North Karnataka Heritage tour Part-3 - Badami

Date: 30-Dec-06
Hospet – Badami
Soon after this we started to Badami as it was just 140kms away. But we under estimated the traffic (truck traffic). By the time we got out of the jam it was 8:00pm (1.5hrs and just 15kms). But after this it was adventurous.

Routes:
We have 2 routes (one the local route and the other specified by the tourism dept. which is slightly longer).
Local route: Hospet – Kustagi (take a left at the junction) – Gajendragad – Rajuru – Mushigeri – Jalihala – Belur (not Belur Halebidu J) – Banashankari – Badami (Very involved if you don’t get help from locals)
Or
Hospet – Kustagi (take a left at the junction) – Gajendragad – Ron - Banashankari – Badami (fairly easy but around 10kms more than the above)

Tourism Dept Route: Hospet – Kushtagi – Aihole – Badami (atleast 45Kms more than the above)

As we knew the local language and my wife turned adventurous, we took the local route (1st one). It was pitch dark with trees on both sides and occasionally a village passing was hinting at life. The discussion we had, turned on the “Signs” that you get in life. We reached Badami by 11:00pm. Badami Court was booked, so we went to KSTDC hotel and got a room for a night. The staff there was very courteous and arranged for food too. The food (the Veg fried rice) was really good.

Next day the first task was to get a room for the night. Lucky, we got in the same hotel. At 9:15 am we hit the road. We reached the Badami Cave temple (hardly 1km) and engaged a guide (she asked for Rs 150 and we settled for Rs 100). This is also known as Vatapi because the demon Vatapi and Ilvala were believed to be living there. The caves are in 4 levels. The first level is Shiva, then Harihara (Shiva and Vishnu), then Vishu and finally Mahaveera (Jain). This signifies that the rulers, the Chalukya dynasty, used to treat all the followers equally.

There are no joints in any of the temples as it is fully carved in the mountain!!

Badami Cave Temples

We had a nice look of Agastya tirtha and Bhoota natha (Shiva) temple from the last cave.

Agstya Tirtha

We went to Bhoota natha temple. The approach is really bad. The temple is not very impressive to look when we go near.

Bhoota natha temple at Badami

So I won’t recommend this place (unless they get the locals around out of the place and improve the place). There is a museum nearby which is worth a visit if you are interested in old carvings and sculptures.

Then we had lunch and we proceeded to Pattadakallu. But on the way we got enough “signs” to goto Banashankari temple. This was on the way. The best way to take care of Monkey menece

Pattadakallu (Pattada = Throne, Kallu = Stone Place where the kings crowning ceremony is done) is considered to be auspicious place as the river Malaprabha flows from South to North – no other river in India flows like that. It was 1:00 pm when we started and reached by 2:00pm.This is supposed to be the College for sculptures as they have tried out different types of temple architectures (North Indian, South Indian style etc.).

North India Style temple at Pattadakallu

South India Style temple at Pattadakallu

As always, we took a guide who did a good job of explaining the place. Worth seeing are the carvings of different hair styles, Ramayana, Mahabharata, etc. Most of these carvings are improvised by Hoysalas in Belur and Halebidu.

By the end, my daughter was thoroughly bored (pretty obvious). So we decided to go to Kudal Sangama. This is 60kms from Pattadakallu. We reached there at 5:00pm. As soon as my daughter heard of boating, she was wide awake. We went for boating and she was really exited. They take to the meeting point of rivers where 3 rivers meet (Krishna, Malaprapha and Ghataprabha). We had a very nice sunset view here too (with a nice halo around the sun).
Sunset at Basveswara temple at Kudal Sangama

Sunset at Kudal Sangama

I would suggest that you spend the rest of the evening here. There are lodges here that are good to spend the night. As we hadn’t got our luggage we headed back soon after this. Again a local gave the direction (a shortcut – but very good road). We reached Badami by 8:00pm. Had dinner and went to sleep.