Belum Caves, 1 day , 700kms.
This is a trip from 2007, dug up from the archives. I lost quite a few pics and videos from this trip when my laptop hard-disk crashed and only a few pics could be retrieved. Going on to the travelogue: Ever since I moved to Bangalore in 2001, I have been doing the Bangalore-Hyderabad route [...]
Hathi Singh Temple, Sidi Saiyyed Mosque & a Haveli in Ahmedabad.
Ever since I landed on the IIMA campus in April 2010, life has been mostly following a regular pattern. A normal day revolves around the classroom, dining hall, syndicate-room and the hostel-room… An occasional ‘highlight’ in the routine would be a visit to the Big Bazaar @ Himalaya mall. After stumbling through yet another hectic [...]
An incomplete guide to Hoysala temples ;-)
From the preface of the “Complete Guide to Hoysala temples” by Gerard Foekema: “For me, enjoying Later Calukya and Hoysala temples is one of the great pleasures of life. I love these temples because their plans are so logical and natural, because their architecture is so ingenious, and because their execution is so rich…" We [...]
A DIY (Damp It Yourself) story: DynaMat, FonoMat…Yoga-Mat ????
Normally I listen to music in my car with the volume set at ‘sane’ levels. But once in a while I get this urge to crank up the volume towards the ‘are you deaf?’ mark for a song or two. I don’t use a sub-woofer, but with a custom amp set-up and good speaker boxes, [...]
Havelis & Mosques – Ahmedabad old city
Sangeetha was in Ahmedabad during the weekend of 26th & 27th June 2010. That weekend, we took some time off to visit a couple of places in and around Ahmedabad. After covering Adalaj, Modhera, Patan and Sidhpur on the 26th (That is a seperate travelogue), we went around to see a few places in Ahmedabad [...]
Kadapa, Pushpagiri, Gurramkonda & Horsley hills.
We had just come back to Bangalore late on the night of 30th September 2009 after driving around for over a week in Tamilnadu and this trip was from the morning of 2nd Oct to the evening of 4th Oct… So two back to back trips. The main high-lights of this trip were visiting Pushpagiri [...]
Tirumala, Tiruchanoor, Vellore and Sripuram.
Parkinson’s Law goes something like "Work expands to fill up all available time" and so it had been for the last couple of months. With work often spilling over into the weekends, we had not gone out for any serious long drive after our Hoysala Temple trip in March 09. It was also around two [...]
7 days of driving around Karnataka – Temples, Hills, Forests, Caves, Ruins, Forts and Highways
The three of us returned on 2nd Jan after another wonderful road trip! [Sanjay, Sangeetha & Santro ] We started out at around 7.00am on the 27th of December and parked back at 10.30pm on 2nd Jan 09, making it a 7 day trip around Karnataka.. 7 days of sheer driving pleasure. Day 1 – [...]
The shore temples of Mahabalipuram
In early 2007, we had to go to Chennai over a weekend for a family function; this was the first time that me and Sangeetha were visiting Chennai together. After the function we had some time on hand and post lunch we headed out to Mahabalipuram, which is included in UNESCO’s list of World Heritage [...]
Chennai and Kanchipuram
There was a wedding in the family and plans were made for a trip to Chennai. Not being much of a crowd person, I did have second thoughts about joining in for the trip… but the temptation of a long drive on the GQ was too irresistible and I opted in. We left on the [...]
5am to 5am – Uchangidurga, Santhebennur, Shantisagara, Koolahalli, Bagali
Synopsis of the trip: Started from BLR at 5am on 2nd Aug 09. Returned to BLR at around 5am on 3rd Aug 09. Total distance covered on the Odo: 823kms Main places visited: Huchangidurga, Santhebennur, Shantisagara, Hallimallapura, Davanagere, Kulahalli & Bagali. With Sangeetha off to Chennai for a couple of days, I had planned to [...]
The MacLehose Trail – Hiking in Hong Kong
We were in Hong Kong & Macau during November – December 2011 as part of my IIMA PGPX exchange program with the China University of Hong Kong. While Googling around for interesting places to visit in and around Hong Kong, I came across the MacLehose Trail. Though the complete trail was out of question due [...]
Brahmagiri , Irpu falls – A trip and trek.
The trip/trek was done on the 8th Feb 09. Brahmagiri is a hill in the Western Ghats (1608 mts). It is situated in the Brahmagiri wildlife sanctuary on the border between Wayanad District of Kerala and Kodagu district of Karnataka. The Brahmagiri wildlife sanctuary is a restricted area, featuring a rich variety of wildlife including [...]
Belief – A trip to Kebre
“For those who believe, no proof is necessary. For those who don’t believe, no proof is possible."-Stuart Chase. A very good friend of mine underwent a brain surgery late last year. Though the tumor was removed, he has not recovered his vision even after 9 months. Initially the doctors were somewhat positive, saying that though [...]
The Elephant & the Tiger – Hathi Bhata & Ranthambore trip.
It was the 19th of December 2011. We had just come back from the big trip around Rajasthan. Vani & Aish had taken the flight back to Bangalore the previous evening. Sangeetha & me still had a few more days of vacations left and we scanned through our list of ‘must see places in Rajasthan’. [...]
Kotilingeshwara – A quick little trip.
On the 30th of March 2008, we were returning back to Bangalore from a family trip to Chittoor. Since we had started our return journey quite early in the morning, we were quite ahead of schedule and were driving back at a very liesurely pace. On a couple of earlier trips along this route, we [...]
Trainspotting at Dudhsagar.
A quick little travelogue – This was not a ‘Xing’ drive, but a TT-trip & a weekend trek. We started from Bangalore at around 8.30pm on the evening of 6th Nov 09 and came back into Bangalore at around 5.30am on the morning of Monday the 9th Nov 09. Trip outline: Trek to Dudhsagar falls: [...]
Adalaj, Modhera, Patan & Sidhpur – Vav, vav – Wow!
* Vav = ‘Step-well’ in Gujarati. Once upon a time, when Doordarshan was the only channel on TV, I had seen a Gujarati movie on a Sunday afternoon. It was Ketan Mehta’s "Bhavni Bhavai"- starring Naseeruddin Shah & Smita Patil. Based on a Gujarati folk tale, some significant scenes from the movie were shot in [...]
The Bhoot bungalow trip – ACMCC Trip II
The last time around I had a Bhoot Bungalow experience was in June 2009 when Sangeetha and I went for a trek into the core area of the Parambikulam wildlife sanctuary in Tamilnadu. Since it was right in the middle of the monsoons, camping in the open was ruled out and we had to spend [...]
Newcastle, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Highforce waterfalls.
These are a few photos from a trip to the UK in 2004. I was in Newcastle for a couple of months with my team, working on a P&G project. We did manage to get some time off from our hectic schedule to do some sightseeing in and around Newcastle. Unfortunately this was a trip [...]
