Valparai

Valparai a less traveled beautiful hill station near Coimbatore in Tamilnadu. It houses many scenic view points and water falls around tea estates. Visitors can make it bigger with a visit to Athirapally waterfalls through a dense virgin forest with great chance to see wildlife (elephants, bisons, lion tailed monkeys...).

Hairpin bends way up to Valparai

It is 430 km from Bangalore, drive up the hill can be tricky through 40 hairpin bends - it is a sharp climb up for about 30 kms. We took few breaks on the way to relax and watch scenic views, we had carried hot milk and coffee essentials to sip caffeine on the way. There are a few water falls and view points on the way, Monkey falls is more popular with tourists. Mountain goats (Nilgiri Tahr) can be seen in typically between 17 and 20th hairpin bends.

Since Valparai is not a well developed tourist destinations, there aren't many good hotels in the city - there are many homestays and few hotels. The best available option one on top is Hotel Green Hill, they actually have a homestay which you can ask the manager there - he infact shifted us to the home-stay next day. This was much better stay. They have a pretty good restaurant downstairs which offered good food for dinner and breakfast.

We drove to Athirapally waterfalls next day early morning, it's about 75km but will take 3-4 hours. There are a few forest check posts where you need to make entry and declare all plastic items that you have, they will check it when you return back - if anything is missing from the list, you'll need to pay a fine. Good to see they being very strict to conserve forests from polythene. It's a great drive through the misty tea estates and thick jungles on western ghat - we did see bisons, lion tailed monkeys and few other animals en-route. There is very little human settlement on this route apart from few tribal settlements, roughly for about 25 km - there is absolutely none. Road is in average condition overall, less vehicles pass through this road as well.

Enroute Athirapally

Enroute Athirapally

Bison - Enroute Athirapally

Waterfall

Sholayar dam, Vazhachal falls and few other water falls are good stops on the way. Entire route is quite scenic and most likely to encounter wild life - overall it is an enjoyable and thrilling drive. Athirapally is called niagara of india, nice view you will get when you get to the bottom of the water fall - we were not allowed to enter water as it was rainy season and Sholayar dam was filled to capacity, water gates would be opened anytime. Otherwise, I heard that they would allow visitors to enter water at the falls. On the way back, we stopped at few tea estates to relax and enjoy good views. Returned back to valparai by the night fall and checked in at homestay instead of the hotel room.

Hike to poonjalai

Early morning we started our next day, as we wanted to return back to Bangalore in the afternoon. Nallamudi Poonjolai was the first spot, winding roads through tea estates will take you to a stop from where you will need to walk through tea plantation for 10 mins to reach this spot. There is a glorious view of other peaks (like munnar, annaimudi...) and valleys from this spot. There are a few patches of light green land in deep valleys that are occupied by tribal.. no roads connect them, it is about 40km walk for them to reach nearest transport.. A special person (Velu) who will greet you at here, he claims to have seen god exactly some day, month, year, hour, min and seconds ago !

View from Poonjalai

There is tea stall where we parked our cars before started walk towards nallamudi poonjolai, we picked up organic green tea powder from here and sipped cup of organic green tea, like it.Our next target was Balajee temple which closes doors by 12 noon and we could just park our car 10 mins to 12.. from there it is a 15 mins climb up to the temple - we really had to really rush to get there by noon and visit to the temple.

Started back to Bangalore and reached Bangalore by 11PM..

Bangalore to Hampi - 2 day tour

Hampi is located in North Karnataka region 350km from Bangalore. NH-3 through Chitradurga & then NH-13 until Hospet connects Bangalore with Hampi. We planned road trip to Hampi during the long weekend of Ugadi. Started from Bangalore on Friday afternoon by 2:30 PM from Electronics city and reached Hospet at 9:00pm. Hospet was our camping place, took lodging at Hotel Priyadarshini. NH-3 is an excellent drive, NH-13 is not as good as NH-3 – but definitely well maintained one. Chitradurga is halfway, we took a brake @ A1 Plaza having coffee and refreshing ourselves. NH-13 is filled with trucks, you need to drive carefully here and it’s not a divided highway.

Day-1
We started from the hotel after having breakfast at 9:30AM and were at Hampi by 10:15AM. Hampi is just 12km from Hospet, traveling through little villages. There will be plenty of guides around who will approach you – we didn’t take a guide. They charge 600-800 rupees per day on an average. We had done some homework as to what to see and where to go. We arrived at the bus stand where we parked our car and started walking through a gate.

We entered into Hampi Bazaar which is filled with sovereign shops, restaurants, book shop. On the west end (left side when you enter the street) of the street we saw a tall tower – this is entrance of Virupaksh temple. We visited the kitchen area which is generally locked, one can ask for the keys where you buy tickets to enter into the temple. Aqueduct system to feed water into the temple is still intact and water flows in that even now! Visited the
main temple complex and there is a shrine underground as well on the northwest side of the temple. We were exiting out from the rear side, an old man sitting there was shouting – “upside down tower, upside down”. In a dark room on the right hand side, we saw camera pinehole effect of the entrance tower - Inverted image of the tower! Image falls on the wall through a narrow slit which is amazing to see. While exiting out there were lots of kids asking visitors to click a photo or two of theirs. They will crowd around the tourists to see their pictures on the viewfinder.
We walked up the Hemakuta hill; there are lots of small shrines – mostly deserted. This is on the south side of the Virupaksha temple. We also observed the technique used to cut the granite stones. These are clearly visible on the rocks – rectangular holes in some of them. We also visited Kadalekalu Ganesha temple which is on this hill. It was a decent hike to the top of this small hill in scorching sun. General landscape around Hampi is gorgeous to see – hills filled with boulders and green agriculture land on the plains with Tungabadra river flowing through the middle.

It was 1:30 by the time we were back at the Hampi Bazaar and were feeling hungry. Went into one of those Khanawali’s, where we could get “Jolada Rotti”. Food is generally bit spicy around this area. We bought a map for Rs 5 which covers all places of interest in Hampi. Generally maps available on internet are not as good as this one – worth buying it. It was getting hot and we started to our next destination by car. We skipped some of the temples on the way as it was getting little monotonous to see temples and its architecture.Next stop was Royal center – here we saw ruined parts of the palace. One can only see the boundaries of the structures little higher than the foundation. It’s left up to visitors imagination to know how these structures were used in those days. There are plenty to explore – I must say it was grueling in hot sun though. Here we saw underground aqueduct system of feeding water into this area. Also, there are plenty of water tanks – which are one of the key features of Vijayanagara architecture. There is an underground chamber where king used to conduct secret meetings. Adjacent to it is Mahanavami Dinne, this is the biggest structure in this area. Plenty of carvings on the outer walls of this pyramid shaped structure. Historians say - Krishna Devaraya built this to commemorate victory over one of the Orissa kings. It is not clear as to how this stage was used though.

We went to see Zeman Palace – this was supposed to be private palace for royal women. On the left side, there is a museum – this is a must visit place. Just spent 15 mins here looking at the artifacts and some of the collections. Lotus Mahal on the far right hand corner built in Indo-Islamic architecture is a pleasant structure. On the rear exit of this complex we visited the Elephant Stable and walked back towards the entrance – we again skipped another temple – Ranga Mantapa.
 
While driving towards Vijaya Vittal Temple we visited queens’ bath – a square tank surrounded by small window like openings for the servants to shower flowers when queen was taking bath. Change room was located on the first floor – this structure is not present today. One can see a picture of this in the museum @ Zeman palace. Again the aqueduct system is quick stunning here too.

Drive to Vittal temple from here took aprox 10 minutes. Vittal temple is the main attraction of Hampi – stone chariot, rich carvings, story of ruined temple, musical pillars. We hired a guide to
understand the significance and started with history and the chariot. It was during Krishna Devaraya’s time, Vijayanagara kingdom flourished and many of the structures were erected. Stone chariot was also built during his time – this was done to commemorate victory over Orissa kingdom. After looking at Konark temple in Orissa, Krishna Devaraya built one for its memory. During those days, it was painted in red, yellow and green – after taking beating from weather, colored paints have faded out. Guide showed us the intact paintings on the roof – this is great to see after 500 years it was built. Originally it had horse structures pulling this chariot – but since horses were destructed, they are replaced by two elephants recently. 4 wheels of this chariot were rotating freely until very recently – 1970’s. You can see the marks on the brakes and on the surface of the wheels. Visitors to this place caused damage to the brakes, causing the wheels get stuck there. Main complex in this temple has many pillars which has granite mini pillars in it. It produces various musical sounds on tapping it gently. No one is allowed to do to protect them from damaging. This temple is built in Chinese and Dravidian architecture – Chinese links are seen on the corners of the roof and the hooks below them. Guide showed us some immaculate sculpture works on the pillars and platforms. Temple has two towers named after two wives of Krishna Devaraya. Both are in ruined state – damaged by Muslim kings defeated Vijayanagara kings in 1500’s. They used fire to cause massive destruction to these structures. One must be careful while you are under these – as brinks continue to fall even now as there not much support remaining. We also saw sunset rear side of this temple – which was amazing sight. It was getting dark and most of the visitors had left already when I inquired the security guard if I can see the musical sound on the pillars. He obliged to this request and showed how it sounds on each pillar. It was amazing to hear this sound – different sound coming from each pillar and how it can be used to play music.
Day-2
We went back to Hampi bazaar; we decided to have dinner at another one of those Khanawali’s – this time Manju Khanawali. Food was much better here – tried Tibetian Momo’s and Thali. Went back to our hotel room in Hospet, which again took just 30 min drive.

Next day morning we wanted to climb Matang Hill – when asked at breakfast table at another one of the Khanavali’s, it wasn’t great news. They suggested that it’s difficult to climb this and also dangerous. We asked another person who suggested that this is easy climb ! This is the highest point around Hampi which houses Veerabhadra temple. We started our walk towards base of this hill – we met some lovely young kids saying “Hello”. If you take picture of theirs – they will be delighted  . When we started the hike, 15 mins into it we were wondering – “this is easy! Why locals were saying it’s hard and dangerous”. Very soon we realized what the danger is! Suddenly we see a huge rock on which was clipped a bit to create steps. This rock was on the edge and no supporting rails to hold on and if you slip – there is no second chance for survival. Without second thought we walked back down and back to Hampi bazaar.

We wanted to climb Anjaneyadri on the other side of the river – two options to get there. One by coracle crossing the river and 2 km walk (take bicycle) to the foot of this hill. Other option is to drive back to Hospet and drive another 30 km to get there via some vllages. We choose the second option as it was getting pretty warm. This drive is a great one, in middle of paddy fields – very scenic. Clibing Ajaneyadri - there is a clear walking path well constructed with support on both sides. It takes 30 mins to reach the top and spend 15 mins there at the temple and nice view of Hampi. Took some pictures and returned back. We drove to nearby Pampa sarovar – which is not far away. Driving back to Hospet we saw Bukka’s aqueduct which is a mammoth bridge like structure which was used to lift water and supply to low lying areas.
Tip for travelers:
1. What you need: Lot of water and a wide cap! It gets really hot towards noon and afternoon.2. How to plan: Get up early in the morning and start your trip by 7AM in the morning. Take break during noon time in one of those temples. Inside these temples it’s much cooler. One can drive the car to most of the places around – rest you can walk to take bicycle.
3. Where to stay: Best place is Hospet. If you want to live in nature, you can choose huts at Virupapur gadde – but these are expensive as well. You can choose to stay at one of those guest houses around Hampi bazaar. Residents here rent some rooms in their house to visitors. This is the cheapest option.
4. Itinerary: Hampi Bazar, Virupaksha temple, Hemakuta Hill, Krishna Temple, Lotus Mahal, Royal Center, Mahanavami Dinne, Queens bath, Vittal Temple, Matang hill, Coracle to Virupapur gadde, Anjaneyadri hill, Bukka’s Aqueduct.
5. Where to eat: Kahanavali’s in Hampi Bazar has good choice. They serve North Karnataka, Indian, Italian, Tibetian, French, German….