TOUR OF HAMPI – CAPITAL OF VIJAYNAGARA DYNASTY

TOUR  OF  HAMPI – CAPITAL OF  VIJAYNAGARA  DYNASTY  

We decided to visit HAMPI, capital of The VIjaynagara dynasty, for a two night three day tour during July 2019. It is not very far from Bangalore but a place worth visiting. This trip was targeted to three issues, to visit an old and famous city of Karnataka, testing our one year old vehicle and testing my daughter’s driving skill. The trip was exact for all three purposes and this was a trial tour before going on a long tour of Tamilnadu and Kerala.

We decided to drive to Hampi stay there for two nights and see around and come back by same route to Bangalore. We started on 4^th July 2019, knowing that the distance to be around 350km and may take around 5 – 6 hours. We booked Vijaysree Resort and Heritage Village for staying at Hampi, through our time share provider.

We were very happy once we were on road, as usual the Karnataka beauty unfolded in front of us. The roads are good, landscape is full of greenery and small hills, it is never boring, as the rainy season about to start, everything looked fresh and green. Once we are on road we were not feeling any fatigue of driving because of refreshing landscape. We took the route as indicated by Google map, via Neelamangala, Tumkur, Hiriyur, Chitradurga, Hosahalli, Kudigi to Hampi. We followed route no 48 and 50 to reach. The road was superb, I had no idea that Indian road has improved a lot during my outside stay. Once we were near Chitradurga we found the hills are dotted with big windmills which enhanced the beauty a lot, especially when those were rotating it looked very beautiful. I always believed that India has all the beauty, compared to all around world. I believe if one can see India in detail, need not go outside India to see anything and that is proved once again, on this route. It was simple superb.

We started early morning around 6.30 in the morning and reached around 13.00 at the resort. We purposely kept aside Chitradurga for some other trip, as our main target was Hampi. Friend told we need time to explore all the places. The resort was very soothing and sprawling on big plot with different types of cottages, spread over with gaps in between all the cottages. We fell in love at first sight. After freshening up we went for lunch and came to know the resort was a vegetarian one and with a No Smoking and No Drinks policy. But the food was good and we, not being very fussy about non veg food, we enjoyed food during our stay.

After lunch we started our site seeing with a visit to the Tungabhadra Dam popularly called as TBD. We had to leave the vehicle some distance away at the parking place and a bus was waiting for taking us to the dam level. We went up at that level and walked to the dam, it was so huge and the basin is so big, one can understand the importance of the dam. Unfortunately the basin was empty as rain was yet to start. We spent some time on the dam, taken photographs and then came down to the parking area by same bus. Then while coming back to hotel we found the city was calm cool and with no unnecessary speedy vehicle. We loved the city and drove around without any goal for some time and came back to resort.

Though we had done our homework about Hampi before we going there, we decided to discuss with the staff about the spots we must visit and we found the staff were very helpful and when we told them that we liked the city. They had given us route we should follow for completing as far as possible, all the spots.

Next day we dedicated to the spots in and around Hampi, accordingly we have visited the following spots, we know we have not covered all the spots and it is almost impossible to visit everything in one day. The spot listed may not be in the same sequence as we visited.

• Virupaksha Temple : As usual we were stunned with the beauty and grandeur of the temple. We visited  the temple and surrounding structures. The beauty of the intricate stone works are stunningly beautiful.
• Old ruins of Hampi – these structures though in runins gives you an idea what a sprawling and prosperous dynasty was this.  
• Stone Chariot at Vitthalla Temple – this we are all familiar with as the same is printed on currency notes of India. It seems the stone wheels is carved in such a way that those can not be taken out but can rotate!!!!
• Hampi Bazar – this is another place where you can have a idea how big was the market considering the time we are talking about. It was no less than in size for a market in any city now.
• Achyutraya Shiva Temple – as I said earlier this temple though in ruins in most of the portion still stuns with its grandeur.
• Garuda Shrine at Vitthalla Temple – you need to look into the intricate stone works here also.
• Queen’s Bath – this a place where royal ladies used to take bath and in no way less comparable to Greek spas, in addition the layout, the privacy, the water flowing system is unique if you think about the time we are talking about. 
• Octagonal Stone well – a beautiful well for water storage.
• Stepped Well – a beautiful structure to go down almost 20-30ft below to get water in dry times, the arrangement of steps were done in such a way it gives idea of architectural and structural knowledge they were having at that point of time.
• Elephant Stable – another grand structure to house elephants with comfort.
• Krishna’s Temple – could not go inside because some restoration and repair work was going on.
• Krishna’s Bazar – near to Krishna’s temple another market with stone columns and beams  but in a orderly manner with a wide enough space for movement of people and may be chariots. 
• Musical columns, at Virupaksha temple- Several multi-columned pillars make sounds similar to specific Indian musical instruments such as the ghanta (bell), mridanga (percussion), or veena (strings), in this structure. We could see the structure from outside of cordon for protecting the structure, nobody is allowed to touch the columns and damage those, as a scientific study is being conducted how a stone column can sound like that.  
• Archeological Museum – The museum we visited on the day of coming back as we did not get time earlier day. The museum gives us idea about the dynaty and the details about Hampi and the about the greatness of people of that time about the knowledge, town planning, architecture and engineering to actually building those structures. Unfortunately photography was not allowed inside the museum and we could not get any picture of those details.

The day we visited Virupaksha temple we took our lunch at a restaurant, again vegetarian, called Mango Tree restaurant near the river. The food was awesome, we did not know that a sizzler plater can be vegetarian also. The place was traditional with bamboo structure, one can sit on table chair or low table chair and even seating on floor and taking food on a raised platform. The place was real good, though the location was in an alley beside temple.

One thing I must mention with all these old things I could find an old fashioned letter box near the temple and it matched with the surrounding nicely.

On third day we started for Bangalore around 9.00 in the morning after having breakfast and taking photographs of resort and the musician at the gate.

Tough it was a short visit but rejuvenated us well, we took our lunch on the way at a road side restaurant and reached home around 7.00 in the evening after crossing usual traffic on Tumkur road.

I must say it was a beautiful trip and refreshed us a lot. By the by my daughter drove the car well and I was confident about taking the forthcoming trip of Tamilnadu and Kerala.