Weekend Getaway: Navaneetha Krishna Temple, Manchinabele Dam and Dodda Aalada Maraa(Big Banyan Tree)

A picnic to Dodda Aalada Maraa aka Big Banyan Tree was long pending. Finally, last weekend we made it there. The plan was to start early in the morning at 7 AM, visit Ramaprameya-Navanethakrishna temple at Channapatna, then come down to manchinebele dam and finally visit the banyan tree and return back home by aftermnoon. Thoguh we covered all the places, it strectched well beyond the original schedule, thanks to the memmerizing locale of the dam, we just couldn't leave that place and finally reached home by around 5 in the evening.

Here is a small account of our trip

Started from Bangalore(B.G.Road) at 8 in the morning, Reached NICE road by 8:15 and headed towards Mysore Road after paying toll amount of Rs 38. The drive on NICE road is undisturbed and smooth. Our first destination was the temple at doddamallur, around 1 to 1-1/2 kms beyond channapatna. We reached channapatna, the land of toys, by 9:15 AM. After driving around 11/2 kms past channapatna, we reached the temple which is on the left side of the road.

The Ramaprameya-Navaneetha Krishna temple was patronized by Sri Ramanujar, the Vaishnava Guru soon after he arrived in Karnataka in 11th century.(source). The main dieties are Ramaprameya, his consort aravindavalli and the baby Lord NavaneethaKrishna with butter in hand. There are also some idols of few Alwars including that of Sri Ramanujar. The temple gopuram looked similar to the one at Nanjangud, the sculptures painted in yellowish white color.

As soon as you enter the temple, on the right side is the idol of Sri Ramanuja, in front is Lord Ramaprameya, then the goddess and finally Lord NavaneethaKrishna, the baby Krishna with butter in his hand in a crawling posture. The temple was not very crowded, vert silent and clean and we felt very peaceful. We left the temple premises at 10:40 after having hot, tasty Iyengar's coffee in one of the temple shops.

Our next destination was Manchinabele dam. So we drove back towards Bangalore and took a left at Rajaraeshwari dental college on Mysore Road. First we reached the Banyan tree, but without stopping there we drove ahead to reach the Dam. With the help of the locals for the direction, we reached the Arkavathi River over which the dam is built, at around 12:20 PM. Trees on both sides of the road bearing different types and colors of flowers, a small lotus pond, paddy and vegetable fields on one side of the road and huge rocks on the other provided a scenic drive past the village till we reached the river. To see the river from near, we drove downhill on a narrow, raw road and for a minute we felt as if we were driving in a mini hill station. It was that beautiful and the bad road did not bother us so much. After driving for more than a km or two, we reached a flat terrain where we could see the river. The place was scenic, serene, exotic to say the least. We never expected to see such a picturesque sight. Open wide grass land with river on one side and rocks and hills on the other....truly a precious gift of Mother Nature. We could see the dam at a distance, but we completely got immersed by the beauty of the place that the dam had become unimportant to us.

We had our brunch, kids had a nice time, wandering here and there, trying to catch butterflies. There was also a couple of Madras Sapper's jeeps and a bunch of army men near the river side. There were also few people wind surfing in the river. We spent good 2 hours in the open, just lying on the grass, mesmerized by the beauty of the place, . We did not go prepared to venture into the river, so settled down for wetting the legs.

It was cloudy and the weather was quite cool which helped us in spending time in the open in the peak afternoon. So, on a sunny day, it is recommended to reach there early in the morning and pack back before it gets too hot. I feel the best time to visit this place would be in August or September, when there would be a good amount of water in the river due to rains and the effect of sun would be minimal due to the clouds.

We left the place at 2:40 and reached our final destination for the day, the Big Banyan tree at 3:15, around which the whole trip was planned. Kids were fast asleep. Even the adults were not that enthusiastic about stopping by. But for customary photos and for the sake of "have been there", we visited the place. The area was huge with branches spread out everywhere. There was also a temple at the entrance. It seems, the main root succumded to illness few years back(read somewhere), but few branches were so enormous that they made us wonder if that was the main root. There were lots of monkeys too, if the kids were awake, they would have enjoyed. We left the place at 4 PM and reached home by 5:30.

That was one memorable trip for all of us.

We did not note down the distance travelled, but approximately,

Bangalore(BG Road) to DoddaMallur temple: 60KM

DoddaMallur temple to Dam: 40KM

Dam to Banyan tree: 10KM

BanyanTree to Bangalore: 30KM

Best season to visit..

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Temple and the Banyan Tree: Any time of the year

Dam: Preferrably August/September. Also, there are literally no sshops near the dam, so its advisable to bring our own food, snacks, wwater etc and taking care not to litter the place.

We are also contemplating venturing out to the Dam in the night during summer when the skies would be clear to get a spectacular view of the stars without any obstacles..

Egypt Travelogue-8: Sight seeing trips: Day 8 & 9-Sharm-el-Shiekh: Mt Sinai

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Day 8-Trek to Mt Sinai

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Our next destination was St Catherine's City. The St Catherine’s monastery situated in the foothills of Mt St Catherine and Mt Sinai were the places of interest in this region. St Catherine's monastery is one of the oldest monasteries where among others the burning bush is located. Mt Sinai also holds religious significance were Moses received the Ten Commandments from God. A trek to Mt Sinai and watching the sunrise from the summit is also supposed to be a memorable experience which was in our itinerary.

Someone from the tour agency was supposed to escort us from the resort to the bus which would go to St Catherine's. We were eagerly waiting at the resort reception with our bags. We read in various articles that it would be very cold early in the morning when we reach St Catherine's. So we packed gloves, scarves, jackets etc along with some biscuits and water bottle. The person came at 10 PM. In a flash of a second we were following him and within few minutes we boarded the bus that was waiting in the main road. The bus was already filled with tourists of different nationals. The bus journey was comfortable except for a couple of times in the midnight when we were asked to show our passports/visa to few Egyptian authorities. They were just doing their duty, so no complaints there..

We reached St Catherine's at around 2 in the morning. When we got down the bus, it was extremely chill that I covered myself with all possible things to keep warm. In case you forgot to take jackets, no worry, there were many renting out blankets.

At St Catherine's, the plan was to trek to the summit of Mt Sinai, watch sunrise, visit St Catherine's monastery and finally get into the bus. Our tour operator left us with a guide and told us to return back to the bus by 8 AM. It was pitching dark and the torch we carried came in handy. There were around 20 tourists in our group. We started our trek to Mt Sinai at around 2:30 AM following our guide.

There are two principal routes to the summit. One , the longer and shallower route the other steeper and shorter. During the ascent, we took the longer route. The climb up the cliff was a bit tiresome, but the thought that I would be seeing sunrise from the top of Mt Sinai kept me going. As morning broke, we could see a lot of people making a beeline to the summit. As Mt Sinai also holds religious importance, there were lots of elderly people walking with sticks and riding in the camel to reach the top. After some point, the path becomes so steep and narrow that the camels can no more walk. At this point, you can opt to be carried in a chair by a couple of men, of course for some Egyptian pounds.

It took around 2 1/2 hours for us to reach the summit. The view was amazing from the summit. Sun hadn't showed its face yet. We managed to sit on a rock facing east to behold the spectacular sunrise on Mt Sinai. Nature had different plans. The clouds played a spoil sport and as the time passed by, the day light broke, but no trace of sun. Now everyone waiting for the sunrise realized that the clouds had hid the sun. So we got down the rock and walked here and there (mostly following people with sophisticated cameras..They would definitely be more desperate to see the sun than us :))to at least see the sun once. How can you come back without seeing the sun (rise) at Mt Sinai. Somehow we managed to see it. There was nothing great about it, it was the usual sun. :-), but I felt happy..

After the sun drama was over, we took time to enjoy the array of huge reddish-orange granite mountains surrounding Mt Sinai. The sight was just spectacular. After 1 year and 2 months of our visit, the sight is still crystal clear in my mind.

We took the shorter, steeper route for the descent. As there were so many tourists flocked, finding the way down was not difficult. We had to just follow the people ahead of us. The descent, as with any other was easy and smooth except for few places where the steps were really huge. There were people on the way selling so many different kinds of stones, especially alabaster. We felt them to be costly, so did not buy anything. I remembered reading somewhere that alabaster is cheaper in Luxor. So we reserved buying those stuff for our Luxor visit. We had karkady in one of the shops for 5 EGP each.

The descent directly led us to St Catherine's monastery. The monastery is surrounded by a huge wall.
We entered inside, saw the burning bush, took some photos, went inside the monastery, saw some amazing paintings and came out.

We then boarded the bus and had buffet breakfast(cost included in the package) in one of the hotels on the way. I, being a strict vegetarian confined myself to eating just bread and jam. We reached the resort in the afternoon, physically tired by the trek but the whole experience was still lingering in our minds.

We just watched TV the rest of the day and went for a walk in the night to have a glimpse of the night life in Naama Bay, full of life, vigor and color.

As a side note, within few minutes of getting down the bus, we were feeling hungry, more because we got up so early. The biscuits that we carried helped us quenching our hunger. If you are also like us, its advisable to carry something light to munch on.

We stayed back at the resort the rest of the day watching TV. We were supposed to checkout the next day morning. Our bus to Cairo was only at 10 in the night.

Day 9

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We did not have any planned activity either. There was this quad runner which I wanted to give a try. But dropped the idea for no particular reason. We enquired at the reception if we can checkout later in the evening. The manager said we can, by paying 100 EGP. We accepted. We went for snorkelling. My husband read in the "rough guide" that somewhere at the end of the beach, you can find lot of lovely corals. We walked from one beach to the other in search of that "spot", but in vain. My husband did snorkelling on the way in every private beach(he could not end his quest for seeing beautiful corals and hundreds of varieties of fish), calling me occasionally if he spotted a really nice coral surrounded by a school of fish. We came back to the resort in the afternoon, packed our stuff, paid 100 EGP to the manager and checked out in the night. We took the taxi to the bus station and boarded the bus to Cairo. Our 7 days stay in the "heaven on earth" came to an end. If these 7 days were nothing but pure fun, the rest of the days in Egypt took us back in time, to the time of pharoahs and their splendid temples, which was also a fun in different way.

Egypt Travelogue-7: Sight seeing trips: Day 4, 5, 6 and 7-Sharm-el-Shiekh: Snorkelling and Scuba Diving

Sharm-el-Sheikh is at the southern most tip of Sinai peninsula where, in a few square kilometers all natural wonders come togther-sand, sea, corals, mountains. Its also one of the best places for holidaying with exotic locales, quaint resorts and fashion hot spot. The main attractions in and around Sharm are beaches, snorkelling, scuba diving, trip to Ras Mohammed, glass boat trip, early morning trek to Mt Sinai, desert driving and so on...

Day 4-Booking for scuba diving and Mt Sinai trek
While planning the trip, we had put scuba diving and trek to Mt SInai in our must do list(these were the main reasons why we left our then 1 1/2 years old kid at home) ..We have read a lot about red sea and its magnificient under water life with rich flora and fauna.. Its a diver's paradise with crystal clear water and good visibility under water.Trek to Mt SInai and watching the sun rise is also supposed to be an equally splendid experience. 

There are lot of diving centres through out Sharm..We enquired in 3 to 4 centres. Camel driving centre offered us diving in Ras Mohammad one of the best places in the world for suba diving. Generally beginners and people without any prior experience like us are not taken to Ras Mohammad.. When Camel offered us that, we readily accepted and paid the advance. We also chose our diving suit and shoes that fitted us. We had to wait one more day for the trip. 

Next we had to book for Mt Sinai trip. As our resort has been converted to a disco club, we did not get any help wrt sight seeing trips..But there were so many other resorts having their stalls for various tour packages..Trip to Mt Sinai is generally available only on fridays.. We booked in one of the resort's stall(forgot the name of the resort) We had to wait 3 more days for the trekking trip..

We then had a stroll in the main road of Sharm to experience the night life. It has starbucks, lots of ice cream shops, many restaurants offering variety of cusines and of course night clubs...We just had coffee in starbucks and we felt we are spending a fortune on a cup of coffee. 

Day 5-Just snorkelling
We did not have any planned activity for the day..So we just went to the beach to do some snorkelling. Snorkelling equipment was available for rent for the whole day for 20 EGP per equipment. My husband did a quick calculation and felt that buying the equipment would be cost effective(we had already enquired the price) than renting for another 5 days at 40 EGP per day for both of us. So we bought the equipment for around 120 EGP per piece.(of course after bargaining). We did a lot of snorkelling in the beach..It was a very nice experience. I was so happy to spot the same fish which was animated in Finding Nemo as the lost kid. Once we go a bit away from the shore, we could see colorful live corals being habitated by different varities of fish. 

Back at the resort, we packed for the next day's suba diving trip.

Day 6-Scuba Diving
Camel driving school's van picked us up at the resort at around 7:30 AM. We met a Russian scuba diver who saw a shark the previuos day he went for scuba diving..The instructor in the van told us that we would not be able to do the diving in deep areas as we do not have any prior experience. We were a bit disappointed. In the next half an hour, the van was full of Russian divers and all of them were experts. They had dived more than once in the red sea. We realised how funny it was that we were disppointed that we would not get to dive in deep sea. We also felt we did a big mistake by choosing ras mohammed as there was no beginner for our comapny. 
Once we reached the quay, we boarded our boat. Within few minutes, I felt sea sick and had to take a pill. I was just lying down for the most of the journey cursing myself for choosing ras mohammed. Then came the first deep sea destination for diving. All the russian divers changed to diving suit, tanks and dived into the sea. The guide offered us to go for snorkelling till the time the divers come back. My husband accepted immediately and I backed off at the same pace. I was really scared that my husband was going to snorkel in the deep waters of red sea. I know he has never done anything like this before though he had always wanted to. He is a good swimmer too, but he is not going to swim in a swimming pool or pond...its the RED SEA. I just kept my fingers crossed. The boat was always following him while he circled the sea reefs. Finally he signalled for the rope by raising his hands in the sea. The boat went towards the shore and threw the rope so that he can be guided. He reached the boat safely and was just elated to have seen so many fishes,corals. it was indeed a happy event for him though the memorable one was yet to come. 
After few more diving by the Russian experts in deeper areas, we headed back towards the port. I thought may we might not dive today and I was really happy about it..But the boat stopped at some place and my husband was supposed to dive first ofcourse with the guide who would handle all the operations. The guide explained to us some of the sign languages with which we need to communicate when underwater. 
My husband dived, and I started worrying. Atleast during snorkelling I could see him, but diving is entirely different. He was below the water for what looked like a very long time to me. He came up safely after fifteen minutes or so and he had loved every minute of it. Then it was my turn. I don't even want to say anything about it except that after going 1 foot under water, my ears started paining like anything(due to pressure difference), I got panicky and I just remebered one sign language that is to tell the guide to bring me to the surface. I felt terrible and ashamed of myself...But I was really happy for my husband that he could do it. We came back to the resort in the evening. For lunch, we had brought some noodles. The too provided lunch on boat for 20 US $ per person.

Cost per person for scuba diving: 100 US $ for one dive

Day 7-Just snorkelling again
We spent our time in the beach snorkelling. I forgot to mention that we did buy an underwater camera in one of the shops in SHarm to take snaps while scuba diving. as if diving was a child's play. We did not even take out the camera there. We used it to take snaps of the fish in the beach while snorkelling. .We developed the photos in a studio in Sharm, half of the photos were good..Back at the room, we got ready for the Mt Sinai trekking for which we were supposed to catch the tourist bus at 10 in the night.

To be continued...

Srirangapatna travelogue - A day's trip

We had been to Srirangapatna last weekend. Here is an account of our trip.
Srirangapatna is a small island near Mysore in Karnataka surrounded by river Cauveri. Tipu Sultan, known as the Tiger of Mysore and his father Hyder Ali ruled the Southern part of India with Srirangapatna as the capital city. The main attractions of the city now are the Sriranganatha temple from which the city gets its name and some really good monuments of Tipu Sultan's period.
Our itenary consisted of visiting the ranganatha temple, some of the monuments related to Tipu Sultan, ranganthittu bird sanctuary and balmuri water falls. We had planned to return to Bangalore by 7:30 PM as we had a dinner invitation from one of our relatives. So we decided to cover as much as possible before 4 PM, without over doing.
We started from home at 7:15 AM in the morning in our Hyundai accent. There were 5 adults and a kid. We took the nice road and reached kadumane restaurant on Mysore road at 8 AM. The mysore road is pretty good though there are some traffic jam points. We went past Ramnagaram of Sholay fame, mandya, maddur and finally reached sriranapatnam at around 9:45 AM. An arch welcomes the visitors once they enter Srirangapatnam. We went past the arch and crossed the bridge and there was another arch to the right welcoming again. We took that right and went straight. We then went past the fort entrance. "The sword of tipu sultan” serial's famous title music lingered in my mind. We kept going straight..On the way to the temple, there were some historical places of interest which we decided to visit on our return from temple.
SriRanganatha Temple

We reached ranganatha temple at 10 AM. The temple is a small one and unlike its counterparts, the gopuram was yellow in color.. The inside of the temple was simple without elaborate carvings. I guess belur and halebid has one of the best carvings, not even an inch is left without a carved figure.. We had the darshan(Vishnu in sayanam posture, goddess lakshmi, hanuman, garuda, narasimha to name a few) and left the temple premise at 11:45 after having our packed breakfast.

Obelisk

Of the many historical places, tipu's summer palace and tipu's mausoleum are the only 2 places that are covered in a tourist package..The first not very touristry attracton that we visited was the Obelisk. After seeing the obelisk in Egypt, we really could not dare to miss this one. From the temple, we kept going straight in a very narrow road, after getting confirmation from the local people that the road is indeed motoroable. We parked the car when we could not go any furhter. We saw the obelisk from a distance. It was a small one. The surrounding was more fascinating than the obelisk itself..The whole area is enclosed within a fort, though destoyed now. Once we climbed an elevated road, we reached the fort wall from where we saw river cauvery flowing away to glory. It was very scenic with lots of trees dotting the banks of the river. There was also a railway bridge to give it a modern touch.

Dungeon

We spent sometime there and then headed towards the main road. On the way to the main road are a dungean and tipu's death place. There was nothing much to see in the dungeon. It was a big hall with pillars. There were some stones fixed to the dungeon wall. The prisoners were suppusedlt tiesd there and beaten..
Tipu's Death Place

Then we headed towards tipu's death place. It was here they found tipu's body during his valiant battle against the british. Tipu's own men betrayed him by showing the water gate to the british through which they breached the fort.
Then we saw the remains of tipu's palace which was completely destroyed by the British. Apparently, the summer palace of Tipu, our next destination, stays intact and after tipu it was occupied by Lord Wellesely.
Dariya Daulat

The Summer palace known as Dariya daulat(wealth of sea) was built by Tipu to commemorate his victory over british during one of the battles.
The entrance to the palace looks beautiful with trimmed pine like trees on both the sides with a passage for water in between. The walls of the palace are extensively painted mainly depicting the wars that Tipu had won. There were also paitings of Hyder Ali's victories. There were fighting scenes depicting both the locals and the british. The paintings are colorful and well preserved.. It is more like a museum now, with the furniture used by tipu displayed. It also has some potraits of Tipu, Hyder Ali, Tipu's seven sons. There was also a full size portrait of Tipu at the entrance in his war attire which looked really nice. It has a 3D effect in the sense that, you would feel as if the picture looks at you from any direction you see..

Outside the palace there is lot of open space with lawn where we (me and my parents with the kid) rested for a while when my husband and MIL were busy enjoying every detail of the paintings..
Mosque

Next we visited the mosque. I somehow liked the architecture of this mosque. It looked very elegant. One fascinating aspect of this mosque was the presence of 2 pillars that resembled their counterparts in hindu temples..
Mausoleum

Our last historical destination was the masaouleum. It was built by Tipu to rest his father Hyder Ali. When Tipu died, he was also put to rest there. The shape of the tomb reminded me of the citadel in egypt. :-) The place were the bodies are resting has some beautiful colorful paintings.

Sangam

That was the end of our historic trip. Now was the time to spend some time with mother nature. Our first destination was sangam where cauvery from south and north join. I expected some nice scenaries here. But nothing much to see. The water was dirty.
Balmuri Falls

Next we headed towards our last destination for the day( we cancelled ranganthittu wild life santuary due to lack of time), the balmuri falls. The falls was playing hide and seek with us. Finally with local help we reached the spot at 3:30 PM. August is supposed to be the best season. Best season is synonymous to crowd. There was lot of water and people. The sight of water flowing in steps was a treat to the eyes. We did not get into the water. Spent some time there. Had a late lunch at 4:15 and left the place at 4:30.
Scrumptious Dinner

We reached bangalore at . We were invited for dinner at a relatives place near koramangala. Had a scrumptious dinner and left their place at 9:30. Reached home at 10:30 PM.
It was a trip to remember. We have read about Tipu Sultan in our history class during school days. Visiting the place were the great Tipu built forts, patronaged art, ruled and fought various wars and finally died like a great warrior was like truly reliving history. This is also one of the best places to see river Cauvery at its best.