It was Dad n Mom's 40th Anniversary, so my sister decided to have a family trip to shimoga and surrounding places. The plan was to drive down to shimoga, and then visit Jog, agumbe and other places. It was decided to take brother-in-law's (BIL) duster and my palio SDX, as there were a total of 8 people including my 5 year old nephew prithvi.
We started at around 7 AM on 29th Morning from Bangalore, as I had to drop a relative of mine, I got delayed and BIL went ahead in his duster. So it was up to me to make up the lost time and catch up with them. Initial plan was to reach shimoga, check in to royal orchid and then do some local sightseeing, but we decided that after the drive and lunch no one would be interested in getting out of the room, decided to visit belur, halebedu, chikmagalur, sringeri and agumbe and reach shimoga by night.
The Bangalore - Mangalore is excellent and with almost nil traffic so was able to maintain a good speed of 100+. Close to yediyur, i was doing 120+ on my palio and observed a engine check light coming on. In the past I have had issue with car engine switching off when doing such high speeds due to pressure sensor problem. So not to take any chances, I stopped the car by the side, switched off the engine and took a bio break. When i started the car the engine check light was gone. But to ensure it does not repeat and no further problems are caused i maintained speed till 100.
Our first stop was at cafe coffee day/ kamat at chennarayapatna. After the break we headed towards Hasan and from there we took the route to halebedu. This route was just about OK. The sun was beating down and when we reached the temple, the stones in the temple were literally burning. We quickly went to the temple, which surprisingly was cool inside. spent some 30 mins took pictures. After some juice/cucumber we started towards belur and this road was worse! Especially there is a tank bund road which was having moon craters!
Here are some photos from halebedu:
At belur we hired a guide and it proved to be a good decision as he was able to not only explain the history of the temple and the carvings but he also showed us the finer details and explained about the different sculptures on the temple walls. Like a lady with dog, lady coming back from hunting with the kill, lady with “shorts”, vishakanya with a scorpion. Over all it felt good to hear and see the details as compared to halebedu where we just walked around clicking pictures without even waiting for a few minutes.
Observe the kill in the hand of helper lady.
By the time we finished the temple visit at belur it was around 1 PM and the sun was beating down hard. The initial plan was to go to sringeri from there via chikamagalur and then proceed towards agumbe for sunset. But considering the time and the distance (sringeri was around 100+ KM from belur). This schedule would have required us to drive another 220+ kms, so we decided drop that plan and instead head towards chikmagalur and also grab lunch on the way. Chikamagalur is some 60 odd kms from belur and we reached there by 3 PM. While looking for some good restaurant which we couldn’t locate we took the route which goes to kadur. On the way we saw a hording about the gateway hotel. We decided to visit the place for lunch.
Gateway by Taj is a nice place on the hills of chikamagalur with an amazing view. Being a taj venture you can expect the ambience, cleanliness and service to be good and it indeed was. The highlight of the lunch was the Rasam. Made from the peppers grown in their own farm, it was simple HOT! Just one sip of Rasam and the next thing you know is you are coughing coz the pepper has hit the back of your throat!
A quick check of the google maps revealed that there was a shorter router directly to terikere and shimoga. Instead of taking the kadur-terikere-shimoga route we decided to the other route to terikere. This proved to be a good decision as this route passed thru the hills and coffee estates on both sides of the road. The road condition was superb and the traffic almost nil! We stopped en route at a coffee bar at one of the estates and boy the cold coffee was to die for! We spent almost an hour there at the café admiring the beauty of the place as well as the weather!
From there we proceeded towards terikere and on toward shimoga. Finding the maddening traffic on the terikere main road was like driving in Bangalore. Finally we reached Royal Orchid at around 8 PM. One incident that happened during our checkin at the hotel is worth mentioning: While waiting at the reception for the checkin, one of the hotel staff was handing the wet towels. My lil nephew prithvi went to hand over the used towel to the staff and the staff said: Thank you sir! To this prithvi loudly says: “Why are you telling me sir? I am only a small boy!” That reply from prithvi made me think how innocent the kids are and how they change as they grow up and learn new aspects of life! I wonder why did we change why can’t we see everyone the same way the kids do! Well that’s a topic for another day and discussion.
After freshening up we have dinner at “tiger trail” one of the restaurants at royal orchid. The food was nothing to write home about, but there was a performer singing songs as per the customers’ requests. I wonder how is he able to sing when people are just diving in to their food :-? Due to the journey everyone was tired and hot the sack soon after.
That ended our day 1 of the trip.