Hampi - The beauty of Ruins
" If dreams were made out of stone, it would be Hampi"
Finally on last sunday, hubby and I packed our bags and started enroute our long pending trip to Hampi. Expectations full in our hearts we wondered how this new place is going to be.
It was late when we started ( it was 4 pm in the evening ) , so we decided to halt at Chittradurga. Morning, wide eyed and excited we started our journey to Hampi. Hardly 50 km from Chittradurga, we got to watch the first of our surprises - Windmills here - Windmills there - Windmills everywhere . Below is a picture of the wind mills standing proudly in front of the rising sun.
Smiling to ourselves, we moved ahead . Finally we reached Hospet , where we checked in to a hotel. Freshened up , we now left to Hampi which is just 20 km from Hospet.
We entered Hampi and got a glimpse of what Hampi was all about - Gosh there was stone architecture everywhere . We went to the Hampi market place and went to the KSRTC office where we got introduced to the "interesting person" who was going to be our guide for the next 1 day.
Rates settled, our guide, Shiva Prasad informs us- I too am not from here - I am from Bangalore - I am here to write a book on Hampi and to earn while I do this, I act as a guide to the tourists here ". He gave us his card, which showed his qualification as BA, MA, BTS, MTS. Boy !
Hampi is located between 5 mountains and the river Tungabadra divides Hampi into North Hampi and South Hampi. Hampi was earlier Kishkinda , the kingdom of the monkeys ( Where Vali and Sugreeva ruled ), as described in the Ramayana. Around 1300 century, the Vijaynagar dynasty was started by the two brothers Hukka and Bukka and their guide VidyaRanya.
Shiva Prasad informed us that there were two routes that would take us around Hampi - One was motorable - which we planned to cover the first day itself and the other that had to be covered thru walk.
Hmm.. Dont want to bore you with data - But need to add this. There were many kings in the Vijaynagar dynasty . The kingdoms of all these kings , have the same architecture - all of them have a temple, named after the king, a market place, a kitchen and a hall for travellers to have food and rest. And you will see this architecture repeating itself again and again.
Hampi comes across as a open stone museum under the wide blue sky. Below is the picture of one of the untouched and beautiful temples on the backdrop of sunset.
Below picture shows a balance, that the king used to measure gold/silver against his weight
Shown below isone of the huge sprawling areas of market that are visible everywhere in Hampi. If you close your eyes, you can almost hear the hustle and bustle of the people in the busy market.
End of the first day , we saw lotus on land.. Arre, I am talking about the lotus Mahal , the queens mahal , guys !
Below are the few pieces of architecture in the temples that caught my eye. The below architecture, show business men from all over the world who came to Hampi for trade. Note the different dresses and headgears of the business men.
This one shows Hanuman killing Ravana's soldiers - one with his tail , one with his right leg and one with his left leg. :)
We had been in Hampi for only a day - but it felt we had been there for ages already. On our return journey, we said bye to our very knowledgable guide and asked him to inform us when his book got released.
As we returned , we felt the pride and gratitude in all the creations that the people all over the world have left for people like us. Smile in our minds, we started our journey back with a promise to start our tasks back home with full of enery, vigour and creativity.
Finally on last sunday, hubby and I packed our bags and started enroute our long pending trip to Hampi. Expectations full in our hearts we wondered how this new place is going to be.
It was late when we started ( it was 4 pm in the evening ) , so we decided to halt at Chittradurga. Morning, wide eyed and excited we started our journey to Hampi. Hardly 50 km from Chittradurga, we got to watch the first of our surprises - Windmills here - Windmills there - Windmills everywhere . Below is a picture of the wind mills standing proudly in front of the rising sun.
Smiling to ourselves, we moved ahead . Finally we reached Hospet , where we checked in to a hotel. Freshened up , we now left to Hampi which is just 20 km from Hospet.
We entered Hampi and got a glimpse of what Hampi was all about - Gosh there was stone architecture everywhere . We went to the Hampi market place and went to the KSRTC office where we got introduced to the "interesting person" who was going to be our guide for the next 1 day.
Rates settled, our guide, Shiva Prasad informs us- I too am not from here - I am from Bangalore - I am here to write a book on Hampi and to earn while I do this, I act as a guide to the tourists here ". He gave us his card, which showed his qualification as BA, MA, BTS, MTS. Boy !
Hampi is located between 5 mountains and the river Tungabadra divides Hampi into North Hampi and South Hampi. Hampi was earlier Kishkinda , the kingdom of the monkeys ( Where Vali and Sugreeva ruled ), as described in the Ramayana. Around 1300 century, the Vijaynagar dynasty was started by the two brothers Hukka and Bukka and their guide VidyaRanya.
Shiva Prasad informed us that there were two routes that would take us around Hampi - One was motorable - which we planned to cover the first day itself and the other that had to be covered thru walk.
Hmm.. Dont want to bore you with data - But need to add this. There were many kings in the Vijaynagar dynasty . The kingdoms of all these kings , have the same architecture - all of them have a temple, named after the king, a market place, a kitchen and a hall for travellers to have food and rest. And you will see this architecture repeating itself again and again.
Hampi comes across as a open stone museum under the wide blue sky. Below is the picture of one of the untouched and beautiful temples on the backdrop of sunset.
Below picture shows a balance, that the king used to measure gold/silver against his weight
End of the first day , we saw lotus on land.. Arre, I am talking about the lotus Mahal , the queens mahal , guys !
Below are the few pieces of architecture in the temples that caught my eye. The below architecture, show business men from all over the world who came to Hampi for trade. Note the different dresses and headgears of the business men.
This one shows Hanuman killing Ravana's soldiers - one with his tail , one with his right leg and one with his left leg. :)
We had been in Hampi for only a day - but it felt we had been there for ages already. On our return journey, we said bye to our very knowledgable guide and asked him to inform us when his book got released.
As we returned , we felt the pride and gratitude in all the creations that the people all over the world have left for people like us. Smile in our minds, we started our journey back with a promise to start our tasks back home with full of enery, vigour and creativity.
2 comments:
FAB PICTURES...
YOU ARE RIGHT IF DREAMS WERE MADE OF STONE,THEN IT WOULD BE HAMPI
not read this, but heard a lot abt that place from another bum friend. gonna get back and read, in the meanwhile, jus thanking u for visiting :)
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