Chikmagalur,Kemmenguddi, Belur and Halebid

We had been planning a weekend outing for several weeks now.. But for one or the other reason it was not realized.. So this weekend, we decided that we are going somewhere, come what may..
And the destination was initially decided as Belur, Halebid and Shravanbelagola.. But some localites of Hassan had a different thot.. They felt Shravanbelagola is very commercialized and a better place to include in the trip would be Kemmengundi.. So it was all finalized on Friday the me, Anurag, Juby and her cousin Benjamin(Chikku) were packing off for the weekend on Saturday morning..

Our preparation for the trip began with a Google search on the route and place to stay.. A nice description of the route was obtained from http://www.indiacar.com/index2.asp?pagename=http://www.indiacar.com/infobank/drivingdest/drv_july04/index.htm. This helped us to reach Chikmagalur without loosing our way once.(At Hassan, there is a left turn that you need to take but the directions in the link says to take a right turn.. But if you look for the directions on the road, it is clear..) And we decided to stay at Planter's Court in Chikmagalur on Saturday and reserved rooms there..Friday evening, we did a shopping for snacks and fruits..

Our day started at 3:45 am on Saturday morning.. Packing up our things and getting ready as usual took us more time than we had planned. We dumped our things in our Santro and started off for Juby's house, reaching there at 6am, half an hour later than planned. Juby and Chikku were ready and we started off on the drive.. We took outer ring road and then turned to NH4 and later onto NH48 to Hassan.. The road was really good and we went real fast.. We stopped at a Reliance petrol bunk on NH48 for fuel for the car and then at the Kamat restaurant for breakfast.. Drive on NH48 was a real nice one- the road was good, not much traffic and beautiful views on either sides.. We stopped at a marigold garden and sunflower gardens and a couple of other places to take in the view..

From Hassan, we took the state highway till Chikmagalur. Belur is enroute and its just a 2km diversion from the Belur main junction to the main Belur temple. This temple build by Vishnuvardhana of the Hoysala kingdom is famous for the sculptures. Very intricate and the main ones are of the different poses and moods of a dancing lady.. Above the dancing platform inside the temple is a sculpture of Shantala Devi, queen of Vishnuvardhana, who was a blessed dances herself. One will need the service of a trained guide to point you to the minute details brought out in those sculptures. On either sides of the main temple are the temples of Sridevi and Bhoodevi and a marriage hall.

Once we savored the beauty of the temple, we continued our journey towards Chikmagalur. Since there were not good places to eat around Belur, we banked on the snacks we carried to quench our hunger. Another unplanned stop on the way was the Yagachi dam..We spent some time there and then continued our journey towards Chikmagalur..


Once at Chikmagalur, we directly went to Planter's court and checked into our rooms.. The web suggested that this is the next best place to Taj in Chikmagalur.. But I didnt find it quite welcoming.. Especially the bathrooms.. I would have choosen a different place if given an option. As the drive-in restaurant didnt look very good, we went to Taj for a high tea. At Taj, we tried our hand on pool. Chikku was the only one who had played pool earlier and so he was giving directions to everyone. But soon Anurag outplayedChikku.. After the tea, we tried our luck at the Coffee museum. But it was closed. We roamed around a bit in the town of Chikmagalur and then went back to our rooms.. I had a small nap while Anurag watched TV.. Then we decided to get out of the hotel and look for a place for dinner. At the reception, we found that Planter's Court has another restaurant also. Hence decide to have dinner there itself..

This dimly lit restaurant looked like more of a bar than a restaurant. We were the only ones having dinner there.. Every other guest there left after drinks.. Back from dinner, we had a few games of UNO and cards..

The next day started at 5:30am for us and we got ready and checked out of the hotel before 7 am.. We soon took the road to Kemmengundi stopping once in a while to take in the beauty of the place.. As we approached Kemmengundi, we spotted trees and rocks that had fallen down on the road in the rains. As there were chances of rain that day also, we had second thoughts on going further up as the road can get blocked in the heavy rains by the time we come back.. So we decided to turn back and came down to Chikmagalur. After a late breakfast there, we stocked ourselves with fruits, snacks and water for the rest of the day. Ofcourse, we didnt miss to buy Chikmagalur's own coffee powder. Soon we were on our way to Halebid.

At Halebid, we decided not to take a guide's help and went around on ourselves. This is a Shiva temple. As expected there is a Nandi there. The Hoysala temples are built in star shape. Here there are 64 legs for the star where as the Belur temple had only 32 and more than the dancing ladies, you find sculptures of Gods and incidents from epics. The damage done to Halebid temple is much more than the damage at Belur. Another difference between the Belur and Halebid temples is the huge lawn that surrounds the Halebid temple.

Bidding Adieu to Halebid, we started back on our way to Bangalore. Now we did a major mistake. There is actually a way from Halebid to Hassan which as per the sign boards in Hassan is only 30km long. But without knowing this, we went back to Belur and turned to Hassan from there.. That should have costed us quite some time..

We stopped at Hotel Hassan Ashok for a high tea. Hot chocolate and lots of snacks - sandwiches and pakodas - refreshed us for the rest of the journey. Our aim was to hit Bangalore as early as possible and it was a deadly drive back by Anurag.. We dropped Juby and Benjamin at their house, visited Rajesh and gave him the sunflowers we had picked for him on the way back.. And then we were back in bed to sleep off all the tiredness...