Travelling tales1- A trip to Badami and around

  “The world is a book, and those who do not travel read only one page.” – Saint Augustine


My bizarre obsession to know the hidden secrets behind every mountain,to see every shore of the sea,to peep into a cluster of dense trees,to view how many colors of a sea can be,to feel how much soft a beach sand can be and to measure the end of an endless water through my eyes,perhaps drives me to wander amazing places.My infinite wander lust knows nothing,but to unfold an unknown ,hidden secret of the nature!!!!!



 Travelling tales1- A trip to Badami and around 

One such desire took me to a place, not so popular among tourists, Badami,Karnataka.
Traveling Tale:Badami,Karnataka.
It was November 2011,When we had a long weekend after a long time,three days to enjoy (Friday,Saturday,Sunday)... But with very few options(viz.Mahabaleshwar,Khandala,Matheran or Kashid beach) and we knew these places will be entirely packed on weekends. After hours of searching on internet,finally we found a place which could be covered within 3 days and possibly lesser crowded than others... Badami,some 462 km away from Pune,a tiny place with great archaeological significance(Word Heritage Site), an ancient town situated at Bagalkot district,Karnataka Badami was the capital of the Chalukya dynasty which has some temples,caves and monuments. 

We started around 10 o 'clock in the morning with an idea to hit NH4 in an hour. As the Nh4 road is in a very good shape up to Belgaum,Our planning was to reach Belguam by 4:30 including few breaks. As estimated correctly,before 5pm,we landed at a decent,affordable hotel, Sai International with gated underground parking in Belgaum for the night halt (need not to go inside the city as the hotel is off NH4 first right turn before the over bridge as soon as Belgaum city starts).A famous restaurant Ramdev, quite a favorite among medical students for its delicious ,sumptuous and cheap food, just diagonal to Sai International. On asking few locals about our destination,we decided to book a full day cab with the driver who is familiar with every nook and corner of the place than taking our car (as all temples are scattered in the interior) so booked a taxi from a nearby kiosk of Makemytrip.

Next morning around 8 o' clock after having light ,fluffy idlies and onion utthpam ,we headed towards Badami via Bachi - Raichur Hwy,SH45 and NH218 to Badami Rd . On our way, we saw dozens of parrots flying in a valley(do not remember the place exactly).Within 3 hrs ,we reached our destination,entire town has scattered huge red rocky mountains. Our first place was Badami cave,belong to Chalukya dynasty (one can immediately recollect movies shot here viz.Rawdy Rathore,Guru etc:)The Badami cave temples are a complex of four cave temples surrounded by an artificial lake ,called Agastya ,an example of magnificent rock-cut architecture,with some fifty
steps. (beware of monkeys)

First cave portrays the dancing Shiva, as Natraja. Second cave shows Vishnu as Trivikarma and Cave 3, is the largest one , a Vaishnava cave. Cave 4 features detailed carvings and diverse range of motifs belonging to Jainism . We spent around one hour here ,clicking pics and appreciating marvelous structures. After that ,moved to museum adjacent to caves .Pre-historical sculptures and stone equipments are the main attractions of the museum. From here,we went to Bhuthnath temple(did not have much to see from inside).We decided to have lunch at Krishna resort as hunger pangs strike. Good,tasty,authentic Karnataka thali.Now we headed to Pattadakal(half an hour)to see Virupaksha temple,Sangameshvara temple,Chandrashekhara temple ,Kashivisvanatha temple and Galganatha temple to name a few. Everywhere you need to buy ticket(nominal), (queues had more foreigners than Indian).

It was around 4 o'clock,we decided to go back,though I wanted to visit few monuments of Aihole too,but time was short. We returned to our hotel around 7,had dinner and retired to hotel room. Next morning started 7:30 for Pune and reached home safely by afternoon.