What
are the things to explore in Hampi in 2 day trip?
Hampi.
Well, its a
very amazing place and i strongly recommend that you explore it yourself.
I will any way
tell you my experience. BTW Hampi is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Keep your SLR
and cameras ready.
So i went to
Hampi from Chennai; Chennai->Guntakal->Bellary->Hospete->Hampi.
Hampi is like 15 km from Hospete and there are local town buses that will drop
you till hampi, the autowalas will only loot you.
Day 1-
As soon as you
reach Hampi Market Road, the first thing you would see is the Virupaksha
temple, which is the center spot of Hampi; and as soon as you step down
there will be a set of autorickshaw walas who would approach you for a one day
Hampi tour, do not take the auto tour because the fun is in exploring the place
yourself by walk, do buy a guide book which has the map.
Go to Virupaksha
temple, behind is the Tungabhadra lake and on the right is the bazaar and guest
houses. The bazaar is very small and has a few guest houses for the
tourist to stay, i stayed in Pushpa guest house. The bazaar is the only place
where the locals stay, every were else in Hampi you will find deserted temples.
The first place
we went to was the Narashima temple and it also had a huge Linga
idol in its premises.
Then we went to
the Underground Siva temple, it is actually build below the ground
level, and it is dark inside, beware of snakes and bats. The temple floors were
flooded with water from the rains even though it had its own drainage system.
Then we headed
to the Mohamaadden's quarters which was a open land with a few
towers and it had a wall surrounding it. As the name goes there was also
a Mosque structure in the quarters. Good place for model photography.
Next was the Royal
Enclosure which was like a Mandapam and next to it was the Pushkarni,
a place for people to bathe.
Then we went to
the Queen's Bath, i tell you when you see the whole structure then
you will understand how much of a royal and a thug life the Queen had had those
days.
After this we
had lunch in Mango Tree restaurant, this is the best of the 3
restaurants in Hampi, good taste , amazing ambiance and pure vegetarian food.
Then we headed
for some hill climbing, there is a hill in Hampi, Matunga hill from
which the whole of Hampi is seen. Climbing it was thrilling and once we
reached the top of the hill, it was just bliss. We went for the sunset and
that was my best sunset ever. I just stood there for a while, kept my camera
aside and as the sun was setting i was able to fell the soft wind on my face, i
could see the boulders down under and there was silence, there was silence but
there was a sound, the sound of nature. Being on the hill has been a
great experience, and i will keep coming to Hampi just to climb the Matunga
Hill.
After we came
down the hill we called it a day and went back to our hotel room, and then to
the bazaar. The bazaar is very small but is very interesting,you would find a
lot of Europeans and Russians here, some singing , some rolling a joint,
and some doing some Indian shopping, even though the bazaar being very small,
it had an amazing ambience.
Day 2-
We planned to
climb Matunga hill again for the sunrise but we failed to do so, and
fortunately we went to another place which was as a amazing experience as it
was to climb the hill.
One of my
friend who is a photographer stays in Hospete, so he accompanied us to show us
Hampi. He took us to this place which is behind the Virupaksha temple
and it goes through the temple road, first we walked a long way along the
fields and the coconut trees and trees and bushes, and then after long walking
we reached a point where we saw boulders and hear water flowing.
So, this place
is kind of like boulders placed on the way of the Tungabhadra river or we can
say the river flowing through thousands of boulders, thus you can see small and
minute forms of waterfall at places.
We had to
carefully climb boulders, small and big and follow the sound of the waterfall,
after a lot of climbing boulders we reached a small waterfall. Let me tell you,
it was a totally new experience, thrilling and at the same time a bit risky
also, but worth a visit. We kept on climbing boulders with our DSLR cameras in
hand and kept on moving forward searching; and then at a point we found a
place with still water, much of like a pond and sat there to relax in peace. It
was very peaceful, sitting in between thousands of boulders and with the river
flowing by our side, what can one ask for on a Saturday morning, i guess it was
more blissful than the sunrise itself.
The mini
waterfall.
A very good
spot for model photography.
From the place
where we were resting near a still water lake , we saw a hut build on the
highest point of the boulder hill, and i was wondering who would have been that
crazy to climb there, we tried to climb up to reach the hut, but we gave up on
it as it was a very risky thing to do.
We had a tough
time finding our way back from where we started.
After lunch we
went to the river road where there were boats that took us to the other side of
the river to the Hippie Island.The river road is a very good place
to just sit and click pictures. Hippie island is an another experience in
itself, do experience it.
After this, it
was on the second day that we went to Virupaksha temple, the temple
is a major attraction and is the biggest temple in Hampi, it is in ruins and
has a lot of sculptures of Indian Gods,Goddess and also a lot of monkeys.
Now after this
was the time for the sunset, once you come out of the Virupaksha temple on the
left is the sunset points, here is a small hill kind of a inclination with
large boulders in place and this is also a amazing sunset point,right in the
heart of the Hampi. This place is itself called the Sunset Point. Again,
an amazing place and must be visited.
Day 3-
We had like a
couple of hours on day 3 , so we decided to go to the temple that we missed,
the Vithala temple.
On the foot of
Matunga hill is the Achutaraya temple. It was boring but as we went
on, we saw amazing things. As we walked out of the temple we saw a open land
with pillar blocks on both side, more of like a Kings gathering on those days,
as we see in movies.
Then the PranaDevaru
temple.
Then we was
the King's balance. and a little further is the Vithala
temple, which is a major site for tourism and is specially maintained by
the Archaeological Survey of India(ASI).
There are two
important things to see in Vithala temple, first the main temple which is made
of 1000 pillars, its a heritage beauty.
Second is the
stone chariot.
The Vithala
temple again is in ruins and has a lot of damaged sculptures. But again it is a
marvelous temple of Vijayanagara.
So, a very
beautiful place, amazing views and memorable experiences is what HAMPI is all
about.
-
Aashish Gundesha Jain, the more
you travel , the more you discover yourself.
FROM QUORA
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