered. There is Manikeshwara temple and a stepped tank right behind the bus stand, on the other side of the town, which we thought to cover at the last.

Kashivishwanatha/Kasivishveshvara Temple: The first one which we visited was Kashivishwanatha Temple dedicated to Lord Shiva built in 11^th century A.D., which is just about 1 km from the bus stand, although there is no entry ticket for this temple but it is still undertaken from Archeological survey of India (ASI). The place is well maintained by the government and is a protected monument. The complex consists of Kashivishwanatha Temple and Suryanarayana temple opposite to each other and also Nanneshwara Temple on the other side of the road.

Kashivishwanatha temple - south face

We opted for a guide here who took us inside the temple which is otherwise locked to protect it from other public. Felt this was a good idea to protect the ancient monuments to be locked and opened only on arrival of tourists. There were a lot of beautiful and intricate stone carvings inside the temple, unfortunately the guide said it is banned to click photos inside, which I felt very bad and also suspect the guide said it in his personal interest and there is no government rule as though it was not put up in any boarding as “Photography is prohibited”. Leaving behind this bad experience we continued to enjoy the gorgeous sculptures on the columns and on the door frames. It looked like the heavy circular pillars were made using some kind of lathe. There was also a sculpture on one of the column depicting the 12 sun sign’s (rashi’s), but the guide said that it is not sun sign’s, but I could clearly see the Leo, scorpion and many other sun sign in circular form, which the guide said it is just there coin’s. I felt he was wrong as it was attached to the Surya temple so it is more evident that they were sun sign’s not just some coins.

I could still click the below three pics inside the temple before the guide stopped me from further clicking,

Ceilings inside the temple

sculptures on the pillars inside the temple

The door Jamb of the garbhagudi of Kashivishwanatha temple, it was about 5 layers here

There is a linga, which stands three feet tall in the sanctum. The best part of the temple was outside the temple which was the Door Jamb and lintel moldings, which were of five to nine panels of stone carvings each of them portraying a separate meaning like flowers, weapons, animals, and birds. On the lintel of the doorway is a dedicatory block containing an image of Gaja-Lakshmi with an elephant on either side. In fact, in the Kannada spoken regions, it is common to find the image of Lakshmi in the dedicatory block on the lintel irrespective of the temple's original dedication; whether the principal deity was Shiva, Vishnu or Jaina.

Door jamb of east door with Gaja lakshmi at the center

side view of the different layers of the door jamb of east door

The right part of the door jamb with 7 layers of stone carvings

The Left part of the door jamb with 7 layers of stone carvings

The Left part bottom section of the door jamb with 7 layers of stone carvings

The entrance doorway and the towers are covered with close intricate carving.

Intricate carvings on the east door jamb

The ornamentation on the outer wall of the shrine consists of prominent central niches above which is a miniature tower (sikhara or aedicule) which is purely nagara (north Indian) in style.

sculptures on the walls of the temple

Kirthimukha (legendary face) with miniature tower–decorative arch combination going up the shrine superstructure

Perhaps the most beautiful part of the temple is its south door-frame, it had nine sections of stone carvings.

section of the south door showing all the nine layers of the door jamb with small intricate sculptures

Bottom section of the south door jamb

full view of the right part of the south door jamb, here you can imagine how intricate and small the sculptures are

Door Jamb and lintel moldings on southern door of Kashivishwanatha temple

small sculptures on the lintel on the south door

Kashivishwanatha shrine(left) and the Suryanarayana Shirne(right) from the south view

Another view of the south door of Kashivishwanatha temple

One more interesting thing about this temple was its miniature shikara's on the main shikara,

sculptures on the shikara of Kashivishwanatha temple

sculptures on the walls of Kashivishwanatha temple

Suryanarayana temple: a small Surya shrine faces the main shrine on the west of Kashivishwanatha temple. There is a common platform between both which must have been an open mandapa originally. Hence the Kashivishwanatha temple has two entrance one on the east side and other on south side of the mandapa. It is dedicated to the sun god Surya hence is called Suryanarayana.

The door jamb of Suryanarayana temple with five layers of sculptures

the lintel with Gaja lakshmi and five layers of sculptures of Suryanarayana temple

The bottom section of door jamb of Suryanarayana temple with five layers of sculptures

sculptures on the pillars of Suryanarayana temple

Makara: Makara, a strange animal with elephant trunk, crocodile body and peacock tail is a Hindu mythical animal and the vehicle of gods Ganga and Varuna is depicted in the temple.

Makara

This should also be Makara??

Beautiful carvings on the columns of suryanarayana temple

damaged sculptures on top of the columns of suryanarayana temple

Front view of the Syryanarayana Shrine

Sculpture of the seven horses indicating the seven days of the week at the walls of the Suryanarayana shrine(sun temple)

colorful columns on the exterior of the Suryanarayana Shrine, the colors are due to the natural exposure of the sandstone to rain and sun

One more beautiful sculpture on the Suryanarayana Shrine, showing as if several men lifting the column on top of it which holds the shikara of the temple

The Shikara of Suryanarayana temple with beautiful sculptures

This is one more interesting sculpture on the walls of the Suryanarayana temple, which indicates as, both the columns in the pic as several men and women made together to form the column structure

Sculptures on the Shikara of the Suryanarayana temple

Sculptures on the walls of the Suryanarayana temple in black and white

Sculptures on the Shikara of the Suryanarayana temple in black and white

Sculptures on the Shikara of the Suryanarayana temple in color

Suryanarayana Shrine, you can see the Kashivishwanatha Shrine on the left, both are connected with the doors in opposite directions to each other

Front view of Suryanaraya Shrine as seen from the east door of the Kashivishwanatha shrine

Nanneshwara Temple: On the west of the Kashivishwanatha temple is the Nanneshwara temple, is worth a visit. This temple looks like a simple and small replica of the much elaborate Kashivishwanatha Temple. Probably the Nanneshwara Temple was built as a prototype before the grand Kashivishwanatha Temple was executed. The temple stands on a platform of four feet in height. The mukhamandapa has sixteen pillars, each with a square pedestal and circular mouldings above. Based on an inscription found in this temple, it can be dated back to second half of the 12^th century A.D.

Nanneshwara temple front view

Lakkundi - Brahma Jinalaya Temple… To be continued…

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Lakkundi - Brahma Jinalaya

Lakkundi - Brahma Jinalaya Temple:

Next in the itinerary were the Brahma Jinalaya and the museum, which was just about 500m from the Kashivishwanatha temple. After spending enough time at Kashivishwanatha temple, we then moved towards the Museum, where the Brahma Jinalaya temple is also located.

first look of Brahma Jinalaya Temple

Archeological Museum: The Museum is worth a visit. Unlike Kashivishwanatha temple there is a ticketing counter here where one has to take tickets at the museum, it was 10Rs per adult and 25Rs for camera. The museum is undertaken from the Archeological survey of India and is pretty well maintained too. It has a lot of exquisite monuments and here again photography was banned.

Brahma Jinalaya/Jainalaya (Basadi): behind the museum is the Jain basadi which is perhaps the largest and oldest temple at Lakkundi today. An inscription found here reveals that the temple was built in 1007 AD by queen Attimabbe or Attiyabbe, wife of chief Nagadeva, during the reign of the Kalyani Chalukya ruler Irivabedanga Satyashraya. This temple is a good example of the Karnataka Dravida style of temple construction, a style that evolved during the Kalyani Chalukya period.

The temple is arranged along an east-west axis, and has a sanctum, a vestibule, a walled hall, a large open pillared hall, and an entrance gateway. But an unusual feature here is the second functional smaller sanctum over the ground floor sanctum. The temple’s three-storied superstructure is crowned by a square cupola and a pot finial. The front open pillared hall with its varieties of beautiful pillars and sloping roof may be a later addition. Exterior decoration is restricted to architectural motifs and small figures of Tirthankaras, Yakshas and Yakshis.

Side view of the sloping roof

The square navaranga has in the center four Chalukyan pillars of great beauty. The base of the pillars has low relief sculptures of dancers, musicians, mother and a child etc.

sculptures on the base of the pillars

The doorway is finely carved with creeper and has Gajalakshmi on the lintel.

Lintel

five sections of the door-frame of the grabhagriha

Close up of the door frame carvings

The open mukhamandapa has 28 fine pillars.

Inside the open mukhamandapa with each of the pillar design being unique

The temple is dedicated to Mahavira, the most revered saint of Jainism. The square garbagudi holds the idol of Vardhamana Mahavira tirthankara in a fine black stone. He is flanked on both sides by Chamara bearers and there is a triple umbrella above.

Statue of Mahavira, with golden statue in the front

Statue of Mahavira

There was hardly any light inside the garbhagriha, i took the above pic with long exposure and the one above it with flash.

Sculptures on the roof top

Sculptures on the walls of the temple

More than all, the cylindrical sculptor of Chaturmukha Brahma located on the right side of the temple hall, attracts the pilgrims and the art lovers to the heart's content. This was one of the most beautiful sculptures I've ever seen. There were already a lot of damages on the statue so i feel this should rather be preserved inside the museum.

Statue of Brahma - termed as the creator of the universe with 4 heads

Here i leave it with few more snaps of the temple,

Front view of the Brahma Jinalaya temple

Side view of the Brahma Jinalaya temple

View from one corner of the temple

The two storey garbhagriha shikara showing of its height

Monkeys at Lakkundi Brahma Jinalaya Temple

Rear view of the temple

Rear view on the other side

had to mention in this blog, this was another temple just beside the Museum which is encroached by the locals, hope government take back these ancient temples under the control of ASI

Recall, one of the most popular song in Kannada film, "Anisuthide yaako endu" from movie "Mungaaru Male" was shot here.
It was by late afternoon when we finished seeing this temple and felt have to leave to reach Gadag before dark, so our plan to visit Manikeshwara temple was dropped thought shall see it in my next visit. Our auto was waiting and we went back to the bus stand and caught our bus to Gadag from there. As said by most of the visitors of Lakkundi, it never disappoints you, so it was definitely worth the visit and my time. We reached Gadag in the early evening hours and again felt the Trikuteshwara temple over here would be closed by that time and hence decided that will also go in my next visit.

Hope I visit Manikeshwara temple of Lakkundi, Trikuteshwara temple of Gadag and temples of Dambal and Lakshmeshwar in my next visit.

I leave here some of the information about Lakkundi,

Information About Lakkundi:

Distances from Lakkundi bus stand to various temples:

Manikeshwara Temple: 230m

Kashivishwanatha, Suryanarayana and Nanneshwara Temple: 900m

Brahma Jinalaya and Museum: 900m

Distance from Museum to Kashivishwanatha temple: 500m

How to reach: Lakkundi is well connected by government buses from Gadag and Koppal & can be reached by road easily.

Nearest airport: Hubli, Belgaum. Nearest International airport is Bangalore.

Nearest railway station: Gadag

Camera Used: Canon 550D with 18-55mm lens

Hotels & Restaurants: there are no proper hotels at Lakkundi, so one have to stay at Gadag.

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Lakkundi - Kashivishwanatha Temple

Belur Halebeedu – Climax of Indian Architecture:

The temple of Belur and Halebeedu, has been described as an “outstanding example of Hindu Architecture” and as the “Supreme Climax of Indian Architecture”. This must be the most beautiful Hindu sculptures made in the whole world.

The Hoysala era was an important period in the development of Art, Architecture and Religion in South India. The empire is primarily remembered today for its temple Architecture. At present day there are over a hundred temples scattered across Karnataka of which Chennakeshava temple at Belur, the Hoysaleshwara temple at Halebeedu, and the Keshava temple at Somanathapura are the most important and beautiful. Other temples include Viranarayana Temple at Belavadi, Isvara Temple at Arasikere, Lakshminarayana temple at Hosaholal and Lakshminarasimha temple at Javagal.

Belur Temple complex, with the main entrance Gopura on the right

Although I've now covered the Hoysala Big three, the other four are definitely on my cards for future. Back to the travelogue we planned for Belur Halebeedu as a one day trip from Bangalore, which we later felt was no way sufficient, as you need at least two days to understand and feel the two big temples of Hoysala.

One more weekend, and this time it was a long weekend of Sankranthi festival and we had left Bangalore on Saturday morning at 6.30AM in two of our cars, we headed towards the NH4 towards Tumkur and then took a left at the Bangalore-Mangalore highway (NH48) at Nelamangala after the toll gate. This newly constructed highway is 4-lanned up to almost half way built by Lanco Infra, the remaining half way was under construction by L & T. So we almost zoomed the halfway easily passing by two of the toll gates on NH48, both charged 54Rs each for a double way entry. Altogether crossed three toll gates (Rs133). Just about half way we stopped for our breakfast at Hotel Café Kamat (Veg), had some decent dosa’s here and then continued through the route which was under construction so our speed dropped here when we finally arrived near Hassan, and we continued on the highway as shown on our GPS, but unfortunately we were fooled nearly by the GPS navigation as it showed a shorter way but horrible road to connect to the Belur road, the actual proper route was to take a right at the circle just after passing the Rajeev Institute of Technology which falls on the left side of the highway. From there you can connect to the BM road and then to the Belur road. Best option is to enquire the locals about the roads. As our first stop was at Belur we followed the Belur road directly to Belur Chennakeshava temple, parked our vehicles at the free parking space provided in front of the temple, and then entered the main entrance of the temple.

Hotel cafe Kamat on the Highway NH48

Facts and History about Belur: Belur was the first capital of the Hoysala kingdom; it was also called as Velapuri or Velapura. It is situated on the banks of the river Yagachi. It is now located in the District of Hassan, and the nearest city Chikmangalur is 25km away from Belur. Hoysala’s after having defeated the Chalukyas, rose above all to become the parsamount rulers even over the Cholas and Pandyas in South India. Hoysala’s ruled from 1026-1343 A.D., By the 13th century, they governed most of the Karnataka, parts of Tamil Nadu and Kerala, and parts of western Andhra Pradesh in Deccan India.

Belur Temple Complex:

The first thing you notice while entering is the tall gopura structure built in the later period by Vijayanagara kings in the 16^th Century A.D. Most if the time the gopura was occupied by birds.

The other temples which are added in the later period within the complex are Kappe Channigaraya temple, Veera Narayana temple, Saumyanayaki temple, and Goddess Andal temple.

The whole temple complex is enclosed with tall wall structure and the main entrance is crowned by a Rayagopura built during the days of Vijayanagar, a flagpole stands in the foreground and a Pushkarni or stepped well to the right side of the main entrance, is situated in the north east corner of the complex.

Flagpole infront of the gopura

Pushkarni or stepped well, belur

Inside the temple complex, is the Chennakeshava temple at the center which faces to the east. There is Kappe Chennigaraya temple situated to the south of the Chennakeshava temple. To the south-west of the Keshava temple is the temple of Saumyanayaki. The Veera Narayana temple to the west of Keshava temple. The temple of the goddess Andal is situated to the north west of the Keshava temple.

Kappe Channigaraya temple:

Situated to the south of the Keshava temple in the complex has two cells. This temple has the features more or less similar to the Chennakeshava temple but miniature in scale. The main cell has a beautiful sculpture of Chennakeshava 6.5feet tall. The Prabhavali has Dasavatara sculptures. There is an inscription of Shantala the senior queen of Haysala King Vishnuvardhana stating that it was consecrated by her in the year 1117 A.D. The temple raises over an elevated platform. The perforated jalandras of the temple were got executed by Hoysala Ballala-II in 1206. The Sukhanasi doorway is beautifully executed and has a figure of Lakshminarayana flanked by makaras on the lintel. The doorway of the Venugopala shrine has the figure of Narasimha killing Hiranyakshipu. The niches on the outer walls of the Sukhanasi has the beautiful sculptures of Lakshminarayana, Ganesha, Saraswati and Mahishamardini. The four pillars of the navaranga, are lathe turned and have bracket figures on them. The central ceiling has Hoysala emblems and lotus medalions.

Kappe Chennigaraya temple in the left and Chennakeshava temple on the right. Both look identical

Saumyanayaki temple:

To the south-west of Keshava temple is the temple of Saumyanayaki. It has a Garbhagriha, surmounted by a tower. According to an inscription the original tower which was damaged was got repaired in 1387 by Muddappa a minister under the Vijayanagara king Harihara II – and a metal Kalasa or finial was fixed on it. The front portion of this temple is a later addition built by the Dalavayi family of Kalale.

Saumyanaki temple is the left and Chennakeshava temple at the center. Also in the pic is the flagpole in the front

Veera Narayana Temple:

Located to the west of the Chennakeshava temple is a small and compact structure with the outer walls containing beautiful sculptures of vaishnava and shaiva faith. It consists of a Garbhagriha, a sukhanasi and a Navaranga. The 59 large images on the outer wall surfaces consists of Vishnu, Shiva, Brahma, Parvati, Saraswati, Bhairava, Ganesha and many more. The temple is raised on an elevated basement and is contemporary to the Chennakeshava temple. This was also said to be built in 1117 A.D.

Veera Narayana Temple, Belur

Remains of some temple kept inbetween Veera Narayana and Andal temples

Andal (Ranganayaki) Temple:

The temple of the goddess Andal is said to be built in 12^th century, and is situated to the north west of the Chennakeshava temple is also locally known as Ranganayaki temple. The basement has friezes of elephants, scroll work and puranic scenes. The temple has the appearance of having been built with the materials belonging to some ruined temple of Hoysala period.

Andal (Ranganayaki) temple, belur

The temple is known for the row of 31 large images on the outer walls. The canopies over these images, which differ from one another, show elegant workmanship. The deities represented here are Lakshmi, Mohini, Venugopala, Lakshminarayana flanked by female chauri bearers and etc.

Two of the images on the south wall have the names of the sculptors Bechama and Madhuvanna who carved them.

Sculptures on the walls of Andal (Ranganayaki) temple, belur

Having walked all around the Chennakeshava temple through the temple complex, it was now time for some exciting instants to enter the Main temple which I’ll be unfolding in my next post.

Model gopura of Chennakeshava temple on the right & the Main gopura of the belur temple complex entrance on the left

Chennakeshava temple of Belur…To be continued…

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Chennakeshava temple of Belur:

Some facts about the Chennakeshava Temple: Hoysala king Vishnuvardhana defeated the Cholas at Talakad & to commemorate this great event built many temples in 1117 A.D., of which Chennakeshava temple at Belur is the most important & beautiful, dedicated to Keshava one of the 24 forms of Vishnu.

Although the temple was completed by Narasimha, it took over 103 years to finish the structure.

Though the legends assign this temple to have been built by Jakanachari, as per the inscriptions the master builders of this temple are Dasoja and his son Chavana, other sculptors include Chikka-Hampa, Malliyana, Padari Malloja, Masada and Nagoja who bestowed their best in creating this masterpiece.

Chennakeshava Temple, Belur

Back to the travelogue: Most important aspect of these Belur Halebeedu temples is that Chennakeshava temple is famous for beautiful and intricate interiors and Hoysaleshwara temple is famous for the magnificent sculptures on the exteriors. Employing a tourist guide in these places is recommended, as there is immense history to be said from there sculptures.

We hired a guide here who took for a tour around the temple first, he explained about the temple for almost an hour, and charged 200 Rs.

About the temple Plan: The building material used in the Chennakeshava temple is soapstone (chloritic schist) and is of a star shape of 32 angles, which stands on a wide elevated platform of similar outline, which raises about 3 feet in height. It is 178 feet long (east-west side) and 156 feet broad (north-south). The Shikhara surmounting its sanctum is now gone. It consists of a Garbhagriha (sanctum), a Sukhanasa (Vestibule), and a Navaranga (the central hall). The navaranga pavilion is a large hall with beautifully designed lathe turned and polished pillars and ceiling and has entrances on the east, north and south.

Chennakeshava Temple Main Entrance(East), Belur

Chennakeshava Temple

The platform with pradakshinapatha has flight of steps on east, north and south flanked by a small tower on either side.

south side entrance with model shrines on either side

Friezes on the wall:

The outer wall of the temple from bottom on-wards has tiers of minute sculptures consisting of rows of elephants, lion faces, creepers, ornamental frieze, dancers in small niches, female sculptures in between the pillars, and episodes of Ramayana and Mahabharata.

There are a total of 650 such elephant sculptures all around the temple base on the wall, each one said to be carved uniquely.

Friezes on outer wall

Should be Shilabalikas on the friezes

Intricate Sculptures on the walls of the Chennakeshava temple, Belur

3 desired characteristics represented on the base of the walls:

From the Bottom:

Bhala (Strength) represented by Elephant
Shourya (Vigor/Courage) represented by Lion
Veega (Speed) represented by Horse

Base of the wall representing 3 desired characteristics

Miniature Balcony kind of structures on the carved on walls of the temple

It looks as if the lady is looking out of the house through the pillars standing beside the balcony

This also gives the same perspective of the previous picture.

Some kind of beautiful patterns sculptures on the shrines of the temple

Some kind of beautiful pattern sculptures on the shrines of the temple

Huge columns on the walls of the temple

Sculptures of Gods & Goddesses on the outer wall:

Above the friezes are sculptures of gods and goddesses in various poses under finely carved canopies. These sculptures are so varied and finely ornamented; it looks like an open air museum. The important sculptural depictions of Vishnu as Lakshminarayana, Vamana, Narasimha (half man & half lion form of Vishnu), Varaha, Balarama, Siva & Parvati, Siva as Andhakasura & Gajasura (Lord Shiva slaying demon in form of elephant), Harihara, Surya, Durga & Mahishasuramardini, Bhairava, Brahma could be considered as the best representations of the Hoysala sculptural art.

Sculptures on the walls of Chennakeshava temple

1. Narasimha: This vigorous sculpture portrays the rage of the man-lion, with adoring Garuda at photo left. Chennakeshava means "beautiful god," a form of Vishnu; the shrine images are of this god, while the panel sculptures include both Vaishnava and Shaiva images.

Narasimha

2.Shiva Gajasamharara: Shiva dances in triumph on the decapitated head of the elephant demon Nila, while stretching the elephant's skin over his head like a canopy.

Shiva Gajasamharara

3. Varaha: Varaha's expression in this well-known piece seems kindly or perhaps even humorous rather than heroic, fierce, or tender.

series of sculptures including Varaha in the right of the pic and Arjuna shooting in the left side

4. Arjuna’s shooting : To the left in the pic you can see Arjuna shooting the fish by looking at the shadow reflected in a bowl of oil, placed just below the target pillar.

5. Sixteen-armed Narayana: From the outside of the south shrine. Sixteen-armed Narayana seated on a lotus upheld by a four-armed Garuda, carries attributes (photo left to right) of club, spoon, skull staff, conch, sword, drum, chakra, and other attributes, some of which are hidden behind the visible arms and attributes, is supported by another image, of which only the hands and the tip of the head are visible.

Sixteen-armed Narayana

6. Ravana shaking mount Kailash: Ten-headed demon king Ravana is holding up Kailas mountain. You can see Lord Shiva is sitting with his beloved Parvathi on the top of the mountain.

Ravana lifting the Kailash mountain

7. Chamundi: The goddess Chamundi is killing the demon Mahishasura.

Chamundi

8. The Sun god: The sun God is coming upon his seven-horsed chariot.

Surya Deva

9.Vishnu (???)

10.Brahma and forms of Vishnu:

Ornate Pierced Screen:

The ornamented windows called jalandhras which were inserted, between the previously open columns of the mandapa, in the 13^th century allow sufficient light and air to enter the interior of the temple.
There are twenty pierced stone windows (perforated screens) surmounted by the eaves, ten on the right and ten on the left of the cast doorway, covering the whole temple. Ten of them are decorated with Puranic scenes and the rest with geometrical designs. Among them five on the right and five on the left of the east doorway are especially noteworthy.

Ornate perforated Screen

Entrance:

Ornate Lintel: An ornate lintel above one of the temple entrances shows Vishnu as Narasimha (hard to see) above Garuda (easy to see), beneath an elaborately curved arch that issues from the open mouths of elephantine makaras bearing riders.

Lintel sculptures on the east entrance(Main)

Lintel sculptures on the east entrance(Main) in close up, you can see the Makaras on both sides of the Lintel, on top of the pillars

Lintel sculptures on the east entrance(Main) further close up to show up the Narasimha and Garuda below that

The south entrance, you can observe that it is not as beautifully carved compared to the east door

Hoysala Emblem: The warrior, killing a horned lion with his sword, is the emblem of the Hoysala dynasty, symbolizing their courage and strength.

Hoysala Emblem at the doors

Model Shrines: Model shrines flank the stairs leading up to the temple entrances. Horned lions and elephants decorate the "wings" on either side of the shrine entrance. It is tempting to speculate that the original temple roof may have been intended to look like this example (shown in the above pic with two of the model shrines with shikhara’s), although there is no real proof one way or the other.

Model Shrine

Sculptures inside the Model Shrines: Each of these model shrines has an idol of gods, most of them being of Vishnu's

Sculptures inside the Model Shrines - 1

Sculptures inside the Model Shrines - 2

Sculptures inside the Model Shrines - 3

Ruvari Mallitamma, a prolific artist, had more than 40 sculptures attributed to him in Chennakesava. Dasoja and his son Chavana, from Balligavi in Shimoga district, also made many contributions. Chavana has been credited with the work on five madanika and Dasoja with four. Malliyanna and Nagoja created birds and animals in their sculptures. Artists Chikkahampa and Malloja have been credited with some the sculptures in the mantapa.
Over the sculptures and on the level of the roof are bracket figures known as Madanikas or Silabalika sculptures. Which I’ll be detailing in the next blog.

Madanikas of Belur Chennakeshava temple … To be continued…

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Madanikas of Belur Chennakeshava temple:

Most popular feature of Belur is its Shilabalike’s or the Bracket figures of different dance forms.

Various poses of Madanika's at the Belur Chennakeshava temple.

There are 42 Madanikas or Bracket figures on the corner out of which 38 are outside the temple and four are inside the temple. Each figure attracts on its own merits.

They represent beautiful damsels in various moods representing feminine charm and grace, this perhaps are one of the best creations of the Hoysala sculptors of the Belur temple. There are a total of 40 pillars on the outer walls, each with a bracket figure of dancing girls (38 in total on outer walls). These sculptures are finely proportioned and exceedingly ornamented.

Actual placement of the Madanika's op top of the columns

Out of the 38 Madanikas on the outer walls, I've written a photologue on 25 and all the 4 interior Madanikas.

Each one of these Madaniks are given a number to represent there location which i'll be publishing along with there photo.

1. Darpana Sundari (Beauty and Mirror):

Starting from the most popular among all the Madanika's, The Darpana Sundari, which is right at the main entrance of the temple.

A lady holding mirror in her left hand and looking at her beauty in it.(Madanika No 1)

Darpana Sundari (Beauty and Mirror), #1

2. Shuka Bhashini (Pet Parrot):

A parrot sitting on the fore palm of a lady's right hand. It looks like conversation with her pet.(Madanika No2)

Shuka Bhashini (Pet Parrot), #2

3. The Huntress:

A bird sitting on the canopy behind, she is aiming her arrow at the bird. (Madanika No 6)

(Left)The Huntress, #6 & (Right) Monkey Pulling Saree, #5

4.Monkey Pulling Saree:

A monkey is pulling the edge of her saree. She is going to beat it with a twig of a tree made out of the same stone.(Madanika No 5)

5. Thribhangi Nritya:

A lady is dancing stylishly by bending her body into three portions, one from the waist downward, other from the waist to the chest and another upwards. This is said to be the most difficult one, so far no other dancer has been able to exhibit. This is apparently one of the most difficult postures to achieve in Bharathnatyam (Madanika No 8).

Figure 21: (left-right) Thribhangi Nritya

(Left)Thribhangi Nritya, #8 & (Right) Hair Dressing, #7

6. Hair Dressing:

she is dressing her hair after bath. The attendandants are holding flowers and toiletery. This madanika has washed her hair and is squeezing the water out of it. This depiction is seen on a sculpture inside the temple too. (Madanika No7)

7. A sham, she Saint:

she is in disguise as a saint. She holds a rod with skull at the top in her left hand.. (Madanika 18?)

(Right-Left) 1.A sham, she Saint, #18; 2.Drum dance, #9; 3.The Flutist, #10

8. Drum dance:

she holds in her left hand a drum and she is playing upon it with her right hand. (Madanika 9)

9. The Flutist:

She is playing on her flute. Her maid on the left side is sitting to the tune of the flute.(Madanika 10)

10. World Bewitching Beauty:

Her hands and legs are cut out very nicely. Look at the canopy above her left shoulder. You can see a jackfruit and a fly on it. A lizard is planning to catch the fly. You can see the natural pose of the Lizard.(Madanika 12)

(left) World Bewitching Beauty, #12 & (right) Musician, #12

11. Musician:

She is singing with time. (Madanika 11)

12. Violinist:

She is a violinist. She is standing holding the instrument (Rudra veena?) in her left hand. Her maids are arranging for a concert.(Madanika No 13)

Violinist, #13

13. A curly Haired Beauty:

she holds a mirror having a handle. She is arranging the curls on the forehead with her right hand finger .(Madanika 14)

(right-left) A curly Haired Beauty, #14 & The Huntress, #15

14. The Huntress:

She is plucking a mango with her right hand.(Madanika No15)

15. Beauty Dance:

She is practicing her dance. Her maids are helping her by playing on their instruments. .(Madanika 24)

Beauty Dance, #24

16. Bhasma Mohini Dance:

The figure illustrates the epic story of God Vishnu who took the form of Mohini.(Madanika No25)

Bhasma Mohini Dance, #25

17. A Gypsy girl:

She hold in her left hand palm leaves and holds the right hand in speaking pose.(Madanika No 28)

A Gypsy girl, #28

18. A beauty after heavy meal:

she is returning from her dinner and is about to retire for rest.(Madanika No29)

A beauty after heavy meal, #29

19. Nagaveena dance:

The expert musician is playing on her violin, which is in the form of snake. .(Madanika 30) This madanika is holding a ‘nagaveena’. A veena with one end shaped like a snake.

Nagaveena dance, #30

20. Proud Lady:

She is fully dressed and has put on all sorts of ornaments on her body. She is looking at her beauty in proud through a mirror. This madanika is called Abhimani… the proud one. Symbolizing someone who has a lot of pride in her beauty and is also very conscious of it. The sculpture at the left (at her feet), holds up a mirror but is looking away – kind of telling her ‘woman, reality check’. (Madanika No31)

Proud Lady, #31

21. A kite Dancer:

she is dancing imitating the play of flying a kite. Look at her standing pose. She is standing as if she is pulling the string of the kite using both her hands. But in other view looks like an IMAGINARY FLUTE - This one has an imaginary flute in her hand.(Madanika No33)

A kite Dancer, #33

22. A beauty with her Hair:

She has tied her hair into a fine knot. This is up-to-date pony-tale. (Madanika No34)

A beauty with her Hair, #34

23. A Beauty in perfect Make-up:

The lady has put on her best dress and ornaments and is ready to go for a dance. In another view it looks like THE MARRIED ONE - This one depicts a woman who has been recently married and who toe is being adorned by a toe-ring. she is holding onto a vine for balance.(Madanika No.35)

A Beauty in perfect Make-up, #35

24. Drum dance:

She has a beard & moustache like a man. She looks neither male nor female. She is dancing holding a drum in her left hand. .(Madanika 36)

Drum dance, #36

25. The Arch Dancer:

She is dancing to the tune of the fun of her accomplice on both her sides (Madanika 38)

The Arch Dancer, #38

On entering inside the temple in the navaranga there are four pillars at the center with four bracket figures on top of each pillar,

1. Beauty with her pet parrot:

A lady holds a creeper in her right hand. A parrot is sitting on the fore palm of her left hand. She looks as if she is having a conversation with the parrot. She is having a bangle on her right hand and can move up and down.

Shilabalika with her pet parrot., #39

Side view of the Shilabalika with her pet parrot., #39

2. Shantaladevi:

She is dancing. See the canopy behind. She is wearing a gem just above the middle of the forehead.

Shantaladevi Shilabalike, #40

3. Gandharva Dance:

She wears on her fore arm, a good number of bangles, which give an impression of moving to and fro.

Gandharva Shilabalike, #41

4. Kesha Shrungara:

She is wringing her hair to squeeze the water after her bath. You can see the drops of water collected at the tip of her hairs.

Kesha Shrungara Shilabalike, #42

There is no denying the fact that most magnificent specimens of Hoysala sculpture are the Madanikas. For the sheer beauty of form, delicacy of workmanship and perfection of finish, they are without parallel and may be called "poetry in stone." They have elicited un-qualified approbation from the art-critics of the world and to the temple, they have added great grace and charm.

Each one of Madanika figures here may be taken as a representative illustration of the rhythm and grace of which an ideal female form is capable. The workmanlike finish given to every one of them and the remarkable delicacy and skill with which details of decoration and ornamentation have been executed, have placed on them an exceptionally high value as pure works of creative art.

Some of these sculptures, are so delicate that it seems nearly impossible that they are made of stone.

The most exiting part of the temple is behind the walls of the temple, interiors, which i'm sure anyone can be amused by the amazing level of craftsmanship on these interiors.

Interiors of Belur Chennakeshava temple…To be continued…

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Interiors of Belur Chennakeshava temple:

Originally the interior received much daylight, but the added screens make it dark and mysterious.

The interior of the temple consisting of a garbhagriha, Sukhanasi, navaranga and a mandapa takes us to a new world of sculptures with lathe turned pillars of various designs.

The central square of the navaranga has four pillars decorated with bracket figures atop. These bracket figures are remarkably of superior workmanship in conception and execution.

The Navaranga has raised verandah's on both sides of the three entrances.

Sufficient space has been left out in the central hall (Navaranga) for musical performances and Puja (worship) ceremonies by large numbers of devotees and others.

Sculptures on the entrance of Garbhagriha

Pillars:

There are a total of 48 pillars, while the four central pillars have been hand churned, the others had been lathe turned.

One of the four Pillar's at the central square of the Navaranga

Some of the other pillars beautifully designed, the second pillar here is the central pillar of the Navaranga.

All the pillars are artistically executed and are different from one another in design and the arrangement enhances the beauty of the Navaranga.

Pillars inside the Main hall, each one is unique in design

The well-known Narsimha pillars are carved out with minute figures all round from the top to the bottom. A tiny bull (Kadali-basava) is in the size of a seed of the Bengal gram (Kadal). A small space on the south face of the pillar is said to have been left blank by the artist who prepared the pillar as a challenge to any artist who can appropriately fill it up. It is said could be turned on its axis.

Here you can see the scale of Narasimha Pillar, infront of people.

The Narasimha Pillar

Design on the Narasimha pillar

The Mohini pillar in the navaranga is one of the finest specimens. The pillar is cut vertically on a sixteen pointed star plan. It is decorated with a narrow band of filigree work. A creeper scroll and figures inset in convolutions. It has eight vertical bands with fine scroll work the convolutions of which are made up of delicately executed figures representing the Hindu minor gods of the eight directions and others. The eastern face of the pillar has a large beautifully carved image of Vishnu as Mohini exceedingly graceful with a chauri bearer and garuda on the other.

Mohini sculpture at the Mohini Pillar

You can see here that these pillars are made hollow from inside out of a single stone, carved so delicately. Mohini Pillar

Mohini Pillar

Rows of Pillars, beautifully carved

This one had some magnificent patterns on its surface.

Row of pillars from the Narasimha pillar towards the main entrance on the east

Other set of pillars towards the north entrance of the Navaranga

Ceilings:

There are many delicately carved ceilings and they represent the best specimens of that type.

Stone sculptures on the roof

The central vimana: The four central pillars support a large domed ceiling of about 3.05 meters (ten feet) in diameter, 1.83 meters (six feet) deep, that is one of the most elaborately decorated ceilings in all India.

The amazingly beautiful central vimana, or the central dome of the Chennakeshava temple, Belur

It is elegantly carved with frieze of varied sculptures some being mythological.

Friezes of various sculptures on the bottom of the central dome

Narasimha stands at the central of the ceiling protruding out of the dome. It is a remarkable piece of artistic workmanship famous for the richness of ornamentation and elaboration of details.

The epicenter of the central dome with Narasimha protruding out of the Dome

Brahma, Vishnu and Mahesvara are shown on a lotus bud and the bottom frieze of Madanikas, standing on the capitals of the four central pillars, add much to the grace and charm of the Navaranga. Three of them are signed by the sculptors.

Sculptures of Madanika's on the central four pillars, in the pic is Gandharva Shilabalike

A common design found on the roofs

Ornate bay ceiling in mantapa

Garbhagriha:

The crowd during the pooja timings at the temple

The doorway of the garbhagriha is another specimen of delicate carvings unsurpassed of that type. Inside the garbhagriha is the sculpture of Keshava (Vijaya-Narayana), a handsome figure of 1.83 metres (six feet) in height with a halo (Prabha), standing on a 0.91 metre (three feet) high pedestal, holding sankha, chakra, gada and Padma in his hands, with a karanda makuta(crown) at his head. Bhudevi and sridevi are standing at the bottom.

The intricately carved doorjamb of the Garbhagriha

Intricately carved Makara toranas on the exterior of the Garbhagriha

The doorway, you can see here the hollow structure around these sculptures which opens up to the Garbhagriha

The door jambs: The door jambs of the sukhanasa and garbhagriha carry across intricately carved Makara toranas on the exterior.The door-keepers (Dvarapalas) are elegantly executed on the Sukhanasi (vestibule) doorway. Its pediment with a fine figure of Lakshmi-Narayana in the centre has excellent filigree work. The Makaras at the side bear Varuna and his consort on the back.

The amazing view from the side of the garbhagriha doorway, here you can see the whole structure is so beautifully carved not leaving behind any piece of stone plain.

After spending decent time at the temple we went for a small shopping around the temple complex where you find some beautiful stone and metal sculptures made from the local people, most popular being the Mahavira face carved from granite stones. The sun was heating us while we were feeling hungry; it was about 2 pm when we left Belur towards Halebeedu town. The road towards Belur from Hassan was not so good, but manageable.

Halebeedu Hoysaleshwara Temple …To be continued…

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Belur Temple Complex: