[lucifer1881]

'Tis the season for Hampi... At least that's how it seems here on TBHP. So what can this travelogue say that others haven't already said? More importantly, can it say it better?

Give or take a few years for education / work, I have been in Hyderabad since 1990. The road trip fever took a grip on me in 2009, about a year or so after I got married. Any connection is purely co-incidental and fully unintended. Some of the trips that my wife and I have been on truly boggles my mind - Dalhousie Log (5,278 km drive across 7 States - Rajasthan, Punjab, Himachal & more), Spiti Log (The Elantra does it again: 6233 km, 9 States, 18380 feet above sea level. Spiti, Ladakh & more), Ladakh Log (From Africa to Leh - The Journey of Two Souls), Bhutan Log (Where no Elantra has gone before - 5500 kms, 6 States & Bhutan!), Patna Log (The Great Bihari Road Trip) - five 17-day road trips in 10 years (2020 does not count and has been henceforth erased from the calendar). We must have driven to Goa Log (Goa; been there, done that) no fewer than 7 times. It is our second home and we do not even count it as a holiday destination - the joke goes that we end up using GPS more often in Hyderabad than we do in Goa.

We have done Coorg, Gandikota Log (Three and a Half Men & their Women: The one with Gandikota and Belum Caves) (incidentally, we did this twice in 2 weeks), Ooty Log (Hyderabad - Ooty - Hyderabad: The Highlight, The Sidelight, The Lowlight), Satpura Log (Satpura - Quick Jaunt, Quicker Log), and umpteen other weekend-ish destinations.

But Hampi never happened until 2019 (August 31 to September 02). And then it happened again in 2021 (September 03 to September 06). Now that is some continuity, the gap in years notwithstanding (2020 does not exist anyway, even if we did Goa but what happens in Goa stays in Goa). It is almost as if we never left Hampi - spiritually, we are still there.

Anyhoo. How do 2019 and 2021 compare? Hampi hasn't changed much (the pandemic induced devastation of tourism aside). It still remains a place that has something for everyone. You could visit Hampi for pilgrimage, you could visit it for its wilderness, you could visit it for its rivers and lakes, you could visit it for its heritage, or you could visit it to experience the hippiness of it all.

The Steed in 2019 - 1.9 lakh km on the odo, good for many more


The Steed in 2021 - 4k km on the odo, a veritable spring chicken

The steeds may be different (and I will compare the two in the next post) but the Tungabhadra river remained in spate both times.

The Mighty Tungabhadra

Virupapura Gaddi has become sadder than what it was in 2019. All constructions there are in various stages of demolition, their remnants yet to be cleared away. The dismantled concrete and steel tell their own sad tales. The bridge to the "island" is now a solid structure. May be there are plans to revive it. May be governments do what governments do, which is to say "who knows what they do". May be that is a chapter forever closed in the glorious annals of Hampi's "hippy" history.

[lucifer1881]

Enough has been said and written, and then said and written some more about the Elantra. She has been an absolute beaut. She may be the old girl but like many old girls she still has her wily ways. The Rapid had very large shoes to fill, and I hoped with all my heart that she did, for the Rapid is the wife's car. And wife's car is better than heaven - them's the rules.

The Rapid outshines the X3. Skoda 1 BMW 0

The Rapid is fast, a rare case of a car living up to its name. It pulls like a WAP7 locomotive. 0 to 100 happens in no time. It may have a 3-pot 1.0 litre engine but its mating with the 6-speed DSG gearbox is what makes orgasms possible. Put your foot down and she shoots across the tarmac. Put your foot down in "S" mode and she shoots across even before you realise that was what you wanted her to do. The word for this sort of responsiveness is "telepathy".

By the lake on the Hospet-Hampi highway

Yes, there is some turbo lag when you put your foot down in "D" mode but that is splitting hairs. You can always switch to "S" or manually drop a gear or two when you want to overtake in the narrowest of gaps.

The downside to all this, of course, is that the suspension is not tuned for comfort. A two hour drive is fine. But a 6 hour one is not friendly to 40-year old bones. Skoda could have mitigated some of this by putting in regular profile tyres instead of the low profile ones. Honestly, low profile tyres do nothing of any positive note in the real world - they just make the car less comfortable. The real world has potholes and speed breakers. It is not a place where one takes a corner at 100 kph.

May be I am being unfair in comparing two cars across different classes. The Rapid keeps all the promises it makes, and then some. The ground clearance is good enough to get over the speed bumps on Karnataka State Highways, which means it is good enough to cross over the Himalayas. The brakes are fantastic, almost painful at times. The traction control and ABS are very competent.

By the Canal

The internal space is at par for a car its size. She could do with a few more cubby holes for those knick knacks that one tends to accumulate on a road trip but it is not an issue for a weekend getaway. The 12V charging sockets in both front and rear are very thoughtful. The projector headlamps illuminate all the way to Xanadu.

During the 4 days of this trip, I drove the Rapid in all sorts of weather - from scorching heat to blinding rain - and on all sorts of surfaces - from the butter smooth NH7 to the dirt tracks in between Hampi's boulders. Each and every time I got behind the wheel, she put an ear-to-ear smile on my face - a grin so large it was obscene.

Did I miss the Elantra? Of course, I did. I am biased and prejudiced because I am in love with her. But does the Elantra mind that I may also be falling for the Rapid? No.

If there is sky above and ground below, then all you need is a beautiful road

[lucifer1881]

2018 and 2019 were years of extreme travel, the former for leisure and the latter for work. In 2018, we squeezed in family trips to Lucknow and Shajahanpur in between two 2-week trips to Italy and Spiti. All hell broke loose in 2019 for me. Work travel kept me away from home for around 6 months. The only trip we took together was the weekend at Hampi, discounting the 2 weeks that she joined me on a work trip. We also moved to Gurgaon that year and had made all arrangements to do the mother of all trips - Everest Base Camp. Then the pandemic happened.

Hampi to us defines the two contrasting realities of the pre and post pandemic world. The Hampi in 2019 was vibrant, happening, zestful.

Channeling my inner SRK on Hemakunta Hill in 2019


The Kumaraswamy Temple is one of Hampi's best kept secrets


The famous elephant stables


The Octagonal Water Pavilion


Pondering over the miracle of life, the futility of death and everything in between


Finally, flopping down at one of the many cafes to relax and refresh

The Hampi in 2021 was a pale shadow of itself. All temples and monuments were closed to the public due to the pandemic. The main street of the historic town was dead.

Everything is shut, no one is around, this is some post-apocalyptic nightmare


The river still flows with vigour

But, like I said, Hampi is many things to many people. The pandemic may have brought lesser places down to their knees but this town trundles on. The monuments and temples may be closed (they were to open on September 8). The soul of Hampi still lives on.

The moon rises

[lucifer1881]

So what do you do when the things that are to be done are not allowed to be done? You find things that were previously not thought of.

You start with picking the right place to stay. The "rightness" of a place depends greatly on your age. If I had done Hampi 10 years ago, I probably would have stayed in a shack by the river. With age comes the desire for comfort, not wisdom as is often misattributed. We found the next best thing - Hampi's Boulders Resort.

A room on a cliff, comes with the soundtrack of the gushing river below


A jhoola too, because why not?

This time, Hampi was a 6-hour drive. The wife says it is because we were Rapid (and she was quite pleased at her own pun). We checked into our hotel at 11:30am, relaxed for a bit and had lunch. Post lunch, we asked ourselves the million dollar question:

A drive for the sake of it

or


An afternoon nap

It was a no-contest. Drive. In the Work at Home environment that we currently are in, naps can be taken during a work day as well.

I handed over the key to the wife. She randomly picked a road.

#randomDrivesMatter

We also visited Sanapur Lake. Monsoon seems to be good. The lake was at FTL.

Around the Sanapur Lake

We drove around for a bit more and then decided it was time to revisit an old watering hole - Tutti Cafe.

Nestled in paddy fields among the boulders, this place has vibes 24x7

This was a good day. We got back to our hotel early-ish and turned in by 9:30pm.

The hotel's restaurant

[lucifer1881]

Up bright and early, we took a short walk around the property.

One of the many rock pools

Post chai and breakfast, we decided to make our way to the historic town. All the monuments and temples were shut. But the seasoned traveller knows how to make the best of any situation. We make our first stop at Shivarama Dootha Math, atop a hill overlooking the ruins.

We drove around the ruins for a bit and picked yet another random back road where we got thoroughly lost. Well, we chose to be. There was full 4G service and we could have used GPS if we wanted to. But would you really when you find a road like this?

And when the universe conspires to make things even better, are you really going to argue?

The thing with conspiracies is that they do not last long. Eventually, we got on the Hampi-Hospet highway. But when the cosmos is on your side, even a path well trodden can open up delightful vistas.

Is it just me or does one feel extra hungry on holidays? Around 1pm, we were properly hungry. All cafes in the historic town being shut, we made our way back to the other side of the river - where the fun is.

Monkey's Paradise

Lunch was lavish. But the post lunch walk down to the river was the MVP. The sun was baking hot at this time - we didn't care.

We spent almost an hour by the river. It had a crazy calm, mostly because there was absolutely no phone network. That is a luxury ill afforded these days.

What is even more amazing is that most of the places we drove to were mere spur of the moment decisions. If you ask us to take you there, we probably won't be able to. Isn't that the difference between a good trip and a great one?

This, however, is a place we can take you to. This is the sunset point inside Hampi's Boulders Resort. It is a decent climb up the boulders.

At another time and in another place, this would have been the perfect end to a near perfect driving day. But it is Hampi we are talking about. The World is not Enough, with due respect to James Bond. There is something about this town that keeps the energy in these 40-year old veins flowing. Then again, I chose to stay 21 the day I hit 30. There is that.

Dinner @ Wanderlust

On the drive back post dinner, we probably went bonkers. For no reason, we stopped on the MDR and remained stopped for about an hour.

We did not encounter a soul for those 60 odd minutes. It was just us, the Rapid, the street lamp and the infinite darkness of the night.

[lucifer1881]

As morning broke on September 5, we woke up to an overcast day. It had rained almost through the night and it did not look likely that the sun will peek out of the clouds any time soon. Perfect. There are things that you can do in overcast conditions that do not make sense to do otherwise.

We took a walk through the wilderness. Next door to our hotel was another one called "Hampi's Whiskers Resort". Eventually, we found our way there. But we had to overcome features like these .

Earth has not anything to show more fair - Wordsworth was right, his choice of location is debatable

Weir @ Hampi

The property has a lovely restaurant overlooking the river, which was a perfect place to have a relaxed lunch.

It was early yet, and the rediscovered 21-year old in me had too many ants in his pants to be in one place for too long. The wife too wanted to drive around. Off we went and found ourselves next to yet another canal.

Satisfied that it was now time enough for lunch, we made our way back to Whiskers. But wife being wife decided to take a different route to it.

One good weir deserves another


And a lotus pond too

By this time, we were properly knackered and the veins transformed back to being 40. It was time go back, put your feet up and rest for a while. Until it was time for dinner, that is.

Jungle Tree

The place for dinner wasn't chosen at random. It was selected based on a very important parameter - non-floor seating. The many meals while seated on the floor had taken their toll on the urban knees that do not know how to squat anymore.

[lucifer1881]

That, as they say, was that. The drive back to Hyderabad wasn't remarkable. It took us about 40 minutes more courtesy Monday traffic.

What about Hampi? Well, what about it? It held many secrets in the pre-social media world. Many of those have been spilled, courtesy "influencers" aka those who make their living leaching off others' time. But she still keeps a few secrets. One just needs to go where no vlogger has gone before, and the world is still large enough to have many such places that offer peace and tranquility.

There are some things that money can't buy, a portico to chill on isn't one of them

The Hampi hangover will stay for days, especially in the strange times we live in. Will it become a regular haunt like Goa? Too early to say either way but the thought of it sounds good - Goa during the monsoon, Hampi during the winter. Or why not an extended break including both?

Onward and upward

[Eddy]

Thread moved from the Assembly Line. Thanks for sharing.

[Big Smoke]

Originally Posted by lucifer1881

It may have a 3-pot 1.0 litre engine but its mating with the 6-speed DSG gearbox is what makes orgasms possible.

Buddy, the Rapid is equipped with a 6 Speed Torque Converter unit. Gone are the days of DSG along with the 1.6 & 1.2 TSI & 1.5 TDI with the kicking in of BS6 regulations.

But a 6 Speed TC making a BHPian feel like it's a DSG speaks volumes about how well tuned the gearbox is!

Crisp, nicely written travelogue. A good read.

[mobike008]

Excellent travelogue. It rekindled old memories of our trip together- 3 Cars and Half Grown Men with their spouses (This would have been a more apt title)

What a trip that was? It was the only time in history of automobile the Aspire was seen in review mirror of another automobile

Originally Posted by lucifer1881

'Tis the season for Hampi... At least that's how it seems here on TBHP. So what can this travelogue say that others haven't already said? More importantly, can it say it better?

We have done Coorg, Gandikota Log (Three and a Half Men & their Women: The one with Gandikota and Belum Caves) (incidentally, we did this twice in 2 weeks), Ooty Log (Hyderabad - Ooty - Hyderabad: The Highlight, The Sidelight, The Lowlight), Satpura Log (Satpura - Quick Jaunt, Quicker Log), and umpteen other weekend-ish destinations.

Lovely travelogue and pictures. I relived our old memories of trips to Hampi (Been there thrice). Let's plan one when I am down there next time. Or, do you think Goa will take precedence?

[lucifer1881]

Originally Posted by mobike008

...Let's plan one when I am down there next time. Or, do you think Goa will take precedence?

This, as they say, is the 64 million dollar question. Perhaps Goa and then Hampi on the return leg because as they say in Hyderabad, "Baaju mein hi hai."