Temple for the Techies ;-)

It’s yet another pilgrimage for me in this month, again in to the state of Andhra pradesh. Two weeks back I was on a trip to Tirupathi and now to Hyderabad, infact chilkur to be more precise and exact about the location. This temple is very famous for the people travelling abroad especially to US. It’s also called as the VISA temple. For me it was really new, something different and amusing to hear that from one of my friends who wanted to visit this temple. The Balaji temple in Chilkur is being visited by thousands and thousands of people every week, majorly by the IT folks and other students who await their visa approval to travel to US.

This temple is located in a village called Chilkur which is around 30 KMs from the Hyderabad city. The connectivity to the temple is really good as there are a lot of buses leaving from Mehdipatnam to Chilkur every 20 mins. [One of the buses which I remember was 288D, as we travelled in a taxi to the temple I didn’t notice much about the other bus routes.] From Mehdipatnam, Chilkur is about 16KMs and it follows the scenic route via the Mrugavani National park. This temple here is entirely different from all the other ones I have seen primarily for the fact that there are no monetary donations accepted. There is no hundi present inside the temple where you can donate any money.

Here goes the belief followed in the temple. One has to make a wish of his/hers and make pradikshana (circumambulate) 11 times. Once the wish is fulfilled he/she should go back to the temple and do pradikshana for 108 times. People of all ages and origin come to this temple, make their own wish and revisit once fulfilled. The Lord Balaji here in the temple is considered so powerful that almost everybody’s wishes get fulfilled and especially for those VISA seekers, they have always seen success after the visit to the temple and hence made this a VISA temple :). There are no special Pooja or anything done for anybody. All we can do is just see the God, pray and wish for ourselves and do the pradikshana. The timings of the temple are from 06:00 AM to 08:00 PM. Twice in a day Pooja would be done by 07:00 AM and 07:00 PM. Rest of all the time it is open for public.

We reached the temple by around 11:00 AM. There are a lot of shops and hotels in that area, where we can have food. We had our breakfast in an Udupi hotel and proceeded to the temple. Since it was a Sunday there was a big crowd of people waiting in the queue, but the queue did move really fast and we were done with our darshan by around 12:00 PM. We had to wait for about half an hour to start with the pradikshana; it took around another half an hour to complete the 11 rounds. That’s it; we are done, went again for a quick darshan and came out of the temple. It would take close to 4 hours for anyone to complete the 108 rounds. Once out of the temple, we had some really awesome lemon soda, sugar cane juice in the nearby shops and headed back to the city :)

Looking forward and awaiting my second chance, yet that won’t be covered in the blog later ;-)

Ride to Muninagara Dam

The weekend was yet another mundane one until I got a call from one of my friends towards the end of the Saturday to go for a ride to Muninagara Dam – a place near Bannerghatta national park in Bangalore. The plan is an expedition into the forest area surrounding the national park to explore the beauty of nature. It sounded very interesting and adventurous for the fact that this is a bicycle ride and the not usual motorcycle ones which I have been on so far. Initially, I was little worried if I could pedal 80 KMs altogether in the first one of this kind, but then boosted myself telling, if I can’t do this now at this age, then when else I could do it!!! So, continued with the plan and scheduled the start by 2 AM Sunday morning to avoid burning us out much in the hot sun during the daytime. The gang of five was ready to ride the next morning.

The next question for us was to get the cycles ready, as none of us except the one who came up with this plan have a bicycle on his own. Got a lead from him about the bicycle rentals in Bangalore and went and approached Unnathi automobiles- located in 6^th cross near the BBMP Park in New thippasandra bangalore- which has B’twin 5.0 bicycles for rent. These cycles have 3 front gears and 7 rear gears providing a combination of 21 gears for easy riding. [I did not know the technicalities of the cycle, yet got to know these details from the shopkeeper]. We just need to give one ID proof original and address proof photcopy to get the cycles. The rent per day is Rs.300/- per cycle. Rented 4 cycles at around 8 PM Saturday night and rode them to Ulsoor, which is the start point of our ride the following morning.By the time we reached back our house, it was 9 PM, had dinner and chats and went to bed to take a power nap.

As per the plan, I and my friend got up by 1 AM to get ready and leave from my house to Ulsoor in bike. The start itself was a bit scary as we were chased by dogs thrice near my house itself. J Somehow built courage and proceeded forward and reached near Ulsoor. There awaited the next scary thing for us. We weren’t aware of some local temple function and the processions happening over there. The whole of that area is on streets, enjoying the festivals. People were drunk all over, dancing for songs and the beats and full police protection was given to that area, we had to take a lot of diversions to reach my friend’s house there.

We set out for the ride from Ulsoor by around 2:45 AM. The ride was at ease in the early hours of the morning that we could cover more than 10KMs in the first hour itself. Stopped near the Royal Meenakshi mall in the bannerghatta road around 4:00 AM for a break of 10 mins, took some snaps there and continued further 

Guys relaxing and discussing about the first leg of the journey :)

The next stop was after crossing the junction which has the deviation for the Bannerghatta national park, kaggalipura and ragihalli. There are two routes to reach muninagara from here. One is via kaggalipura and the other thru Ragihalli. We took the ragihalli route as that would be more scenic to ride amidst the forest. 3 Kms down the anekal road, there would be a deviation with a sign board which says Ramakrishna Mission 10 KMs. We have to take right in this place, from here on it’s the forest route. When we reached this junction by around 5:15 AM, there were 3 villagers who guided us with the routes and also scared us a little by telling about the presence of Elephants en route. We were not having enough light sources with us; only one of the cycles was having a light with which we came so far. After hearing from them, I dint want to take much risk to ride on to the forest route in complete darkness, so took a break there for about 20 mins, so that we would be in sunlight  when we actually get into the forest roads.

The Road Not taken

The Bikes

Resumed the ride by around 5:40 AM when the visibility gets better and moved forward. There were a few two wheeler and auto rickshaws coming in the opposite side and one of the guys stopped us and warned us again about the prevalence of elephants en route and asked us to be careful while going. For a minute I thought, we are going to get stuck with the elephants and going to experience something which is really adventurous. Yet, nothing of that sort really happened. We continued to proceed forward in the twilight and within half an hour we could see the sunrise in the horizon. The road was really good to ride except for 2-3 steep rises in it, which made me get exhausted completely. Stopped for very short breaks for 5 mins in between and reached till Ragihalli by around 6:30 AM.  

Mullaiventhan doing stunts with the Bike!!!

Its Chinnadurai's turn now...

In Ragihalli village, we enquired about the route to Muninagara dam, and to our disappointment everyone told it is not possible to reach the dam via this route and to reach the dam we need to take the Kaggalipura route only, to which we need to backtrack 15 KMs and ride another 19 KMs from there, which would really be a herculean task for all of us. I was so exhausted already that I was not in any mood to backtrack and take the other route. Had we done that, I wouldn’t have had energy to ride back to Bangalore at all. J. Decided to drop the Dam idea, had breakfast at Ragihalli in a small mess and rode a little further to get into the trails in the forest. Got into one trail and did a terrain ride in the rocks and bushes in the forest of about quarter kilometer, took a few snaps out there, and came back to the main roads of the village. It was 8 AM, when we are done with all this and we wanted to head back to Bangalore at this point of time, so that we can reach back before 12 noon. 

Guys following the leader Deepan

Amresh posing in the trails...

Started with the return journey, took our first break after crossing the AMC College to drink tender coconut, sat down for a while and proceeded further. The sun has come overhead and it was horribly hot to ride thru. The return journey was a bit tougher than the onward due to the weather change. Took enough breaks now and then and reached back to the den by around 10:45 AM. Straight away went to the bicycle rentals and returned the cycles and went home and got crashed to get up again by 5:30 PM in the evening. I was really amused and astonished to believe myself that I have done 80Kms ride without much of complexity. Though, we din see the dam for which we intended to ride, it was really a different experience to try out the bicylce after years, it was one of an exhausting yet enthralling ride. 

A Walking Pilgrimage ...

When I discussed about going to Tirupathi with my friends, one of them was very enthuse in going for a walk and climb the hill. I was little skeptical about this idea in the beginning thinking about my physique and the body conditions. I hardly indulge myself in any physical exerices. But then, with his continued motivation and other friends’ involvement I also joined hands with them to be a part of this exhilarating experience.  Did the usual ground work of reading thru various blogs and googling and built the confidence inside and got geard up for the trip.

As per the plan, we reached the downhill – a place called ALIPIRI- by 01:00 AM (04/07/2012-Saturday). This is the place where the steps for the pedestrian starts. Had a cup of tea with a cycle chai wala there and started our missionJ.  The intial idea was to reach atop -covering around 3550 steps and about 16KM-before dawn, as we are all amateurs and first time climbers in Tirumala. When the clock ticked 02:00 AM we had already crossed 1000+ steps and were elated with the good progress we made. The intial 1700 steps were kind of steep and hard to climb continuously. It would be really tiring for a common man who was not involved much with walking or any such physical exercises. We had to stop for every 300 steps, breathe out and march on. I was little scared before we start the trip about the route as to how well it would be lit and how crowded it would be and the like. But to my surprise, the place was neatly and well lit by the TTD, and a humongous crowd was ascending the hill leaving us with no fearJ.

There are a lot of shops available enroute selling juices, glucose, chur mur, mangoes and anything and everything one would want to keep him active and refreshing while walking. The walk became effortless once we reach 2350 steps. This is the place where we can get the tickets for DivyaDarshan –a special queue only for the pedestrians to the temple. One needs to be present infront of the Web cam there in the counters and will be given the ticket with the image of his face on it. The reporting entrance for the darshan would also be mentioned in the ticket itself.

The next 6 KMS from here would just be a casual walk in the midst of the jungle and the bus route. A deer park would be visible to the left of the walk way. This stretch covers about 500 steps. These steps are not at all steep, they are too simple to walk and cross by. Towards the end of this stretch, we can see a big Hanuman Statue near to 2850^th step. We reached this place around 3.45 AM. After this, again the steepy steps will begin; we have around 750+ which need to be climbed to reach atop. When we reached the top of the hill, the time was around 04:45AM, it was much earlier than what we were anticipating. There is a place called Madhava Nilaya, where the pedestrians are allowed to get refreshed- a locker will be given to keep all the belongings inside- and can take bath in the common bathrooms available there. Once refreshed there, we can go directly to the entrance mentioned in the DivyaDarshan ticket and wait in the queue. We reached the queue around 05:30AM. Since it was a Saturday morning and the summer vacation time, we had to wait for about 5 hours before we finish our darshan. It was 10:30AM when we came out of the temple and went to the laddu counter. Though the walk was a bit tiring, lengthy one, and the wait was very long, when we came out after darshan, our hearts were filled with satisfaction and happinessJ.

From my personal experience, I thought it would be helpful if keep in mind the below points:

1. Start in evening 6 PM or at the midnight around 1 or 2 AM to avoid hot sun or else it will be really tiring and difficult to walk with bare foot during the day time. The max time it could take is 4 hours for a normal midaged individual with adequate breaks
2. Don’t carry any luggage while climbing; it would ease the process of walking and climbing the steep steps. We can drop the luggage with the free luggage counters provided by TTD. The luggage will reach the top before us waiting in the counters uphill
3. Water and all other necessary refreshments shops are available round the clock through out the way. So no need to worry about anything to carry with
4. Mobile phones signals are proper, so no worries about carrying them. It would definitely be handy in case of emergency. After reaching top we can drop the phones in the counters provided by TTD ( this would take more time while getting back after darshan, so better to keep it in our luggage after reaching top)
5. There are a lot of Mandaps on the way, where people can sit/sleep if over tired. So it wouldn’t be very difficult for anyone of any age to climb the hill