Hampi - A roll back in time

Hampi is one of those places which have been on my list of places to be seen before I leave Bangalore. The  others being Bandipur Forest Reserve, Wayanad ( in spite of being a Malayali I have not been here), Coorg etc. These are the places where everyone I know has been to, so finding a group to go to such places is also a task in itself. Considering this, we decided to go to Hampi ourselves, just the two of us... maybe like a honeymoon in India too :)


We took the Hampi Express late at night, and drank all the way into the night, as we had a First class cabin.. and moreover the one which has just 2 berths !!What luck ! So drunk as we were, we decided it was time to sleep around 2 in the morning, and we slept quite well too, the only problem being that when we woke up we realized, we had already passed Hospete and now we were at least 2 stop after. We rushed to the TT and explained that we overslept, trying our level best to ensure we were not smelling of alcohol! So he asked us to alight at the next station and take a general train back to Hospete, and that is what we did. But, just that the general train was worse that Bombay locals... I never knew such locals existed in Karnataka, but now I now.. they do in the north of Karnatala.


Anyhow, we reached Hospete finally around 10 as compared to 8 in the morning, and we chose to take the bus out to Hampi rather than a 100 rupee auto ride. The buses are not over crowded, they are clean and they run every 20 mins from the Hospete Bus station which is a km from the railway station. On reaching Hampi... we can looked up Shanti Guest House and heard good reviews about it too. It was on the other side of the river, so we took the ferry out, and Shanti Guest House is almost at the end of the road on the opposite side of the river where many shacks and guest houses exist. On seeing the rooms and the rates,we were not too pleased as we were sure that there would be many cheaper places with the same kind of rooms. Anyhow we stayed here, at the river facing room for 1200 a night, and then the next morning, took a walk and found a room at a much cheaper place called Gauthami Guest House. This place had amazing food and a very relaxed lounge like seating arrangement. Their restaurant is called World Peace Cafe, which served amazing pancakes and thupka!!


So after all the acco related issues were resolved, we got out and got ourselves a tourist guide book, and set about reaidng it and planning our next day! We were there for 3 days so we had the time and energy to readand know the history before heading out to each place. i have heard people tell me they have completely fallen in love with the place, and would be able to go back to it how many ever times you say. Frankly speaking, I was not that fascinated with it as it was made to sound. It is a place where you would go to see and absorb history once, but it certainly would not feature on my repeat visit places. Or, maybe I am of a different kind of person, hence the difference in preference.


Here are some photos of the places we did go to, and my camera does no justice to the true beauty of rocks, but nevertheless, whats a travelogue without pics!

Tungabhadra River

Sunset at Hampi

Shanti Guest House

Temples at Hemakuta Hills

Virupaksha Temple

Remnants of the old bridge across the river

Step Tank

And the ever famous, Stone Chariot at Vittala Temple.