Hampi , is UNESCO WORLD HERITAGE SITE , located in karnataka state. Hampi , looks remarkably unperturbed by the ill effect of ever encroaching human habitation in modern times. It was the erstwhile capital of Vijayanagara Empire, which flourished on the bank of Tungabhadra river, around 15th century.
History :
Within few years after arrival of Allaudin khilji in the kingdom of Yadavagiri in the year 1296, the entire South India was ravaged by invaders. Indian culture and religion was endangered by foreign invasion. At this juncture, people united to protect themselves, their culture and religion. It is in this backdrop that Vijayanagara was founded. It flourished for more than 200 yrs.The Kingdom of Vijayanagara was ruled by 4 dynasties. ....
Hampi is about 12km from HOSPET.
MY EXPERIENCE :
Due to modern infrastructure developments , the roads and flyovers added a modern look to this place..... We were driving from Bijapur towards Hampi...Though the road journey was very very comfortable but it looks every 5/10kms there's toll booth..... the surrounding landscape is full of huge bolders of granite rocks as far as eye could see unless we reached HOSPET city...on one side lies the Tungabhadra Dam , which we planned to visit on our return journey from Hampi......it was almost evening time as we entered the city limit ....but our night stay was booked at Kstdc Mayura Bhubaneswari at Hampi ....which was another few kms away ....I wanted to clicked few pics of Virupaksha temple, with the last rays of sun , so kept on hurrying our driver to reach the location .....in the process , our driver made a mistake and took a wrong lane and so we had to walk another 1 and half kms stretch to the Virupaksha temple site .....the Tungabhadra river looked almost dried up ....I stood a second to view the location where lots of Hindi movies have been picturised on the laps of Tungabhadra. .....Virupaksha 's architecture just made me awestruck and the camera shutter kept clicking away for the best shot...
Saw a beautiful step well there too .....what a creative mind that made such beautiful structure in Granite , I wonder.
It was almost dark and so we headed for our hotel ....we had Presidential suit booked for us two there ; Just a dreamy stay offcourse....we were damme tired and so had to go off to bed early ....Next morning woke up to chilling weather ,after breakfast we drove off to VITTHALA TEMPLE SITE OF HAMPI....
We wanted to walk down to that site instead of those motorised vehicles ....Didn't have had the idea that it would be that long walk but that walk was worth it as we would have missed lot of other locations , which came on the way .....very well preserved and maintained. ..Inside the Vitthala temple complex , the stone Chariot is located .....what to say at that moment ....words will fall short to explain those marvellous works on granite. ....so long I had seen people framing this iconic structure as per their own imagination and now it was my turn to do so .....The musical pillar too made me speachless. ....
We spend quite sometimes there before we could head out for Tungabhadra dam ....
Though there were lots of other locations to see in Hampi , which might take another 2/3 days time to finish ....but we were time bound so had to skip The Temple of kodanda rama, vijaya Vitthala temple, ugra narasima, kamal mahal, Elephant stable etc .....anyways, it's alway next time ....
But surely , today I can say it's a Wonderful world of granite which each one should come and enjoy .
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