New year 2016 Drive

Its so refreshing to begin a new year by visiting a new place. It will definitely give you a new perspective. This time it is more special than the previous new year trips for primarily two reasons one, first time went on a trip with parents and second being the first time in the new car. For the past 5 years I have been on a multiple trips on every new year in bike and all the places I had been were coincidentally a place which had a connection with river Cauvery. The place we visited this time is a different place in its entirety. This is one of the most sought after place for architecture/monument/photography lovers and is located about 120 kms from Bangalore on Bangalore - Hyderabad highway. This has been on my list of places to visit for a long time and I am happy to have struck this off the list this new year. 

Lepakshi is a small town in Anantapur district, Andhra Pradesh, India which hosts the temple of Sri Veerabhadra Swamy and a giant monolithic Nandi (Bull) carved out of a single granite stone. The temple located here is built during Vijayanagar Empire dating back to 15th Century. There are a lot of resources already available in internet to know more about the history and the specialities of this temple. To name a few, the temple’s architecture, the paintings on the ceilings, an open air kalyana mantapa, Hanging pillar, Shivalinga surrounded by snake etc., We started from Kaggadasapura, Bangalore at around 1:15 PM and reached Lepakshi temple by about 3:45 PM. The entire stretch of roads were smooth and completely awesome. I must say this is one of the finest roads I have ever driven in the recent past. The route we took was Kaggadasapura –> Hebbal –> Hyderabad Highway (NH7). Once you cross Bagepalli toll plaza in NH 7, after about 4 KMs there are sign boards which points to left turn for Lepakshi. From here, its a narrow two way road that leads us to Lepakshi. This stretch of village road was also smooth, I was surprised to see that there were no bumpy spots in the roads. Just a few meters before reaching the main temple, you can spot the giant Nandi to your right. We went directly to the temple and on our way back ,we stopped at Nandi. 

Since it was the New Year’s day, there were a quite good crowd. I believe the normal weekends should have less people visiting this temple. I was little disappointed with the parking facilities there. Though you will be charged Rs.30/- to park your car, there is no sufficient car parking space or anyone to regulate the parking. I had to argue with a tempo traveller driver to get a space to park my car. The darshan was real quick, despite good crowd. Once we are done with darshan, we started immersing ourselves in the beauty of the architecture. Every pillar in the temple premises is having some or other carvings present in it. The main attraction is the hanging pillar, that hangs from the top. I was seriously awestruck to witness that. Though we reached the temple by late afternoon, no where we felt hot inside the temple, the floor was chill everywhere. One another thing that troubled me was the paintings present in the ceilings are already faded away. I felt, they need some serious renovation and maintenance to preserve them for some more years. We went around the entire premises and took a lot of photographs.

Nandi

  

          

Hanging pillar

         

All 3 Gopurams in the temple

                                                

        

Open Air Kalyana Mantapa

                                              

       

Faded paintings on the ceilings

        

       

   

We left from the temple by around 5:45 PM and stopped near Nandi statue, took some more photographs, had tea in the APTDC restaurant nearby and resumed our returned journey by around 6:30 PM. On the way back, stopped at Adyar Ananda Bhavan (A2B) located after airport to the left in a service lane, had dinner and reached back home by around 9:30 PM. Overall, this is a MUST visit place for anyone in Bangalore who is looking for a day trip and want to indulge yourselves in the mesmerizing beauty of the architecture and structures in the temple.

Trip in a nutshell :

Origin : Kaggadasapura, Bangalore

Destination : Lepakshi, Anantapur

Total distance (round trip) : 260 Kms

Route: Kaggadasapura –> Hebbal –> NH7 (Hyderabad highway) –> Bagepalli –> Left to Lepakshi and retraced back

Toll charges : Rs.240 (120 @devanahalli + 120 @bagepalli)

Throughout the route, there a lot of fuel stations available. So no need to worry about fuel :-)