Monuments and more in monsoon:
To start with we were going on a road trip after almost 3 years of break. And there are 3 unique things to this trip which has never happened in any of our travels so far.
1) The starting point of this trip is Mysore and not Bangalore as we were living in Mysore during this period.
2) Most places we covered in this trip are repeat visits. We do not prefer to visit the same place twice as we believe one life is not enough to explore this country even if you want to visit all the places just once.
3) I have never had such a complicated planning for any trip till date.
So lets cover the planning bit first. We watched a video on youtube about Hampi and realized during our last visit in 2011 we had missed seeing few of the monuments (Link for the blog of previous trip - Hampi trip 2011). So a list of monuments in Hampi was made and we decided to visit for 3 days to cover all of them. Hotel was booked. A day later we remembered that there is also a wildlife sanctuary in Hampi, so decided to add one more day to trip. When we were booking for this additional day we saw the Jungle lodges website showing some amazing discounts for Dandeli because of off season (We visited Dandeli in 2015, link for the blog of that trip - Dandeli trip 2015). That was too tempting to let go off, so additional 2 days were added for Dandeli and all the bookings were done. A week before the travel we realized that we could actually start the trip a day in advance. Some research was made to check what places can be covered and we came across Lakkundi. So decided to visit Lakkundi and booked a stay in Gadag. In fact this is the only place in this whole trip that we had not visited in the past. This is how a 3 days trip became 7 days trip.There is more to this, but that is for later.
Full route plan
Day 1: 20/7/2021
We woke up at 4:00 AM and left home by 5:00 AM. It was raining and this being a new route for us, the going was slow. First 50 KMs were bad to average road. After that road condition became better and surroundings became greener. Rain was on and off, so over all the drive was pleasant. We stopped for breakfast at Hotel Grand Anagha at Chennarayapattana at 7:00 AM. Post breakfast we continued our journey and rain kept us company. About 35 KMs before reaching Davanagere we came across a beautiful structure on the road side and stopped the car. This place is called Santhe Bennur.
As we had stuffed ourselves with the benne dose we skipped lunch and drove on. We reached Lakkundi at 2:40 PM. Here we visited couple of Chalukya temples and a Jain temple.
Nanneswara temple
Kasivishweshwara temple
Brahma Jinalaya
List of temples around Lakkundi
There is a guided tour facility at Brahma Jinalaya where you can learn about the entire history of the place. We left from Lakkundi at 4:30 PM and reached our Hotel at Gadag at 5:30 PM.
Route taken : Mysore - Chennaraya Pattana - Arasikere - Davanagere - Harapanahalli - Lakkundi - Gadag.
Once we checked in, we went out to explore the Gadag town and had some snacks in the evening.
Had authentic north karnataka food for dinner at Annapurneshwari Lingayath Khanavali.
Day 2: 21/7/2021
We woke up leisurely , got ready and checked out of the hotel by 7:45 AM. We had our breakfast in Hotel Kamath in Gadag.
Our first stop was Trikuteshwara temple, we reached here by 8:45 AM. An average temple, nothing much to mention about. We left from here at 9:00 AM after a quick visit.
Basavanna's statue in Gadag
Trikuteshwara temple
We left Gadag and drove towards our next destination Dambal. As usual Google was in exploration mode, it took us on a nice trip around all the narrow route and finally we reached the main road. Eventually we reached Dodda Basappa temple at 9:40 AM.
Dodda Basappa temple, Dambal
After spending about 30 mins here we left towards Hampi. Gadag to Hampi route is under construction in multiple places. So had to take some deviations. We reached Hampi Heritage & Wilderness Resort at 12:15 PM.
Had lunch around 1:30 PM here and took some rest. Went for safari in the evening and spotted some sloth bears.
We returned back from the safari and had tea and snack. It started to rain again, so we had to confine ourselves to the room. Had dinner and retired for the day.
Some of the birds spotted in the resort property.
Eurasian Collared Dove
Brahminy Starling
Indian Silverbill
Laughing Dove
Day 3, 4, 5: 22/7/2021 - 24/7/2021
On Day 3, we woke up to see cloudy morning and soon it started to drizzle. We left from JLR property around 10:00 AM after breakfast. We reached Hampi by 10:45 AM. We could not explore much as it kept raining. Most of the restaurants were closed as they are yet to open post lockdown. So we decided to go to Kamalapur and check in to our hotel. When we reached there we were informed that the hotel is closed post lockdown. We had booked this via booking.com well in advance. Neither hotel management nor booking.com had informed us about this hotel being closed. We made some calls and found accommodation in Hotel Hampi International, Hospet. Had lunch at Kalapur ( Hotel Hampi Paradise) and left for Hospet as it was raining heavily. Reached hotel by 4:00 PM. A day where we could not do much because of persistent rain.
Thankfully evening was sunny, so we went to watch the sunset at Malyavanta Hill. That completes our Hampi exploration. Tomorrow to the next destination.
We had visited 60 monuments in Hampi over the course of 3 days. Have listed them in alphabetical order in this short video.
Day 6 & 7: 25/7/2021 - 26/7/2021
On day 6, we woke up early, checked out from hotel and left from Hampi at 6:15 AM. On this route till Gadag, there are multiple deviations because of road construction work. We stopped for breakfast at a small road side hotel outside the Gadag town. Road condition continued to remain the same, we reached Dharwad. Here we stopped for buying dharwad peda from the famous Babu Singh Takur Peda. Though the pedas turned out to be very nice, we lost considerable time searching for this shop and negotiating the narrow lanes to reach this shop.
We left from here and the roads became worse and it started to rain as well. After about 20 Kms of drive the surroundings became much greener, but roads condition went from bad to worse. By now it was pouring heavily. Last 50 Kms or so road condition was good, but the roads were narrow.
We finally reached Old Magazine House, JLR, Dandeli at 12:30 PM.
After checking in, we had lunch. It continued to rain heavily, so we slept for a while. Evening was also spent waiting for the rain to stop and some birds to arrive.
On day 7, we woke up and found that rain had stopped for a while. Went out for a walk in search of birds, ended up finding some leeches. In the mean time it started to rain again, so we returned back to resort and had our breakfast. Rest of the day was spent either waiting for rain to stop or waiting to spot some birds. But most part of the day it kept raining. We found out that Jog falls was in full glory because of excess rain, so we decided to add Jog falls to our plan on our return journey. (Here we go, addition of places to this trip continues).
We ended up spotting Malabar giant squirrels and some birds during our stay here in 2 days.
White bellied blue flycatcher
Brown cheeked fulvetta
Blue bearded bee eater
Spot bellied eagle owl
Day 8: 27/7/2021
We woke up early to see more rain continuing, had our breakfast and checked out of JLR at 9:30 AM. We deliberately started bit late as we were not sure of any road blockages due to over night rains in the malnad region. We were asked to take a specific route by the JLR staff which was less prone to land slides to reach Jog.
Route : Ganeshgudi - Baruchi Circle - Chennamma Circle - Bagavathi - Kulige - Yellapur - Sirsi - Jog.
We reached Jog at 2:30 PM. We clicked some photos here, but it soon started to rain again. So we left from Jog at 3:00 PM.
We stopped on the way for snacks in Sagar at 4:00 PM. We had more than 6 hours drive left to reach home. Having experience some bad roads during our first day of the journey we knew what was in store for us in the last 40 Kms . The rain was not stopping. Driving in the night on road full of potholes with rain to restrict your vision is not a wise option to take.
So we decided to halt in Shivamogga and return home the next day. So another day gets added to the trip and becomes 9 day trip. We checked for available options for stay in Shivamogga and booked Royal Orchid. En route had some real good green patches of paddy fields and they looked even more beautiful in this monsoon.
We reached Shivamogga by 5:30PM and checked in to the hotel.
Day 9: 28/7/2021
Now we had one full day in hand and just 5 hours needed to reach home. This gives opportunity to look for more places to visit on the way. So a quick search and short listed couple of places to visit on our way.
We woke up by 7:00 AM and checked out of hotel at 8:00 AM. Had breakfast at Adigas in Shivammogga and left at 8:45 AM. We encountered the most traffic of this trip on this day.
Road condition mostly was just average. We reached our first pit stop of the day Garudagiri at 11:45 AM. This a a small hill and there is a fort on the top. So in total less than 2 hours of trekking time needed to reach the fort and come back. However because of rains thick vegetation had covered the walking path up the hill, so it was not possible to find our way here without the help of someone who is familiar with the terrain. We spoke to the villagers and there was no one available on that day to be our guide. However they informed that every full moon day, villagers go up the hill at 7:00 AM to perform puja in a small temple at the top. Anyone looking to visit this place reach the village in the bottom of the hill before 7:00 AM on a full moon day and tag along with the villagers.So we leave this trek for some time in future and drove on.
We had our lunch in Hotel Grand Anagha at CR Pattana on the way and reached home by 4:00 PM.
A trip that got extended way longer than what we had planned for initially. Rains did restrict our exploration a bit, but hey its monsoon time, what else can you expect. But it was more than satisfying to be back on a road trip after a long time.
