Chandra's Random Updates!

Date: 21st November Places Covered: Kaiwara, Kailasagiri, Kurudumale, Mulbagal and Avani. Vehicle: My Ritz Distance Covered: 280 Kms Start from Home @ 8 AM Back Home @ 10 PM We went to Kaiwara to see the Amaranarayanaswamy temple there.  A passer-by suggested us to visit Kailasagiri when we asked for directions to cave temples of Kaiwara. Didn't know it was man-made caves but it was first time I saw chaturlinga (4 faced Lingas like Brahma). Nice place to visit and temple free lunch was amazing. Details about this place: http://www.deccanherald.com/content/6954/snippets.html We came back to see Kaiwara caves with the lakshminarasimha temple in the caves and then saw the "Kaiwara" Thatha's Ashram + temple. We then headed to Kudurumale Ganesha temple near mulbagal. There is a large stone idol of Ganesha. After that we went to Anjenaya temple in Mulbagal town. It was supposed to be very famous but didn't find much crowd and the pujari there wa...

Last weekend Trip.. Turned out to be quite an adventurous trip especially from Talakad to Mysore. Left Bangalore at 1 PM and reached Shivanasamudra via Kanakapura road at about 3 PM. Visted Talakkad on the same day and stayed at Hotel DasPrakash in Mysore. Next day visited Mysore Zoo and Chamundi Hills. Returned home just after 10 PM.

Day 1. Covered the following places and temples:   1. Dasarighat - Chowdeshwari Temple.   2. Tiptur - Mallikarjuna Temple and Kempamma Temple 3. Shimoga - Kotte Anjaneya Temple and Kote Marikamba Temple Day 2: 1. Ikkeri - Old Shiva Temple 2. Sigandur - Chowdeshwari Temple 3. Jog Falls - Majestic Water falls Day 3: 1. Shakrebyle Elephant Camp - Similar to the more famous Dubare in Kodagu district. 2. Gajanur Dam - Nice view points but no photography allowed. 3. Tyavarekoppa Lion and Tiger Safari with zoo. Photos: http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150780489475015.724895.500085014&l=1917d85344&type=1 http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150781991065015.725321.500085014&l=f7bfef03c7&type=1 Links: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shimoga http://wikitravel.org/en/Shimoga http://www.karnatakaholidays.com/shivamogga.php http://www.travelingbeats.com/blog/shimoga-district-travel-info-karnataka http://soundsofsile...

Snaps Around Chitradurga: First day of trip to Chitradurga. Covered the remote places in the district - 1. Vanivilas sagara 2. Halu rameshwara 3. Holakere https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150750800080015.716247.500085014&l=1fdf73c08a&type=1 In Chitradurga: Second (& last) day of the trip - 14th Aug 2011. Visited 1. Chitradurga Fort 2. Chandravalli Caves 3. Children's Park near some Mutt https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150754051195015.717121.500085014&l=4702d72cb9&type=1

Date: May 30 and 31st Location: Masinagudi, Mudumalai and Bandipur Trip People: Pallavi, Divi, Mom, Sireesha, Lathakka, Jeeju, Aditi, Bhoomika and Papa. Transport: My Ritz and Jeeju's Wagon R Stay: The Tamarind Tree Resort.

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Trip to Mysore

Planned to goto Nandi temple in Nandi ( chikkaballapur ) and ranganatha temple in chikkaballapur in the morning at around 9 AM. I got around 8:45 :) and got ready immediately but Pallavi and my daughter Sireesha got ready by only 11:30 :(. So dropped the plan of chikkaballapur and went to only Nandi. First we went to Kanave basavana temple which is around 3 kms from the Nandi temple. Then happened to visit the Saibaba temple and vrudhashrama – Ashram for old people who do not have anyone to take care of them. After giving them a donation – they insisted us to have lunch there. We went to Nandi after having lunch there. A great temple – the gods there seem to be so real. Uma maheswara temple, Bhoga nandi temple, parvathi temple inside that are all beautiful. There was also a tulu film shooting happening and the music was good. The same 10 seconds music was being played and there were atleast 4 trials before we left the place. Evening, we decided to go to California Ramanashree re...

Trip covering Chidambaram, Cuddalore, Pichavaram, Poompuhar and Karaikal. Trip Start Date: 21st Aug 2010 5:30 AM Trip End Date: 24th Aug 2010 4 AM Route: Bangalore – Salem – Attur – Chidambaram – Cuddalore – Chidambaram – Pichavaram – Poompuhar – Karaikal – Kumbakonam – Tanjavur – Tiruchi – Karur - Salem - Bangalore People: Mom, Divi and me in Ritz Jeeju, Hema, Aditi, Bhoomika, Paapa and jeeju’s ma in Wagon R. Plan was to visit some beaches – but since it was heavily raining in the west coast – Goa / Karwar was rejected. On the east coast, since Mahabalipuram and Pondicherry were done, we wanted to goto some other places. Jeeju suggested Karaikal but since my first view of that place was as a remote village- i said we can visit it on one of the evenings. So we decided to cover Chidambaram , Cuddalore , Poompuhar and the temple towns Tanjavur and Trichy on the way back! As usual we planned to start at 5 but ended up 30 mins late and started at 5:30. Divi was the last one ...

Date: 11 Sept 2010 Persons: Pallavi, Sireesha and me. Transport: Ritz Total distance covered: 140 kms.   Just after Marriage – we had been to Mauritius . Our first anniversary trip was to Kerala . Wanted to plan some good place for the second anniversary but since our cutie girl Sireesha is too young for travel (as per my wife) – we couldn’t plan to go anywhere far. Even Mysore was rejected!. Finally chose Vishwa Shanti Ashrama as we heard it is only around 50 kms from Dodballapur . This place is in outskirts of Nelamangala and infact comes before reaching Nelamangala if you are coming from Bangalore. It’s around 20 kms from Majestic. We had been there about a year back in bike and that time had chosen to go via Maddure, but since the roads were bad – we chose to go via the NH to Tumkur and take a deviation near dabbaspet. Dabbaspet is the junction where you take a turn to go to Shivagange . Roads were okay and we reached the place in about 1 and 1/2 hours. This was a ...

http://picasaweb.google.com/bschandramohan/CoorgTeamOuting#

Date: Sep 18th to Sep 21st Places covered: Vellore , Mahabalipuram and Pondicherry . Transport: 3 cars - My first trip outing in my Ritz. People: Pallavi (wife), Divi (younger sis), Mom in my car.... jeeju, hema (elder sis), nieces - Aditi and Bhoomika, Sis parents-in-law, Anand bhaiya, Jaya bhabhi and their daughters - Dimpi, Anjali. Stay: Mamalla Beach resort in Mahabalipuram and Hotel Sooriya International in Pondicherry . Didn't cover Gingee fort or the Tiruvannamalai temple as it was getting already very late. Took leaves on 18th (Fri) and 21st Sep (Mon). Since Friday was also Mahalaya Amavasya, we took head bath and planned to do Pooja in the morning itself. Pallavi and mom got up even earlier and finished up cooking too before 6. After finishing pooja, we did start at 6:30 in the morning. Jeeju was driving his Wagon R, Bhaiya his Alto and me the powerful Ritz :). Took NICE Road and hit NH4 road. The road was too good and for the first time in my life I cr...

Sep 11 (9/11) happens to be my marriage anniversary and thought about taking a day or two off and go to some place on our first anniversary. Initial choice was Lakshwadeep, but after speaking to "Raghu The Great", decided against going there in the rainy season. Goa and Kodaikanal were two other options we initially covered but thought would go for Goa in November timeframe and Kodaikanal wasn't worth if it's raining... Since Rohit had been to Kerala last month and mentioned it was a memorable trip, thought will check it out. Kerala Greenery website   had lot's of packages and we zero-ed in on SP-05 which covered Alleppey to Kumarakom backwater, Munnar hill station and Cochin city. We started here on 10 th Sep 9:00 PM train from Yeshwanthpur - Kochuvelli Garibh Rath express.. It's a fairly new train with only 3AC and hence people are not aware about it... You can easily get tickets even 1 day before your travel….. Train started on time and we had our p...

  Very happy to see Angel's Landing in Zion National Park as home page for Bing today. One of the best places I have visited in my life.... and what a hike it was ! :).. Still amazed seeing the videos if I really did it :-). Comment on why the monolith was named as Angel's Landing is worth reading: "While exploring Zion in 1916, Frederick Fisher exclaimed, "only an angel could land on it," and thus the monolith was named Angels Landing" .   Some more cool images and text @ http://www.naturalbornhikers.com/AngelsLanding/angelslanding.htm A video from Youtube: <Not mine :)>

So, past few weekends I am travelling to my "athe mane" in Dodballapur regularly as my wife is there :) and visited lot's of places there- July 4th - had been to Nandi Hills - a beautiful small hillock about 70 kms from Bangalore. Not many "view" points to see as in hill stations but the whole place is great to laze around especially during the cool drizzling climate we had. Did a half round of the hill top after visiting the temple and then played some games - shuttlecock , Frisbee , volley ball etc. .. :) Last weekend - Saturday - had been to Sai baba temple and Nandi temple on Dodballapur - Chikballapur road. Not to be confused with the Bull temple in basavangudi. It's in the Nandi village right below the more famous Nandi Hills we had been to last to last weekend. It's now called Bhoga Nandishwara temple , and has idols of Bhoga Nandishwara, Ugra Narasimha and Arunachaleshwara. An ancient and very beautiful temple - you can definitely feel ...

  Mom had prayed that she will get me and Pallavi to MelMarvathur (Om Shakthi) temple after marriage. Again, I wasn't too keen, but had to... initial plan was to goto chennai and then visit this and spend remaining of the weekend in Chennai. But as we enquired about details, we came to know that going via Thiruvanamalai is better and we can visit Vellore while coming back. So we left early at 5:30 on 7th March, and then headed to the Thiruvanamalai . Stopped over at Krishnagiri to have breakfast. Reached Thiruvanamalai at 9:45. Booked a room in Hotel Arunachala which was supposed to be the best hotel there. MelMarvathur was about 100kms from thiruvanamalai but the route was supposed to be good. So we left immediately after having breakfast and we reached around 11:50. saw the temple, prayed for sometime and headed back to Thiruvanamalai. Reached at 3:00 - had lunch, and then went to Girivalam (the route with temples all around the base of the hill). After visiting few temples ...

Last time I went to TIRUPATHI was with my family - grandma, dad, mom, lathakka, kavi and a small small divi :).. Wasn't too keen to go there again, but it so turned out that Pallavi had prayed that she will get her husband there and that too to climb the seven hills barefoot and visit the god :(... I reluctantly had to agree and decided on a Saturday and Sunday with Pallavi's parents and brothers. We left on friday night by KSRTC Airavath -11:30 bus and it reached at sharp 4:30. We checked into a hotel in Tirupathi and got ready and headed to Ticket counter to get the tickets. We were able to get the Archanananthara darshanam tickets for next day morning at 4 Am. Booked a Innova and saw few temples around: Kanipakam (Lord Ganesha's temple), Srinivasa mangapuram and Alamelu Mangapuram. Food was okayish in tirupathi. After visiting the temples, we decided to start the climb to the top of Tirumala where the world famous Lord Venkateshwara resides. The seven peaks a...

  [DRAFT] Are you a "safe" driver like me !  - checking all the traffic signals around and making sure you follow most (the rare cases of starting off even though the light just turned from Red to Yellow fearing the constant honking behind, or not stopping when lights turn from green to yellow fearing others behind you ramming into your vehicle)? If so, you would definitely dread this one too. . u see a road hump and slow down. Invariably the vehicles behind you don't notice that...  drive damn close to you OR just screech halt next to your vehicle and bad mouth you OR just hit your vehicle... . Problem seems to be that most of these humps are  bizarrely put up by some person not approved to put that up - just to make their apartment entrance safe! or just to make people look at their shops while they slow down... Also most of this humps have no kind of notice to drivers ... they are without any white paint markings over the hump or any sign board nea...

  25th Dec (Christmas day), I had been to temple near bettadasana pura . It's in a small village connecting the Bannergatta road with Electronic city (the road is named wipro road, I think). The temple atop a small hill has both Venkateshwara (Vishnu) and shiva temple. It's covered all around with a Fort wall though broken at many places. It was so different not only in architecture but just the fact that it was such an old one (more older than kempegouda defining the Bangalore boundary). The priests were different from the normal showoff temple priests in most part of Bangalore. They were eager to hear about each people visiting the temple. Talk to them, provide a brief info about the temple, and do archana free of charge and that too patient to hear about all the names in the family :-) So different from all the artificial temple 5-star pieces like ISKCON (5 Star complex/Multiplex?), Shiva temple in airport road, dodda ganesha temple in Bull temple road(temple is great, o...

September 16th to September 23rd 2008. Blog about the trip below! Pictures from: http://picasaweb.google.com/bschandramohan/MauritiusTrip